Sorry, Charlie (but not really)

Despite having grown up with a mother who is a fabulous cook, and despite the fact that eating has long been one of my favorite activities (my mother claims that my first word was "cookie"), I've never really learned my way around the kitchen. Sure, I can follow a recipe (mostly), and I have a small repertoire of dishes that I can execute reasonably well by virtue of practice, but I'm not one of those chefs who can effortlessly throw together something amazing by pulling a bunch of random stuff out of the fridge and the pantry and dancing about tossing things gallantly into a pan. I'm clunky at best, painfully slow, and it just doesn't come instinctively to me - as my college roommates, who once witnessed me burning Jello - burning Jello - can attest.

But lately, I've suddenly had this desire to learn. I can't do anything too time-consuming, because my life is just too hectic to be making pasta from scratch. But I want to be able to turn out a decent, quick meal to share with friends or feed myself without whipping myself up into such a tizzy that I stop enjoying myself.

That's how I found myself at Central Market at 8:30 p.m. tonight after a trip to the dog park with Mindy.

I picked up a single albacore tuna steak and headed home, without the slightest clue what I was going to do with it.

After a little web research and a quick inventory of the spice rack, I ended up dredging the tuna in a mixture of fresh cracked pepper, sesame seeds, and lemon pepper. Then I seared it in sesame oil for a minute or so on each side. When it was done, I sliced the steak up, added just a splash of soy sauce, and laid it atop a bed of rice along with some dried kale I'd made earlier in the week.

And oh. my. god. It was good.

See for yourself.

Maybe there's hope for this Jello-burner yet.