[Sca-cooks] OT/OOP From today's NY Times Food section...

[Vitaliano Vincenzi]

No, it's about me. :)

As I read through this I kept saying "Yes, that's me" about every 10 
seconds. Yes, I am the MALE Alpha cook in my kitchen - just ask my wife.

Phil Troy / G. Tacitus Adamantius wrote:
> I swear, this is not about me...
> 
> Adamantius
> 
> 
>> February 14, 2007
>>
>> He Cooks. She Stews. It’s Love.
>>
>> By KATHERINE WHEELOCK
>> YOLANDA EDWARDS was at a friend’s house in Brooklyn for dinner when  
>> the hostess asked her to pull out a pot for boiling pasta. Ms.  
>> Edwards froze. As her friend looked at her in disbelief, she said  
>> she was not up to the job.
>>
>> “I used to think I was a good cook,” said Ms. Edwards, an editor at  
>> the parenting magazine Cookie. “But my husband’s a kitchen bully.  
>> He’s so critical, I second-guess myself now.”
>>
>> If there were a clinical diagnosis for her problem, it might be  
>> called beta cook disorder. Even though Ms. Edwards blithely  
>> prepared flank steak for dinner parties when she was in college,  
>> she is now married to someone who takes charge in the kitchen: an  
>> alpha cook.
>>
>> “I have no problem admitting that I’m an alpha,” said her husband,  
>> Matthew Hranek, a photographer. “Yolanda wouldn’t know a corked  
>> bottle of wine if you put it in front of her. When we met, she had  
>> four days’ worth of dishes in her sink, most of which had what  
>> looked like black bean on them. Ever since then, I’ve cooked for her.”
>>
>> True, life with an alpha cook can mean sitting back and watching  
>> while someone else prepares restaurant-quality wild mushroom  
>> risotto on a quiet Tuesday night.
>>
>> But it can also mean putting up with small culinary humiliations  
>> and an unending patter of condescending remarks.
>>
>> When Robin Henry, an interior designer, helps make dinner with her  
>> fiancé, Andrew Goldman, a writer, she endures his constant,  
>> conspicuous scrutiny.
>>
>> “I’ll be standing there, sautéing onions, and I can feel him  
>> standing over my shoulder, staring down at the pot and gnashing his  
>> teeth,” Ms. Henry said. “He’ll say things like, ‘You should really  
>> turn that down now.’ ”
>>
>> Ms. Henry relayed this — along with her feeling that she is  
>> expected to greet any meal he might make on an average weeknight  
>> with the equivalent of a marching band reception — with affection.
>>
>> “It’s part of his charm,” she said. Like many betas, she seems to  
>> have made peace with her lower status. The only time bitterness  
>> crept into her voice was when she talked about the tasks her fiancé  
>> assigns her when she plays sous-chef.
>>
>> “He’s like, ‘Great, yes, come cook with me.’ And then he gives me  
>> the take-the-chicken-out-of-the-package-and-rinse-it job,” she said.
>>
>> “I am like that,” Mr. Goldman agreed. “I wouldn’t blame Robin if  
>> she didn’t want to cook with me. I’ve caught myself. It’s not so  
>> much me telling her she’s doing something wrong. I think it’s just  
>> that she catches my glances.”
>>
>> It was a nice fantasy while it lasted: rather than letting the lady  
>> of the house bear the constant burden of cooking dinner, the modern  
>> couple would share the work. Husbands would take an interest in  
>> casseroles. Wives would slap slabs of meat on the grill. They would  
>> read cookbooks and watch the Food Network together. The kitchen  
>> would be a peaceful domain equally ruled by two people.
>>
>> For many couples, this never happened. Instead, wedged there in the  
>> kitchen together, they fell into a power dynamic just as unequal  
>> and emotionally fraught as the arrangement that puts the female  
>> half in a frilly apron. Instead of a partnership, some couples say  
>> that their relationship in the kitchen more closely resembles a  
>> tiny dictatorship.
>>
>> This, of course, is the way it works in restaurants, where the  
>> chef’s authority is nearly absolute. It is somebody else’s job to  
>> peel the carrots. And that person is expected to peel the carrots  
>> without muttering bitterly under his breath. The top-down system  
>> helps to avoid chaos, speeds the process and enforces quality  
>> control. But at home that same system can have emotional consequences.
>>
>> Suzanne Goin, the chef and owner of A.O.C. and Lucques in Los  
>> Angeles, is married to David Lentz, the chef and owner of the  
>> Hungry Cat in Hollywood. They are both alpha cooks, she said, but  
>> that has only been an issue on their nights off.
>>
>> “In a professional kitchen you don’t really get your feelings  
>> hurt,” Ms. Goin said. “It’s a little different at home though. If  
>> David says, ‘Do you think this is a little salty?’ about something  
>> I made, I’ll be like: ‘No. Do you think it’s too salty? Maybe your  
>> palate’s off.’ ”
>>
>> Rebecca Charles, the chef and owner of Pearl Oyster Bar in  
>> Greenwich Village and an admitted alpha, said: “Giving orders is  
>> fine in a professional environment, but at home it’s a little  
>> inappropriate. I can be a little bossy. Resentment can build, and  
>> before you know it you have a pot flying at your head and you don’t  
>> know why. Couples cooking together is probably the second leading  
>> cause of divorce next to home renovations.”
>>
>> Statistical evidence does not back her up, but therapists are all  
>> too familiar with marriages that run aground in the kitchen. “If  
>> there’s a power struggle, it will come out in cooking together,”  
>> said Dr. Marion F. Solomon, a couples therapist in Los Angeles. “If  
>> a person feels that they’re not recognized for their abilities in  
>> other areas, they can start to resent the partner who takes control  
>> in the kitchen.”
>>
>> But couples who embrace their culinary inequality can still find  
>> happiness, Dr. Solomon said.
>>
>> A year and a half ago, before marrying, Armistead Wilson, a teacher  
>> in Nashville, went to premarital counseling with her future  
>> husband, Edwin. It was there that she realized she felt guilty  
>> about letting Mr. Wilson do all the cooking.
>>
>> “The counselor said I should just let it go,” Ms. Wilson said. “I  
>> did. And I’m happier for it. The only time I get even slightly  
>> frustrated now is when I’m excited about making something and he  
>> takes it over on the sly by showing me a better chopping technique,  
>> or by demonstrating how to flip an omelet in the pan. But I’m sure  
>> many meals have been saved by this intrusion.”
>>
>> Dr. Solomon said that a couple can enjoy playing student and  
>> teacher in the kitchen “if one person doesn’t feel capable and the  
>> other loves to be a mentor.”
>>
>> That situation sounds dreamy, but many beta cooks say that the  
>> alphas in their lives are not the most patient tutors. Amy Sedaris,  
>> author of “I Like You: Hospitality Under the Influence,” says that  
>> whenever alphas and betas cook together, the alpha’s internal  
>> monologue goes something like this: “Stop bothering me with your  
>> questions. I don’t have time to show you how to chop an onion. If  
>> you can’t chop an onion, get out of my kitchen.”
>>
>> Derek LaVallee, the wine columnist for The Hill, a Congressional  
>> newspaper, and a public relations executive in Washington, was only  
>> slightly more delicate with his wife, Vanessa. Mr. LaVallee loves  
>> to cook, and when they were first married, Ms. LaVallee thought  
>> that sharing his hobby with him might be fun. After all, before  
>> they were married the two had happily shared a tiny office in the  
>> Clinton White House.
>>
>> It turned out that working in the White House was easier. “I can’t  
>> watch her cook,” Mr. LaVallee said. “I’d say things like, ‘I can’t  
>> believe you’re julienning the carrots that way!’ And then I’d  
>> think, ‘Did that really just come out of your mouth?’ ”
>>
>> Ms. LaVallee, the adviser to the president of Georgetown  
>> University, now chooses to sit on the sideline with a glass of  
>> wine. The subject of cooking rarely comes up, except when the  
>> couple watch “Iron Chef.”
>>
>> “She’ll say: ‘See? They work together. He delegates,’ ” Mr.  
>> LaVallee said. “And I’ll say, ‘Honey, if I had a team of  
>> professional chefs working for me I’d be happy to delegate.’ ”
>>
>> There is evidence that alphas and betas are not born that way.  
>> Occasionally, somebody will live happily as a second-class kitchen  
>> citizen for years, only to emerge as a fully capable cook after the  
>> relationship ends. Lettie Teague, an editor at Food & Wine  
>> magazine, said she was content in her role as the beta in her  
>> marriage to the food writer Alan Richman. “I lived a beta cook’s  
>> life because Alan was so much the better cook,” she said. “I was  
>> the alpha cleaner. Sometimes I would clean up around him.”
>>
>> Since they separated last year Ms. Teague has found herself cooking  
>> more, especially for company. And she is realizing what she might  
>> have been missing as keeper of the Palmolive. Guests don’t ask, Who  
>> got this silverware so shiny? With one hand on their belly, they  
>> praise the alpha. “There is huge ego gratification in making a good  
>> dinner,” Ms. Teague said.
>>
>> If there was inequality in the Richman-Teague kitchen, it left no  
>> apparent scars. The two remain friendly. “Long-term problems are  
>> caused by money and things like that,” Mr. Richman said. “Fights  
>> over cooking only cause loathing between couples for two to four  
>> days.” He did add, though, that when there is a male alpha in the  
>> kitchen, there’s very little anyone can do to alter the dynamic.
>>
>> “Men have gotten better at cooking, and that’s all positive,” Mr.  
>> Richman said. “But men can’t share. If you can find a man who’s  
>> O.K. with a woman being in charge in the kitchen, tell any woman to  
>> marry him immediately.”
>>
>> So, over time, an embattled beta will find ways to level the  
>> playing field, ways that do not involve wresting the meat  
>> thermometer from the alpha’s hand. This is the case with Ms.  
>> Edwards, who may have lost the ability to choose a pasta pot when  
>> put on the spot, but who has carved out a particular position of  
>> power of her own.
>>
>> For one, she makes oatmeal and eggs that her 3-year-old daughter  
>> prefers to anything her husband cooks.
>>
>> She also discovered the beta’s best weapon, and the secret to  
>> living with an alpha cook: criticism. An alpha is nothing without a  
>> beta.
>>
>> “I couldn’t strive to be good without her,” said Mr. Hranek, her  
>> husband. “If she’s not happy with the food, I’m devastated.”
> 
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-- 
Lord Vitaliano Vincenzi
aka Shane Lambert
http://www.periodfood.blogspot.com