The joy of cooking?

I have something of a love/hate relationship with cooking. I absolutely loathe the regular weeknight drudgery of meal preparation, but I love planning meals, searching out recipes, and cooking for special occasions. I suppose it's fair to say that I enjoy the cerebral aspects of cooking far more than the practical. You can't coat your kitchen in flour by just researching the perfect recipe. I'm fairly certain I have never met the perfect recipe; rather, I have never met a recipe I didn't tinker with in some manner. I just can't help myself. Double the amount of cinnamon? Why not? Maybe this would be better with mushrooms? Sure.
I was raised to view cooking as a chore, something one did because it had to be done. The idea of finding enjoyment from the exercise would have been a foreign concept to my mother and my aunts. Mom once told me that the greatest gift she ever gave me was not teaching me to cook. But as I got older, I began to view the kitchen as a mystical realm where ingredients were stirred together and became something else entirely by the simple addition of heat. It was spell casting at its finest, and I wanted to learn to do it. Keep in mind, I had very little to work with. In my house as a kid, vegetables came from a can, spices were dried and never thrown out, and Crisco was a staple.
I doubt I am the only thirty-something who embarked on a cooking journey hampered by these preconceived ideas. Because of this, I am profoundly grateful to the Food Network. Say what you will about Rachael Ray with her "Delish" and "Yummo," but she makes meals for the masses, and uses simple, fresh ingredients. I must admit, she got on my nerves in the beginning, but she's grown on me. Rachael doesn't tell you to peal a pound of potatoes, and then edit so that in the next frame, a perfect pile of pealed potatoes (Say that three times fast) is sitting in front of her. Sure, her recipes take me longer than thirty minutes to make, but I bet I can groom a Labrador or knit a scarf faster than she can. It's all about your experience. Most of the Food Network hosts present down-to-earth recipes designed to Alay the fears of the novice. Let me just say that my admiration stops at Semi-Homemade. No, Sandra Lee, you cannot add Shake 'N Bake to everything and it turn out wonderful. I ain't buying it. I don't care how "super simple" it is. Paula Deen is another one of my favorites, but I recently saw Paula make "ox tails" so I'm having to rethink her.
I don't ask a lot from my kitchen. I want hearty, filling meals when it's cold outside and light, refreshing fair during the summer. I am not likely to challenge myself far beyond my culinary limits, but I have managed to find the enjoyment of cooking, mainly on leisurely Sundays when Michael and I can be in the kitchen together. He's way better than me with a knife or hot skillet, and we all rest easier that way. One of my favorite things is to find a recipe, tinker with it, and have Michael say that it goes in our keeper pile.
My best friend, Molly, has a food blog called a Year in the Kitchen. Molly's kitchen year would look vastly different from mine. She isn't daunted by ingredients that put up a fight or narrow margins of error. Check her out for a real ode to food.