I love food: fancy food, foreign food, even junk food. Over the past few years, I have managed to translate my love of food into a love of cooking. However, as much as I love cakes and cookies and breads, I have not developed a love for baking. Lauran doesn’t understand it. She says that a bachelor’s degree in biochemistry, baking should be easy for me. Just follow the recipe carefully and measure precisely.

I guess she just forgets about all the stories I have told her about my lab disasters. Once when I was teaching AP Chemistry, I botched a demonstration because I boiled packaging material instead of the aromatic compounds that I was supposed to use. I now know that cardboard chips do not have any particularly interesting chemical or physical properties. They certainly smell nothing like wintergreen or citrus fruits.

The problem is that following a list of instructions and carefully measuring exact amounts never really appealed to me, which is probably why I ended up getting my master’s degree in English instead of Biochemistry. I prefer to improvise and experiment. Baking just bores me. Furthermore, baking disasters aren’t nearly as exciting as cooking disasters. I speak from experience.

I have had several baking disasters: bread that didn’t rise, cakes that caved in, frosting that was too hard, cookie bars that never cooked through, to name a few. None of that compares to the time my friend nearly burned down my apartment trying to make chicken fried steak. Now that is a disaster worth remembering. My dog is still traumatized by smoke detectors and always keeps a safe distance when we are cooking (unless we drop something). If you are going to mess something up, shouldn’t the mistake be spectacular?

Baking reminds me too much of this biochemistry lab I took my senior year of college. Every week, we would show up in the morning, place some chemicals in a machine and wait for a graph to print out. The chemicals changed every week (at least that’s what the TA claimed), but the process was always the same. Baking is redundant. The ingredients almost always involve some variation of flour, salt, butter, eggs and sugar. You always have to mix them in the same specific order. You always use the same equipment. (I don’t even attempt baking without the mixer we got as a wedding present.) You stick them in the oven and wait to be disappointed.

However, cooking is always a new experience: braising, broiling, boiling, frying, sautéing, grilling, simmering, stewing, blending, chopping, slicing, dicing. There are an abundance of herbs and spices to choose from: basil, oregano, rosemary, curry, cumin, coriander, cinnamon, nutmeg, cloves, sage, saffron, cilantro, thyme, parsley, lemongrass, paprika, and of course garlic, plenty of garlic. International cooking creates infinitely more possibilities and room for experimentation. Just last night, we made samosas using Tupperware empanada-makers.

Cooking also requires little precision. I rarely use measuring spoons anymore. I almost always end up substituting ingredients or adding something the recipe didn’t call for. And don’t even get me started on my own cooking disasters. My arm still gets a tinge of soreness when I think about cooking risotto on the stovetop. I exploded a casserole dish once because I thought it was a Dutch oven. Now that is a spectacular mistake.

People often ask me why I now teach English instead of chemistry. Today I am going to teach students how to take notes for a research paper. Tomorrow I am going to help them analyze poems by William Wordsworth and Dylan Thomas. Last week, we studied satire, and next week we study a short story. And literary disasters are the best kind. Of course, check back in with me when I have a stack of papers to grade.

One Response to “Why I teach English, not Chemistry”

1. Sara Laroya Says:
   February 9th, 2010 at 11:34 pm

   For the record, I was IN the lab where we used packaging material, and no, packaging material did not exhibit aromatic properties. lol.

   I would like to add to the baking thing that not only is it extremely time consuming and precise, but it also makes a big mess. Cookies for example, you need one bowl for the wet ingredients, one bowl for the dry ingredients, you need an electric mixer (or a man with a good arm. lol)for the wet ingredients, a wisk for the dry ingredients, THEN you need the cookie sheets to bake them, and if you’re really extreme, a cooling rack to cool them on, and then probably tupperware to store them. That’s how many dishes for a snack? Cooking on the other hand: Pan, cutting board, knife, spatula: DONE.

   Just thought I’d add a perspective from a woman who is often responsible for doing dishes.

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