Meals became a chore – planning, shopping, cooking – in a tiring loop of obligation and frustration. I’ve been busy and have had other things on my plate – sometimes a girl just wants to get fed and move along. It felt a little like writer’s block, or how some people describe losing interest in physical affection. I was beginning to wonder if I was all right, if all of my essential parts were still intact and in order. I am and they are, of course, and I can write that not only because I have recently had a satisfying experience in the kitchen, but also because I know that one bad stretch in the kitchen does not an existential crisis make.

Our first dinner was soba noodles, shrimp and sautéed veggies. It was just plain good, and warm, and easy. Right away I reverted back to the practice of ducking down to look at the flame when adjusting the setting. The water for the noodles came to a boil faster. Shaking the sauté pan back and forth over the grate felt both sublime and comfortingly familiar.

On the afternoon of Day Two, at about the time I usually begin to think about eating, I was cranky. It was a general sort of dissatisfaction about the state of things, owing in part to this lingering winter-ish weather, the understocked nature of my pantry, and the list of phone calls I am putting off making on account of my not liking to make phone calls one itsy little bit. I walked into the kitchen to take stock. I was determined to cook something worth eating. That sort of a project would, at least, certainly keep me busy until it was too late to make the calls. And maybe it would feel good, too.

The pasta machine I recently inherited from a friend was sitting, unexplored, on the dining room table. I took it out of its box, surprised at its heft, pleased by its shine. Today, I decided, would be the day I’d make fresh pasta for the first time. I assembled the pasta machine, clamped it to my dining room table, and pulled Alice Waters from the bookshelf. In The Art of Simple Food, Alice concedes that the prospect of making fresh pasta can be intimidating, but, she writes, “I assure you, it is surprisingly easy.” Thankfully, I required no more encouragement than that.

Unlike other pasta recipes I’ve seen, Alice’s calls for only flour and eggs. No oil, no salt, no squid ink. It’s the simple food thing, and I love it. Having settled on the pasta, at once I saw my dinner plate: the pasta would have fresh basil in it, and atop the noodles would sit a piece of broiled salmon, snap peas, leeks, and red bell pepper. I’d squeeze lemon over the whole lot. This happens sometimes when I am fixing to cook: the plate comes into focus all at once and all I must do is execute the vision. Forgive me for using such overdone language to describe my inspiration, but when it hasn’t happened in so, so long, it’s really quite the thrill.

I flew the nest for the market – the good market, where the vegetables aren’t wilted and I trust the seafood – and returned within thirty minutes to our teeny tiny kitchen.

The pasta was easy – so much easier than I expected it would be. I read Alice’s recipe, I followed her directions, and everything came out great. If only all cookbooks were so successful. Fresh pasta goes like this (and you can download the recipe from the sidebar!): Blend up two egg yolks and two eggs, just beat them with a fork for a minute. I added about a quarter of a cup of minced fresh basil to the eggs. Next, measure two cups of unbleached all-purpose flour. The unbleached part is important to the final texture and flavor of the finished product. Alice says that bleached flour makes pasta gummier, and I believe her. Put the flour into large bowl. Make a mound, and then a depression (well) in the center. Pour the egg mixture into this well. To mix the dough, use your fingers or a fork, and then knead a few times on a lightly-floured surface to create a supple, well-incorporated dough. I added a few sprinkles of water, as my dough was rather crumbly. Alice said that might happen. Divide the dough in half, and form each half into a disc. Wrap both discs tightly in plastic and let rest, at room temperature, for at least one hour. This rest gives the gluten in the flour some time to relax – it will be much easier to stretch, roll, and cut in the machine after the siesta. Once the dough has rested, pass it through the pasta machine opened to its widest setting. Fold in thirds, and pass through again. Repeat twice, or until dough is shiny and smooth. Continue to pass dough through the machine, gradually decreasing the space between rollers until desired thinness is achieved. Cut to desired shape and length.

I hung the cut pasta on the backs of my dining room chairs while I prepared the rest of the dish. Everything else was as simple as can be – cooked to highlight the flavors of the remaining ingredients with minimal fuss. The salmon received sprinklings of sea salt and black pepper. I broiled the fish until it was cooked through and then squeezed a lemon over it. At the same time on the top of the stove, I cooked the noodles (they only took about five minutes) and sautéed julienne of leek, thinly sliced red bell pepper, and snow peas in olive oil and a little bit of butter until they were soft, but not overcooked. The whole lot was thrown onto plates, received another splash of lemon juice, and was delivered to the table. Had the smoke alarm not gone off twice, I dare say it would have been a transcendent culinary experience.

I think it would be unwise to make some booming announcement that The Slump has straightened out. There will be others, as I have so many more meals to cook in the next decades than I have made in the last ones – it is bound to get frustrating again. But on that first night, over soba noodles, The Squeeze and I decided that we will always have a gas stove. It isn’t, of course, that our new cooktop is wonderful enough to turn a disinterested person into an enthusiastic cook, though the difference, for those inclined to care about such things, is remarkable. It is one thing to know that gas cooking feels better, works better, and is more efficient. It is another to stand in front of a lit burner, worrying that you’ll catch your apron on fire, and watch the lit gas lick the bottom of the saucepan. The thrill is genuine, and so long as the excitement lasts, this cook is gonna ride it.

Tonight, I am going to invent some ravioli, also virgin territory. I have ideas for a spinach/onion/pinenut arrangement, and also a sweet potato-ginger filling. I worry that, like the cheese-less enchiladas of ’06, these will be “interesting” rather than “very tasty.” Still, I am excited to try, and happy that the prospect of cooking is no longer intimidating. I assure you, it is surprisingly easy.

The house that I purchased about 18 months ago came with an electric flattop range in its itty bitty kitchen. They say that most real estate decisions are emotionally-driven – since the kitchen is in the rear of the house, I saw all of the rest of it and fell in love before I made it into the tiny galley with the flattop stove. During the sale, I asked the previous owner, a contractor, how difficult it would be to plumb the kitchen for gas. He said it would be easy enough for me to do, and then went ahead and did the work before handing over the keys. Nice fellow, that one.

At first, I thought that I would buy a gas range during my first week in residence. I had been cooking with gas in my last apartment and was not interested in making the painful switch back to electric “fire.” But, alas, after buying a new bed, curtains, and a bunch of other unexpected nesting items, I just couldn’t get excited about dropping any more cash, on anything. I became accustomed to my electric flattop, started using its smooth surface as extra workspace, pushed the luxury of cooking over a flame out of my head and told myself that so long as the flattop worked, I would use it.

When The Squeeze moved in last year, I started thinking about it again. He appreciates the flame/coil distinction. Months ticked by however, the range still hovering midway up my to-do list, and never gaining any ground.

Then yesterday I clicked over to the appliance page of my neighborhood big-box home improvement warehouse. The Squeeze glanced at my computer screen after delivering a kiss to my forehead and, knowing what I was daydreaming about, said, “Let’s just go look at them.” Surprisingly, it didn’t take any more than that to get me looking for my shoes.

I joked that I ought to leave my wallet at home so that I didn’t accidentally buy a range. He said that the store might be having some great, impossible-to-pass-up promotion and, lo, that is just how it went; and now I am waiting at home, one ear listening for the delivery guy.

I accidentally bought a gas range yesterday, and I am really excited about it. I have been in a rather awful culinary slump this winter (have you noticed?) and it could be that rediscovering flame cooking will be just the thing to get my head back into it. Gas cooking is more even than electric – there are no cool spots on the burner, for one thing. On a gas stovetop, my entire 13″ cast iron skillet will heat evenly, instead of just the seven inches in the center. I like the clicking noise that gas burners make just before ignition, and I love the whooshing sound when the fuel catches fire. I like adjusting the temperature by sight, and the knowledge that I could very well just set myself aflame if I’m not careful.

I suppose I should have accidentally bought a fire extinguisher too.

I was going to make a cake. I was going to make a cake for my Squeeze’s birthday, the first of his birthdays that I will spend with him. I felt I had a precedent to establish, and that the bar would need to be set high. Stick with me, my confection would boast on my behalf, and you will be given a wild sugar high with every passing year. Or something. When I began two days ago I felt as nervous as I had before the first dinner I cooked for him. During our courtship, I advertised myself as a cook and baker and when it came time to walk that talk, it felt important to prove that I was the real thing. The dinner was an unqualified success. This cake, I assumed, would be one also.

I was. so. wrong.

• Here’s what I imagined:
• • Chocolate buttermilk sheet cake: dense and intensely cocoa-flavored, sticky and moist.
• • Coffee buttercream filling: sweet, fluffy buttercream with a light but obvious coffee flavor.
• • Shiny chocolate ganache glaze: nothing more than cream and chocolate melted together and slowly poured over the whole lot, creating a smooth case around the whole cake.

I have tested recipes for each component. I have made this combination before. I would, I imagined, take something I already knew to be good, execute each piece flawlessly, and make a really, really great birthday cake. When I set down with my a.m. coffee in my favorite mug, I felt unstoppable. I was about to use my baking to put my baking to shame. This cake would be Love in sugar form.

I couldn’t find the cocoa buttermilk cake recipe. I looked in all of my files, called my mother, rifled through my cookbook library. When the recipe could not be conjured, I considered panic but then instead thought, fantastic! This is the hiccup! I’ll get over this small speedbump and then proceed unencumbered towards greatness! I have always admired optimism in the face of doom.

I searched around the trusty Internet and found a similar recipe to audition, expecting to make at least two batches (one to test and one to adjust) before generating a satisfactory result. I was disappointed that my recipe could not be found, but decided to cheerily press on and make the best of it. A lot of what happens in the kitchen is making the best of it.

I put the cake together and into the oven in nothing flat, spreading the batter out in a half-sized jelly roll pan so that I could punch circles out for each layer instead of having to slice a cylinder crosswise, which isn’t nearly as easy to do as it looks . Even as a raw batter, I recognized the cake as unacceptably flawed. It would be too spongy and not sufficiently chocolatey, but easily amended in the second batch. Once I’d scribbled some notes over the recipe, I got to work on the coffee buttercream. I figured I was home-free. This buttercream and I go way back, six years or more, and though I’ve read that buttercreams are finicky, I’d always had great results with minimal effort. I’d always had great results with minimal effort.

A buttercream frosting is a creme anglaise sauce – milk and eggs cooked like a custard but not nearly as thick – with whole butter whipped into it. At it’s best it is silky and rich and not-too-sweet. It is nothing like the stuff that is sold in cardboard canisters at the grocery store, and even less like the “white icing” that comes slathered on sheet cakes, just before the spray-on neon “Happy Birthday” is applied and the bright pink roses are globbered into the corners. Buttercreams are a little bit difficult to make because all of the ingredients must be the same temperature and because the cook must be patient. The Coffee Buttercream I tried to make calls for one cup of milk, eight egg yolks, and one and one half cups of sugar for the creme anglaise and a whole pound of unsalted butter. That’s a lot of butter. That’s a lot of butter that needs to be soft, but not too soft, as it gets slowly, gradually paddled into the anglaise, bit by bit, just like brioche. It takes forever and for the first three quarters of the procedure there is no visually-appreciaable progress with which to entertain oneself.

I knew all of this. I made my anglaise sauce, whipped it cool and full of air in my four-quart Kitchen Aid, changed to the paddle attachment, and began very gradually tossing in the pound of butter, bit by tiny nickel-sized bit.

And nothing happened.

And nothing happened.

And nothing happened.

And then it broke.

When a food item – usually a sauce or a batter – “breaks,” the fat that ought to be emulsified separates. It happens all at once: your sauce is smooth and then it is lumpy and greasy. Sometimes you can fix it and sometimes you can’t. Sometimes it doesn’t matter; sometimes the mistake is fatal. A broken buttercream is, as far as I know, fatal. And totally gross to look at. To be fair, I am prepared to admit that the butter might have been just a tiny bit cool and, OK, I might have been a bit over-eager in mixing. So I broke the stuff and there’s a first time for everything and it’s all right to make mistakes because how else do you learn? All right?

The buttercream washed down the garbage disposal, the flavorless cake wrapped in plastic to protect it from the cats (or the cats from it), I ran away to meet a friend for lunch at The Goose Hollow Inn. The Goose Hollow Inn is not, in fact, an Inn, but a completely adorable neighborhood pub locally famous for their Rueben sandwiches and mayoral proprietor. I had a cup of pumpkin soup, which cheered and bolstered me sufficiently to march back home and begin my cake project with spirit renewed.

I won’t draw this out. My second try for buttercream – when I followed the instructions letter perfect, when the butter and the anglaise were both the correct temperature, when I mixed in the butter so slowly I wondered if I might not be done by his next birthday – was also a failure. Smashed to smithereens, you might want to say. And you’d be right. I don’t know what happened.

For the sake of preserving my sanity and sense of self-worth, I shelved the filling and measured out the two ingredients for my ganache, chocolate and cream. I had been saving six ounces of Dagoba’s New Moon. It is so delicious. And, because it quite dark, it would have served as a nice counterweight to the so-so cocoa buttermilk cake. I chopped the chocolate and scalded the cream with some coffee beans and let it steep. I poured the strained hot cream over aforementioned chopped chocolate. I waited, then stirred.

And here is the place in my story, dear Readers, where yours truly basically comes apart. I won’t tell you what happened; I can’t. You know what happened. The story could not be otherwise. Ganache is the simplest thing in the world to make. Two ingredients, three steps. I haven’t the first glimmer of a notion about what when wrong how or where – all I knew then was that between the two broken buttercreams, one batch of passable cake and the inexplicably faulty ganache, it wasn’t looking like such a good day for birthday cakes.

When the Squeeze came home from work some hours later, I wrangled myself into a hug and faked sobbing into his chest. “I’m a failure,” I cried, “I can’t bake anymore! It was a fluke all these years and now” – sob, sob, sob – “the jig is up!” More sobbing, possibly real, and a hiccup. “We’ll have to get you a cake from Fred Meyer with a race car airbrushed on it!”

We decided to go out for some air instead, hoping to push some hidden Restart Button in my head or my hands that would get me back on track when I returned to the kitchen. I harped on and on about what a miserable baker I am, and how I had wanted so badly to make this flawless cake to commemorate his special-freaking-day. “I’ve never had my own birthday cake before,” he told me when I took a breath from my self-depreciating rant. He explained that his father’s birthday is a few days ahead of his, and that his family celebrated both birthdays together on the day in between. He didn’t tell me to make me feel worse; he was just thinking aloud. My only thought was to rush home and make thirty cakes, one for every year missed plus extras. I then remembered that I couldn’t even make one.

Of course, I did finish a cake. I took the perfectly decent sheet of cocoa buttermilk cake, by now the star of the show, cut out three rounds and layered them with vanilla ice cream. I spattered some warm ganache into the ice cream when softening it, creating little flaky specks of mocha-y chocolate. I poured a thin covering of slightly greasy ganache over the third layer and froze it, figuring that whatever happened to it in the freezer I could hide with a glaze, or not, when the time came. For icing, I whipped heavy cream and mascarpone cheese together with some confectioner’s sugar and coffee liqueur. I finished the cake with chocolate shavings and rosettes and shoved it back in the freezer to set, frustrated.

I feel like a kid who has had a very bad day on the playground. Maybe two broken buttercreams, a mediocre sponge cake and failed ganache doesn’t seem so awful to you. Maybe you have real problems, like an overdue mortgage payment or a blood clot silently making its way towards your brain. Maybe I am making a big deal out of trifles.

I have changed my mind about how I will end this post half a dozen times. I wanted to avoid cliché, or some sunshiny moral about how “the true measure of one’s skill in the kitchen may be gauged by how one moves forward after a mistake,” and that this is actually a testament to my ability in the kitchen, having created in a pinch a passable product. Last night I tried to make a soup out of a some leftover tilapia and the contents of my fridge and, while it was hot and edible, I wouldn’t say that it was good. I threw away the corn muffins I made to go with it; they weren’t even worth putting honey on.

If I weren’t already having an off-week in the kitchen, after having yammered on about it I surely will. Last night I seriously considered the possibility that I’ve used it all up, whatever it is that’s in me that knows how to cook. I’d just read a piece in Best Food Writing 2005 about a young woman who moved to France right after college to learn how to cook. She secured a job as a personal chef for a pair of aristocrats and spent the summer botching up dishes and learning French from the good-humored butler and maid. Towards the end of the essay, she wrote about the development of her skills: from having to write out and plan a menu beforehand, making notes about how long each dish would take to prepare and how she would know that the roast is done, to being able to sense things with her hands and her eyes. The passage was so familiar to me I almost teared up a bit. When I am in the Zone, that’s how I cook. I cook with my body, with the intuition and knowledge and rhythm that’s somehow tied up in my hands, my nose, my skin.

Then I realized: I haven’t been cooking like that lately. And I miss it.