What the Heck Is That?! – Vintage Recipe Ridicule

 

Trivia Night & Meatballs

While I was trying to figure out what to bring to Trivia Night for six of us, I was drawing a complete blank. I had just started a diet, so I didn’t want to bring anything fattening, and everything I thought of felt wrong. I was pacing around like I was planning a state dinner instead of a bite-sized snack.

So I texted Coco — my Forks & Fiascos partner‑in‑crime and cookbook collaborator, because it was dinnertime in London and I didn’t want to interrupt her if she was driving home  or eating. A text felt safer. She could answer right away or ignore me until she was ready.

She answered instantly with a phone call. Of course she did. And just like that, we were in full brainstorming mode.

Coco threw out at least twelve ideas — all great, all creative, all totally unusable because my husband has a picky side, and a long list of food aversions.

Before we go any further, let’s pause and appreciate the Roger No‑Food List, because it deserves its own wing:

THE ROGER NO‑FOOD LIST

❌ No tomatoes

❌ No cucumbers

❌ No un-melted cheese (only melted mozzarella or Muenster — the man has rules)

❌ No mustard

❌ No fruit (but grape jam is okay —  And bacon Jam is fine! Who can argue with bacon?)

❌ No deviled eggs

❌ No hummus

❌ No spinach

❌ No olives

❌ No mayo

❌ No ham, pepperoni, salami

❌ No mushrooms

❌ No peppers

❌ No parmesan cheese or similar (he says it smells like feet and calls it Stinky-cheese!)

❌ No butter (unless it’s for garlic bread) Oh, and I can cook with it!

❌ No sour cream

❌ No corn or Brussels sprouts

❌ No pork sausages, but chicken sausages is ok, and NO hot dogs

Just a few of his dislikes- there’s probably more, but this is what came to me at the time of this writing.

At this point, I’m not planning a snack. I’m planning a mission.

The Trivia Night snack had to be:

·         Room‑temp safe for two hours

·         Finger food

·         Healthy-ish

·         Something Roger would actually eat

·         Something the group would enjoy

Basically, I needed to create a unicorn.

Coco and I kept bouncing ideas back and forth until suddenly — EPIPHANY. A lightning bolt. A full download from the culinary heavens...

I remembered I had mini meatballs in the freezer. Some Greek & some a Mexican flare. I had mini filo cups. And chili fig jam. So I said to Coco:

“What if I put a dab of chili fig jam in the bottom of the filo cup, add a Mexican meatball, and drizzle it with an apple‑cider‑honey glaze… and then take the Greek meatballs, soak them in Greek vinaigrette, put bacon jam in the bottom of the cup, and top it with the vinaigrette‑soaked meatball?”

Coco practically screamed through the phone. It was perfect. It was elegant.

 It was healthy-ish.

 It was Roger‑safe.

 It was so ME.

It took a long time- But we had solved it.

Then… Roger walked into my home office with the mail.

I told Coco “Hold on”- I turned to him, and proudly shared my brilliant, gourmet appetizer plan!

And this man — THIS MAN — looked at me and said:

“I don’t know why you were having such a hard time figuring this out. The group always has cookies and chips. We can just buy a bag of pretzels and call it a day.”

I blinked. I stared. I briefly considered divorce (playfully of course!)

He left the room.

Then I got back to Coco:

“Do you want to hear something that made me want to throw Roger out of the room?”

 Naturally she said yes. I told her what he said.

Her response...

“Michele… I knew it. I KNEW IT. This is SO Roger and I am absolutely howling. Seriously, people are staring at me right now! LOL You’re over there like Top Chef, engineering two gourmet canapé flights out of frozen leftover meatballs, filo cups, jams and drizzles… and this man strolls in like: “I’m fine with chips.”

HAS HE EVEN MET YOU? He is married to a chef, a published cookbook author, and a woman who can turn frozen leftover meatballs into a Michelin‑level appetizer. And he’s like:

“Eh, I’ll eat a Chips Ahoy.”

 This man would survive the apocalypse with burnt toast, a well‑done steak, a sleeve of Oreos and peanut butter stuffed onions. Because in his world:

·         Burnt = Flavor

·        Well done steak = Perfect

·         Peanut‑Butter‑stuffed onions = Intriguing (he LITERALLY said he’d eat that!)

And now… Pretzels, cookies or chips = Problem solved?

Me: I was laughing so hard I couldn’t breathe. I had completely forgotten about the peanut‑butter‑stuffed onions, where Roger stated to me “I would eat that” … and now I was laughing all over again. (Sidenote: The Peanut Butter Stuffed Onions was one of our Recipe Ridicules.)

Coco continued ...

“Michele, this is why your stories are funny. Your life is already a sitcom, and Roger is the lovable food gremlin who keeps giving you material. You’re going to show up with a great appetizer for your teams trivia table — and he’ll be eating a Lorna Doon."

... And in the end, after ALL that- no one wanted to even try the meatballs, not ONE! Apparently, some people just don’t like to try new things- what can I say? I thought they were great! But how many can I eat by myself? So, I gave them to the next table over from us, and guess what? They loved them!  Next time, I’m bringing a bag of pretzels!

 

The Takeaway:

You can engineer the perfect appetizer, but you can’t make people try it! Hmmm, sounds like a familiar saying! Even when the plan goes sideways, there’s always someone at the next table who will eat! 

Meteor Reading: Trivia Night Meatballs Edition

Category Score Funny Notes Culinary Creativity   9/10 Gourmet canapés for people who wanted chips. Roger Logic 12/10 “Why struggle? Just bring pretzels.” Classic. Group Appreciation    3/10 The meatballs were invisible to them. Next‑Table Redemption 10/10 Finally-  people with functioning taste buds. Sitcom Chaos Level    8/10 Coco screaming, me laughing, Roger being Roger.