The first meal that I cooked for Susan when we were courting in medical school was beef tongue and chicken Pipian. My chicken Pipian was a Plan B move in case she didn’t like tongue. As it turned out, she was a big fan of tongue, and the Pipian was just an added treat.
I think that it was around the same time that she cooked a Quiche Lorraine for me. I had never had quiche before – despite being (or at least believing myself) a real man. Not all of our dates were about food, but cooking did play an important role in our courtship. The unspoken message was, “If you settle down with me, I can cook good food for you.”
Young men and women on the prowl for a mate would do well to learn to cook. Our son did and managed to find a suitable mate.
Since those early, romantic days, we have enjoyed Quiche Lorraine four or more times a year. These days, we buy the pre-baked tart at the Central Market; take it home to cook in the oven and serve it at dinner. We buy a standard size tart to share with dinner guests, and I select what I call a unit dose quiche when it is just the two of us at dinner.
Dinner this evening was a unit dose quiche with a Ceasar’s (et tu, Brutus) salad. It was a tasty yet low effort meal that transported both of us to earlier years.
Such a sweet story. I remember John Kelso writing a column about “cheese pie,” an alternate name for quiche so “real men” would eat it?
Yep, and that was what I intended in my “real man” comment. 🙂