The Oven
Last week, Josh walked into the kitchen while I was taking care of ordering stuff for the bathroom renovation. “Our oven clock is out. No. Wait. Our oven is out.” The burners on the stove top would turn on, but the oven itself remained cold.
Shit.
We had to get to the Yayoi Kusama exhibit (really, the timing of it made me think that the universe reeeeeeeeeeally didn’t want me to see this installation), but my parents saved the day by running to the store to look at the oven we wanted and even ordered it for us so it would be delivered the next day. (Thank you, Mommy and Daddy.)
All was going to be fine.
Except the first oven they delivered ran abnormally hot. Like we flipped the burner on low and then turned it off 5 seconds later. And 10 minutes after that, it was still too hot to hold our hand over the burner. The store agreed this was likely a fire hazard and delivered a second oven the next day.
Great.
But here’s the thing… I make up most of my recipes, and the temperatures are all estimated because (1) I designed these recipes on a 24-year-old oven that didn’t work very well and (2) the numbers weren’t very clear on the knob so in my head I said things like: “You bake the bread at a generous twisting of the dial.” It probably would have been a smart idea to buy an oven thermometer and test the temperatures BEFORE the oven died. But I didn’t, which means that I’ve spent the last week guessing on things.
My first challah was a little burned on the bottom. But my chocolate chip cookies (that was my biggest recipe fear — the inability to recreate my cookies) turned out fine. I learned that I bake them at 350 degrees. Who knew?
This was the last piece of the old kitchen. Everything (well, except the floor) has been replaced. It was bittersweet to see it go. I folded my hands over the oven’s door handle and talked to it before the delivery guys took it away. “Thanks, friend, for being such a great oven for so many years.” I like to think that the oven knew — even in its dormant state — that love.
I’m not the only one who speaks to inanimate objects, right?
11 comments
You are not the only person who speaks to inanimate objects! Especially something like an oven for people who love cooking and creating for people they care about. I understand, and so did your oven in its dormant state.
Well, I don’t speak to my oven, but other inanimate objects…
And then I came across this today…
https://qz.com/935832/why-do-people-name-their-plants-cars-ships-and-guitars-anthropomorphism-may-actually-signal-social-intelligence/?utm_source=nextdraft&utm_medium=email
Not alone. Our car is named Lenny.
I speak to many inanimate objects. Mostly at work the monitors, beds and IV pumps that beep and squawk at me. Some things around the house too such as my appliances the sing to me.
Hope you enjoy the new oven once you get acquainted with it.
You and that oven made some amaaaaayzingly yummy things together. I bet you and our new oven will be in synch before you know it. Especially now that we know it understand the sacredness of the cookie.
You are not. I still talk to our 15+-year-old fridge, begging it to stay strong.
You’re definitely not the only one!
And we have a Yayoi Kusama exhibit here at the Phoenix Art Museum. (This one: http://www.phxart.org/fireflies) We can go when you come visit me! 😉
I don’t talk to objects but I do talk to my food as I’m preparing it and putting it into the oven/pot/pan what you.
“Okay little pot roast, you are going to taste so good with this sprinkle of oregano and some garlic cloves!” “Listen soufflé, I don’t like you and you don’t like me but this dinner is going to be perfect anyway!!”
Stuff like that.
I’ve never owned an oven, so I never got attached to one. That makes me sad somehow.
Not the oven, but definitely the car. 😉 I had to get used to all new appliances when we moved, so I can sympathize. I’m still not sure how certain features of our oven work. It’s a lot more high-tech than the one we left behind at our old house… which was the oven we bought when we moved in, 26 years earlier. Coil elements, etc. I had to get one of the knobs fixed a few years earlier, and replace the oven light bulb, but otherwise it was in mint condition and still going strong. Our buyers were awful people, and I secretly hope it gave out on them shortly after they moved in. ;p 😉