The Ironic Chef (Lynn Kerstan)

Every year at this time, a peculiar madness takes possession of my senses. Never mind a lifetime of abysmal failures. Forget those expensive lessons learned the hard way. Floating on a meringue of optimism, I enter my personal Hall of Shame–the kitchen–and endeavor to cook.

Supermarket come-ons have a lot to do with this . Who can resist a $5 turkey? A $10 ham? The soups and stews made with leftovers? The prospect of a freezer full of sandwich makings? I can’t. And I didn’t.

You should understand that I don’t have an oven in any conventional sense. This one, I believe, was a prototype rejected by Ben Franklin on his way to inventing the stove. Suspended above a cook-top, which has its own food-fatal problems, is an ancient, avocado-colored box just large enough to hold a 10-pound turkey. What it does to the turkey, or anything else consigned to its maw, is overcook (read "burn") the outside while leaving the inside underdone (raw).

At separate times, my turkeys came naked out of their wrappers, were inserted into the firehole, and emerged as turkey jerky. Carving required the human equivalent of a power saw and prayer. When I offered the cat some nibbles, he gave them a sniff and turned up his snoot.

I, however, am not so persnickety. No teeth were broken during the turkey-with-gravy or the turkey soup phases. As for the many sandwiches to come, let’s just say they’ll be chewy.

On to the ham. It set the oven on fire. Literally.

That ham was doomed from the get-go. When I couldn’t find the loss-leader spiral-cut hams at Ralph’s, a store person pointed me to a bin with a few straggler hams snuggled next to some chickens. It was a couple weeks later, after cutting myself trying to punch through the net and plastic casings, that I discovered the ham wasn’t spiral-cut, or any other kind of cut. Nor was it precooked, like all the hams I have ever bought. Too late to take it back, so I’d have to do the cooking and the slicing. Grumbling, I stuck the dratted thing in the oven.

A few minutes later, while cleaning up the mess and bandaging my finger, I heard popping sounds coming from the oven. Turning, I saw it lit up inside like a Red Dawn. The glass door is encrusted with about 50 years' worth of ineradicable glop, so I couldn’t see the ham at all.

For a time I just stood there, gazing blankly at the fireworks. Eventually, it occurred to me that the oven might explode or something, so I backed away. Edged forward again to turn the knob to Off. Good idea, Lynn! That should do the trick.

Nope. Fire and popping went on for a considerable time. Figuring that oxygen would fuel the flames and lack of it would smother the fire, I didn’t open the door. Not that the rickety oven door was airtight. But eventually things calmed down inside, so I grabbed a broom and, keeping myself at a possibly safe distance, used the broom handle to lever the door open.

No flames came shooting out. I edged closer, expecting to find a large lump of coal where my ham should be. But it wasn’t as black as I’d expected. In fact, the ham looked fairly normal, given a conflagration. It was the pan, formerly non-stick, that took the real hit. The oven looked the same as always–not that it could have looked worse. And the pilot light was still lit. Aha! A second chance.

I sealed the ham and pan with heavy-duty foil, closed the oven door, and lit the rockets. Well, turned the knob to 325 degrees. But I couldn’t be sure what would happen in there. Maybe lift-off.

Luck sat on my shoulder. Two hours later, out came a marginally edible ham. For me, that’s practically a James Beard cooking award. The next day, I used the bone to make ham and beans. The meat itself is fairly tasty. Even the cat has deigned to nibble at it. Tonight, I had a ham, cheese, and avocado sandwich for supper.

And this afternoon, I bought another ham. Spiral-cut. Bought another pan, too. Will doubtless acquire another turkey within the week. T’is the season of cheap meat, and on 02 January, it’s back to a month or two of a low-carb diet.

Make that three months. Did I mention the tub of triple-ginger cookies I bought at Trader Joe’s? By now, you can understand why I don’t bake my own.