It is a truth universally acknowledged between my husband and me that he is The Chef and I am The Grateful Eater.

I just have never been a super cook. There is food I make that I love. But honestly, the only people I’ve ever prepared food for are my brother and my husband. And, god love them, they would do anything to spare my feelings. Plus, they tend to eat pretty much anything anyway.

Husband has never said anything straight out about me being a crappy cook. But he does all the baking and makes most of the meals. So it’s pretty clear whose food we both prefer to eat.

When my mom came for a visit recently (yay mom!!), she asked that I make something simple to eat after her long plane flight from the Wild Wild West. So I made French onion soup. Which is, by the way, one of my favorite soups of all time. I looked at a few recipes online to get a general idea of ingredients… went to the store… and made some soup.

Because of over caramelization of the onions or perhaps a bit too much sherry, the soup was awfully sweet. So I added a dash of Worchestershire sauce, some salt, and sort of experimented with it until it tasted better.

The finished product was pretty darn good. My mom had two bowls. So did I. Yum yum.

Then my husband came home from work. And I prepared some soup for him. He tasted it.

“This is really good. What recipe did you use?”

“Oh, you know, I just tinkered around based on some recipes I saw online.”

“You know,” he said to me. “I think you are a hell of a lot better at cooking than you give yourself credit for.”

For some reason, this little compliment gave me more pleasure than any other kind words he’s said in a long, long time.

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What’s the nicest thing someone said to you recently?