Olive Bread and the Perfect Wife

Much of my growth in cooking started with my marriage three years ago. All of a sudden I was a wife. Wives are different right? I was now the woman of the house apartment. I felt compelled to magically and instantly transform myself into a Martha Stewart clone. I decided that just being myself wasn't good enough. I had to have a cleaning schedule, a meal plan with the perfect recipes, and be prepared for guests at any moment. I had a vision built from fairy tales and magazines.

My husband was and is wonderful and more understanding than I could ever ask for. All of the pressure I felt was from my own desire to be perfect. So, I spent a lot of time that first year feeling inadequate. It was a single recipe for olive bread that gave me the nudge I needed.

Growing up, my cooking experiences were fairly limited. Mom wasn't in the kitchen baking pies from scratch and teaching me her trusted recipes. If we ate as a family it was usually pasta, grilled cheese, or something quick involving ground beef. As I got older I cooked enough to satisfy a meal (or a brownie craving) but it usually involved boxes, cans, or the microwave. Holidays were about the only exception.

So, when I became a married woman I decided I had to know everything. I began my cookbook collection. I love cookbooks. One ambitious day I decided to make bread. I had been reading Williams-Sonoma Essentials of Baking and couldn't resist the sound of warm, crusty bread flecked with Kalamata olives. I wanted to try and make something real and without shortcuts.

Deep in the middle of the recipe I got pretty hard on myself. I was upset that I was doing all of this hard work when I was certain that the bread wouldn't even turn out. Did I mix the dough too much? Did I knead it right? Had it risen enough? I had no idea what I was doing in my tiny apartment kitchen. I had zero knowledge of bread-making and my anxiety was getting the best of me. I just knew that I badly wanted to impress my husband.

More than four hours later, this was the finished product:



I was so proud of this. I still am. I made bread for the first time and it even looked like the cookbook picture. It was delicious.

The olive bread sparked something in me that I had forgotten, and still at times forget. I can do more than I allow myself to believe. Perfection is an illusion.


(P.S.- The bottom of the bread was badly burned)