I can top any and all stories about new wives cooking...

My wife grew up eating casseroles. I grew up eating vegetables. After about a year I finally convinced her that I'd rather have vegetables than vegetable casseroles. Much easier to cook too. I came in from work one day and the house smelled good. I could tell she had vegetables cooking. I was planning to do some work outside so I asked her how long supper would be. She said, "everything is ready except for the cabbage and it shouldn't take long, the water is boiling." So I'm thinking, 10 minutes tops. I go out in the garage and do some piddling. About 20 minutes later I still haven't got the call for supper. I stuck my head in the door and asked if it was ready. She said, "no the cabbage isn't tender yet." I retreated back to the garage and did more piddling. About 15 minutes later I stuck my head back in the door to check on supper again. She said, "I just checked the cabbage again and it's still not ready." I'm thinking, "there's no way in the world that it takes this long to cook cabbage." I look on the stove and there's a large stock pot with steam pouring out from around the lid. I mean that thing looked like it was ready to take flight. I walked over and removed the lid. Yep, there was a WHOLE head of cabbage rolling around in the boiling water. I laughed and said, "you've got to cut up cabbage before you boil it." She says, "no you don't, this is the way my mother cooks it." I said, "Naw, I bet it ain't. It was a long night.

Then there was the cake she cooked. Her uncle was heavily involved with the extension service at Mississippi State. He won an award for a cake recipe he wrote for the extension magazine. It was called Hunters Cake. It was a cake made with no butter and no eggs. It had lots of raisins in it and also ground dates. I dearly loved that cake. My wife made one and I walked in, right after it came out of the oven. She cut me a big slice and wanted me to try it. It smelled so good. I took a big bite and chomped down, and it felt like roofing tacks were being driven into the roof of my mouth. She used WHOLE cloves. I accused her of trying to kill me.

She's a good cook now, but dang I barely survived the early years.