4 and 1/2 gallons of water...

Yesterday, I was the cook.
There are some benefits to cooking...
* You get to leave for a little while. Whenever we decide who's cooking, (this usually takes a little bit of time at roll call, sitting around, shooting the shit, drinking coffee, ect...), they collect the money and it's off to the store. Our mess is $10 a person. There are 6 of us at my station, so we eat on $60 a day. That's for 2 meals, lunch and dinner. This is also a time to do an errand or two if you want. Stop back by the house. Whatever. No one really keeps track of how long you're gone. There's kind of an un-written rule of no more than 3 hours. One guy, one day, a long time ago.. took off for the store, did his shopping, and then went over to visit a girl he knew. I guess this was a common thing for him to do. Evidently his "friends" husband worked during the day. While this guy was "visiting", the girls husband pulled in the driveway. So, the guy takes off for the basement to hide. Well, 3 hours later he managed to find a phone in the basement and call his engine house to let them know he was a little "detained". He had to spill the beans when they asked him why he was whispering. He did manage to escape, un-noticed. I believe he ended up with a few days suspension with the fire dept.
* You get out of house work for the day. Every day except Sundays we have some sort of housework that has to be done. Mondays and Tuesdays are for apparatus, batteries, chassis. Mondays are also inventory, where we go over everything that is supposed to be carried on the apparatus to make sure it's there. Wednesdays are "outside" day. Mowing, trim, ect. Thursdays are tools and ladders, cleaning of, that is. Fridays are cleaning the stove, refridge, and windows. Saturdays are outside if it wasn't done earlier, brass and floors.

There are also some "pains" to cooking.
* "I don't like that" You can't please everyone. I have a Captain that won't eat pork, a firefighter that doesn't like anything green and a paramedic that breaks out if she eats tomatoes. It's taken me a long time to learn, but too bad! You pay your money, you take your chances. One thing's for sure, if I'm cooking, it's something I like.
* planning a menu. "Hmmmm, what do I fix today?" Some days, I'll ask for suggestions. Usually I'll just go to the store and see what's on sale. You'd be surprised how often pork is on sale...

Yesterday we had;
LUNCH
Meatball subs
French fries
Salad

SUPPER
Chicken and dumplings
Mashed potatoes
Roasted green beans
Biscuits
Salad

Oh, and a strawberry, cream cake

Now the reason for the title. One of the guys we work with, lets see... I'll call him Andy, he cooks just so he doesn't have to do anything else. He has 3 recipes that he uses over, and over, and over again. Usually it starts with 4 and 1/2 gallons of water, dip a chicken in it and call it soup. Or, it's 4 and 1/2 gallons of water, dip some beef in it and call it stew. Or, it's empty a plastic bag of frozen vegetables into a skillet, flash fry em and call it stir fry. That's about the extent of his meals. It wouldn't be so bad, until he sits down to eat and says something like "Mmmmm, this is good shit". My next day is Sunday. "Andy" won't be there, so I won't have to worry about eating his biscuits and gravy. He makes his gravy with 4 and 1/2 gallons of water....