I thought I'd get the characterization out there at the beginning since I know it's coming.
I may have underestimated how important this "cooking" thing would be to this challenge. Rice and blackeyed peas should be an easy enough task to accomplish, right? I mean, all food comes with instructions on the label, yes?
I figured out the whole 1 cup of water to 1/2 cup of rice thing - cool. Little bit of oil - done. Didn't have any regular salt, but I threw something from my cabinet called "Soul Food Salt" into the pot. Dunno whether it made a difference or not. I let it boil and then covered it. After that, how do you know rice is done? Loud hiss? Semi-angry hiss? Smoke? Anyway, the rice that was not stuck to the bottom of the pot tasted OK. Heated up the blackeyed peas and added a healthy dose of hot sauce - the culinary girdle on my out-of-shape cooking.
Despite what the plate looks like, it was edible. I mean, my stomach hurt and all, but I'm not sure if that was because I scarfed down 400 calories worth of blackeyed peas in about 4 minutes or if it had anything to do with my inability to cook them.
The first bite was actually not half bad. I decided to eat it as quickly as possible, so as not to give myself the chance to start disliking it as the law of diminishing returns set in. After all, that was all I had to eat for the evening, and it was over 8 hours since my peanut butter lunch. 12 hours later, I'm happy to report that everything stayed down and I've lived to blog the tale.
Tha dirty: 1/2 cup of rice was 1/5 of an 89 cent package, or 18 cents. Blackeyed peas were a solid quarter. Meal: 43 cents. Challenge to date: $1.13 and 1/3 cent.
