Poker food

Hello friends! I have decided to start talking about the job that I love.

Many of you may not know this about me, but people call me "Chef." Ever since September of 2013, I have been feeding hungry poker players in Dallas. That's right. They play poker. In case you didn't know, (I did not!) the underground poker scene in Dallas is, lets say, vibrant. There are multiple locations throughout the city where you'd never know there was a huge poker game happening. Anyway, ever since I got this job, I have had the ultimate freedom to make whatever the heck I want, each day something new, on someone else's dime. It's not very glamorous but it's amazing and I love every minute of it. I'm no Gordon Ramsay, in fact I use the term chef very, very hesitantly. But I absolutely love to cook and experiment and eat good food. I feel lucky to get paid doing what I love. These poker people have been so so good to me. They appreciate my food and let me know by their generous tips. Sometimes I feel unworthy of their liberality. Then I remember they just probably took a chance on a pot the amount of my rent payment and won, so I take it with gratitude. Anyway, this blog will tell of my cooking journies,

I have always loved to eat. I was underwhelmed with my mother's cooking. She'd make things like meat patties with lumpy mashed potatoes and canned green beans with a plop of ketchup on the side. Tacos were weird and dry, obviously never as good as Taco Bell or any other place. I was inspired at some point to start cooking myself. It was a Kids Can Cook Cookbook with measuring spoons attached that changed my life. We could call it Pandora's Box. When I learned that amazing food was as simple as following instructions, I had to see if I could execute the mission. I remember one of my first culinary adventures was following a recipe for Muligatawny. I had several friends over who were super high and hungry and waiting on me to make this weird Indian lentil dish. I don't know if I was unsuccessful following the recipe or if it was just a terrible dish choice for a bunch of stoner teenagers but we all went to Taco Bell after turning our nose at the finished product. But that did not deter me from wanting to make food great. I loved to eat and had already learned how unhealthy fast food was, which is what I was raised on. I joke that Mc Donald's and Dominos are like home cooking for me now. I learned about the power of vegetables when I read The Prescription for Nutritional Healing when I was 18. At 19 I was working through the cookbook 1001 Vegetarian Recipes when I found my love for baking. Oddly enough that particular cookbook has excellent breakfast breads that are super unhealthy but- from scratch and so much better than Little Debbie!!! I forced myself to be a vegan at age 20, as a card carrying PETA member. One alcohol induced binge on a bacon cheeseburger ended that pipe dream but the lessons I learned stuck with me. Food variety is indeed the spice of life. I learned that you didn't need animal products to enjoy a good meal and that expanding palate horizons is fun. I enjoyed cooking for and impressing my friends. I worked in good restaurants as a waitress, paid attention in the kitchen, and copied the dishes at home. When I was 23, I dated a very talented chef. We cooked together at home and I worked in his catering company with him. We were wined and dined at the finest restaurants in town,. He was locally famous as he had been on local morning tv for his restaurant and catering company, so we got star treatment. We traveled to Italy and Spain together on a culinary adventure. My early 20's were the foundation of my knowledge of food. I was just having a good time, not thinking it would ever be my source of income. It was a fun hobby but the fast pace of the hot and greasy kitchen was certainly not where I envisioned myself.

Fast forward to me being a single mom in a terribly unhappy relationship. I was praying for a way to make enough money to work somewhere without having to put my kids in school. I wanted to work it out so the tines they were with their dad I'd work but when they were with me I'd be free. School was simply non negotiable and I would stay in a miserable loveless relationship until I could figure out some miracle. Well, one day when Finley, my oldest, was at karate, I was talking to another mom, Nancy, telling her what all I had cooked that day. She was like wait, you like really cook. I was like yes girl I love to cook! She was like well, I have this job, it's going to sound weird but it's legit. She explained it's old dudes playing poker and they need a cook. I was like wow that sounds interesting. I went the next day, got hired, and Nancy got fired. I took her place. I felt terrible about it but everyone reassured me that she was a terrible cook and I shouldn't feel bad. She even said no hard feelings to me, but I never saw her again. She has no idea how much she changed my life. I wish I could thank her.

I was the black sheep in the room, the hippie holistic homeschooling mom. I was appalled at the use of styrofoam cups, paper towels, canola oil, margarine and msg. I was serving grass fed beef and organic vegetables, real olive oil and homemade dressings, sea salt and real butter. Word got around that I knew what I was doing in the kitchen. Poker rooms are sketchy and the food can't always be trusted. But as people ordered and I gained a solid reputation, people told me they would come to the poker room just to eat my food and play some poker, rather than coming to play poker and then eating some food. I didn't feel I had real talent, just an awareness of ingredient quality and a desire to try new things. And being a people pleaser, and a bit of a perfectionist helped too. And one memory that has always stuck with me from a kids show I used to watch called Maple Town. The host of the show was a sweet lady in a kitchen narrating the little cartoon, she had made some special cookies with a "secret ingredient." The ingredient is love. Every dish I make, I think of the person and bless their food and pray that it nourishes their body and spirit and sustains them in good health and happiness.