The Evil Within

Masochism is an art, and I'll have to say I'm an expert practitioner of the "M" part of "S&M."

You would have to be, if you suddenly had a brainwave (only one? unfortunately yes, my brain usually only suffers one brainwave a day) about suddenly going to the store to buy pâte feuilleté (the Oxford French-English dictionary translates it as "The Evil Within," although Brigitte insists that it's called "puff pastry") and making mushroom/broccoli creatures in cream sauce baked in The Evil Within for some nice moutherly entertainment along with my masterful Minestrone for dinner.

Silly me, I chose a day upon which the temperature spiked into the lower 90s (about 32 degrees C in the kitchen).

And knowing nothing about puff pastry, I quickly found out that no matter what you do with it, it will fuck you. Fuck you here, fuck you there, fuck you Nearly Everywhere.

First of all, it refuses to be rolled. Doesn't matter if it's cold or warm, it will stick to the wax paper. My good GOD give me pasta dough ANY TIME.

It is the most recalcitrant cooking medium I have ever come up against; my condolences to pastry chefs everywhere.

Second of all, it has all the things that you never want to confront while cooking, a little like minding a mental patient: needs to be not too hot, nor too cold. Needs to be worked with extremely quickly, or it will dry out. However, when it's too wet, it sticks to that stuff they line the Space Shuttle with.

Number three, any fix you come up with in the heat of the moment is doomed to be a hilarious disaster, the stuff of kitchen tales for your grandchildren (or Reader's Digest; take your pick).

You need a culinary version of the National Transportation and Safety Board (NTSB) to come over and analyze the wreck that is your kitchen after a bout with pâte feullieté on a hot day.

It is truly The Evil Within.