Power is Already Rotting my Brain

I ran down to church to see what kind of help they needed in the cafe. The upshot is this: I will have dominion over a small arsenal of commercial cooking equipment every Monday from now on. Now no one is safe!

They have one other volunteer who can cook. The rest are grunts. I will break them and indoctrinate them and mold them into mindless culinary shock troops. You got to make de food first. Den when you get de food, you get de power. Den when you get de power, den you get de womengs. Oops, I’m channeling Scarface.

Okay, I take back “grunts.” I mean the rest are not ready to bring in recipes, plan meals, and cook stuff from start to finish. But they are nice people who want to do what they can to help, and I am lucky they are offering. And they will give me someone to blame if I screw up.

I had to look up “shock troops” just now. I realized I had no idea what it meant. It just sounded good.

If I understand the picture, it works like this: they have a certain number of items they can throw in the fryer and slap onto a plate without much effort. But they need a daily special and a couple of sides. About forty servings. I can handle that. I usually make twenty when I’m cooking just for myself. More or less.

They’re having some kind of function on Thursday, with 125 people in attendance. I had to demur on that. I’m sufficiently intimidated by a six-day lead and forty servings. I don’t need to deal with a giant crowd on two days’ notice. I would rather fail on a small scale.

They’re thinking of getting a pizza oven. They’re in real trouble if they do that. I am totally ready to be a pizza warlord. They want to get one of those jobs with a conveyor belt, which is fine by me. They seem to work great, with very limited attention.

I stopped by Gordon Food Supply on the way home and looked over the merchandise. They have boneless picnic hams for $1.55 a pound. That has potential. Big time. I can turn them into caja-china-style pork very easily, and I can crank out yuca and moros on the side. But I have to find out if the quality is there.

I could not resist getting some pizza sauce and cheese at GFS. I think I’ll donate it to the church and wangle an opportunity to make a couple of pies. If they go as planned, they will cement my position as chief principality and power of the kitchen. I could also make a calzone or two. Maybe a pan con lechon calzone. Man, those things are good. I wish I hadn’t thought of it.

I hit a normal store and picked up some stuff for cheesecake, brownies, and flan. I plan to bombard the Thursday function with desserts, since I can’t cover the main dishes. Coconut flan, brownies, chocolate flan, and strawberry cheesecake. I guess there won’t be enough for everyone. We’ll see how well their holiness holds up when they have to play musical cheesecake. This will be a test that would have humbled Job. The goats will feed, and the sheep will have to wait for their reward in heaven.

Here’s a thought. God delivered me from overeating in August. Now suddenly I have been asked to help run a restaurant. Could I have survived this a year ago? No way. It would have killed me. But now maybe it will work.

Coincidence? Another one of those remarkable coincidences that seem to happen EVERY SINGLE DAY when you’re a Christian?

Must be.

If I can have pizza stuff in the house without going Jabba in a week, I can do anything.