Theres many rites of passage throughout a persons life.  Their first word, their first kiss, the first time you got drunk on cheap cider in the park late at night and had to be carried home in a shopping trolley… okay, perhaps that last one is just me.  But still, there’s always lifestyle hurdles to navigate around, and I’m just about to hit one full on, as per usual.

At some point next week, I thought it would be nice to cook my very gorgeous girlfriend a meal, as a kind of token of appreciation for putting up with me for so long.  All well and good, a nice romantic gesture.. or at least, it might be if I could actually cook.

Just for the record, I can cook.  Enough not to burn toast, and to whip up an outstanding beans on toast, or a very agreeable post-hangover egg and bacon sarnie.  I’ve just very little experience at doing anything more complex than this, so it’s really about time I started learning.  Where better than a night where I might possibly near-poison the love of my life?

So, for the sake of Internet Entertainment, I will present you with my failures as a rather crappy chef, complete with the climax of both myself and Sarah, my girlfriend, heaving over the sink and praying for death.

The first step to learning how to cook is to find a decent resource, one would assume.  I’ve discovered a copy of a strangely unused looking Delia Smith book and, being the geek I am, have decided to have a look at Rouxbe for some insight (hey, if it’s good enough for The Gadget Show, its good enough for me).

Rouxbe seems like a decent site – well presented, with the navigation clean and simple (just like me – well, bar the clean bit), and recipes given with both text and video instructions.  Specific terms that I’m unlikely to understand are hyperlinked with a description, so I dont feel totally like an idiot when trying to work out what the three-pronged metal thing is for, and most of their content is free which is always a plus point.

Over the next couple of days I’ll be giving the site a go, seeing if I can actually concoct something that doesn’t on some level somehow resemble vomit, and posting the results up here.

Wish me luck, and can somebody get an ambulance / fire-engine ready just in case?