We learn through our mis-steps

Blogging is a curious thing, isn't it? In a world that is increasingly reliant on technology (email, cell phones, computers, GPS sytems), it's easy to feel disconnected from one another. We spend less face to face time and more time playing with our various gadgets. But technology also can allow us to connect with people we might not otherwise encounter.
I remember when blogs first became popular: they served as more of an online personal diary and method of confession than anything else, and certainly there are blogs whose primary function is still to do that. But there are also the blogs that you find that make you feel understood, less alone, more normal.

Right after I discovered that I shouldn't eat gluten, I went through the grief stages of mourning my usual lunches and dinners. I became an avid ingredients reader, and tried some variations of recipes that turned out abysmally (DONT try to use an all purpose GF flour with your normal pizza dough recipe... needs some tweaking to come out edible!). In a search for gluten free dining, I stumbled across Gluten Free Girl's blog (and have included a link here). I was hooked after reading the first entry. She's got Celiac's Disease and her sweetie pie is a chef (!). She loves food and the way she writes about the joy, the passion that surrounds food reminds me of me. She also happens to be a very good writer and is a joy to read.

Her recipes have excited me (and I can't wait to try a few out this weekend), and reading about her exploits has reminded me that there are many, many people out there with food allergies, and there are many many recipe options.

I know that one of my biggest challenges to overcome is not in finding gluten free foods I can eat, but in experimenting with recipes. I tell my friends that no one is perfect (indeed, I told The Chiro that when we first started dating and he mentioned that he thought I was perfect for him), and yet I still don't want to make any mistakes. It seems that much worse when someone else witnesses my mistakes, but if I am afraid to play, then however will I learn?

This is a theme that comes up in my dancing as well. I have advanced through the ranks quite quickly, and yet still find flaws I want to iron out. I don't think we ever stop learning, but I have always tended to play it too cautiously.

Last week, I decided to experiment (with said GF flour and making pizza dough). I cooked some chicken breasts with herbed sea salt, summer savory, thyme, oregano and dill and then diced the breasts. I rolled out the pizza dough onto my stoneware and sprinkled olive oil over the crust. I chopped 3 fresh cloves of garlic and spread these over the crust as well and then spread shredded mozzarella and fresh baby spinach leaves of the top of this. I added the cubed chicken pieces, some sliced black olives and some crumbled feta and baked it forever.
The resulting pizza was... passable. The toppings were REALLY good (must remember what I did to the chicken!) The crust was dry, tasteless and slightly gritty from the garbonzo and fava beans in the flour mix. The most depressing thing about this whole experiment is that I spent $23 and 2 1/2 hours making this pizza, when I could have gone to papa murphys and gotten their herbed chicken Mediterranean pizza and just not eaten the dough (savings: $15 and 2 hours, includes drive time). Ah well, I know better now.

On her website, Shauna (the Gluten Free girl) mentions that Whole foods has an awesome gluten free pizza crust.
I shall have to try that next time I want to experiment.

There is a certain element to cooking that is like an elaborate dance. Like the form of tribal bellydance that I've been learning, much of cooking is improvisational. Oh sure, you have your rough guidelines (recipes, utensils, etc) but there is a certain grace to someone who is at ease in the kitchen, a flow to their movements.

As my 29th birthday approaches, I wish for myself the confidence to experiment, to takes risks, to play, and to learn. Afterall, as I keep reminding my friends, there is no failure: only feedback!