By Feeding Him

"Young women, resist too much hanging out, and encourage dates that are simple, inexpensive, and frequent. Don’t make it easy for young men to hang out in a setting where you women provide the food. Don’t subsidize freeloaders. An occasional group activity is okay, but when you see men who make hanging out their primary interaction with the opposite sex, I think you should lock the pantry and bolt the front door." --Dallin H. Oaks

I love to cook. Maybe too much. I buy cookbooks like kids buy trading cards. Except I won't trade my cookbooks. They are full of tasteful treasures waiting for creation.  And I love creating them. And I'm rather good at it. In fact, I currently hold the title of Best Cook In The Mission, awarded by the missionaries serving in my ward.

Admittedly I have cooked specifically to entice a guy to fall for me. I mean, they say the way to a man's heart is through his stomach, and I can make a mean meal, so why not use my talent for cooking to impress a guy? Because usually this ends with him loving my cooking, even wanting to marry it, but not loving me.

Being a single lady in a ward with missionaries for over 8 years, it has been easy to invite guys over for a meal to try to impress them, with the ruse that it is because I need another priesthood holder in at the meal in order to feed the Elders. Now, I am not trying to impress every guy I invite. I try to be an equal opportunity priesthood feeder. But I can not lie: I have used the missionaries to feed guys I wanted to get to know more.

And every time my food receives rave reviews.

If my cooking is so good, why wouldn't that entice someone to get to know me better and see if my other talents and characteristics are just as good, if not better, than my cooking?

The funny thing is, I bet most of the guys I have fed over the years were just thinking, "Awesome, free food." And thus we see the huge hole in my logic. When food is present, that is pretty much all a guy will think about. Not the beautiful girl who created it, but his desire to eat.

And that's okay. I guess a marriage can't be built on good food only.