The Unbreakable Man Laws

Tens of thousands of years ago, few destinations were available for males to take their mates and newly minted couples. Movie theaters were only open during normal 9-5 office hours, and sadly restaurants only served the kings and queens of society. What was a young savage and pagan to do prior to the advent of electricity, carnivals, and fancy yacht rides?

When humans were simply groups of nomads roaming the plains of the African Savanna, few things were considered more romantic than the sharing of food.  Because food had yet to enter mass production and the opening of McDonalds was still a few years away, to share one’s life energy, food, was to ultimately “include” them in your family. If you had spent all day hunting caribou, you would be damned to offer your capture to the neighboring rival tribe.

Women have been using food to seduce men for centuries! It's about time we wised up!

To this day, in dining halls across the country and Corporate Cafeterias around the world, humans still tend to “eat” with those who are closest to us – Executives eat with executives, athletes eat with other athletes, Frat boys eat with other frat boys, and those who play Dungeons and Dragons, still eat alone. To dine in a social setting is to tacitly be accepted in ones group and have them fall under your “protection”. We are partaking in an ancient ritual that stated that “If you eat with us, you are ONE of us.”

Italian men learned this secret hundreds of years ago. They knew that if they MASTERED the Culinary Arts, Women would literally fall to pieces and naturally be attracted to them.  It’s for this reason that Italy has some of the best food on the planet and not surprisingly, some of the best seducers of all time have called Italy home at one point.

The seductive power of cooking for ones mate was SO potent, that those Kings and Lords in charge ruled it a feminine task.  You couldn’t have the game keeper cooking for the Queen or else all sorts of affairs would start taking place from within the palace.  If you were a male and you knew this powerful art, to admit to having this skill risked being ousted from your group. Thus, males interested in the culinary arts were confined to their homes in the world’s first form of “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell”.

The 60s changed all of that.  The second wave of the Feminist Movement gave rise to the idea that Women COULD perform outside of the house and could be included in the workplace alongside their male counterparts. With women now entering the workforce in greater and greater numbers, American males discovered this ancient secret that had been long forgotten with the exception of those Italian males who had passed this tradition from father to son, generation after generation.

In college, I experienced this directly on multiple occasions. With some of my closest friends being from very Italian areas of Long Island, when you came over, it was customary to have one of the guys living there to “cook” for the group. Cooking for ones boys was not seen as unmanly, you were simply taking care of your family. Watch this Youtube Clip of Clemenza in Godfather, starting at :32 (Re: Godfather I, http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eea8vp8z8Jg ).

Enter the Present Day.

Taking a woman out for dinner is the worst thing you can do on a first date.  It’s so common it’s seen as unoriginal. You are attempting to forgo a crucial aspect of the seduction process by initiating her into your group without any sort of qualification on her part. You are treating her as “family” before you even know who she is or what she’s about.  With dating, its best to do things that are active that get her involved in the process and thus, cooking for someone and better yet, cooking together is seen as much more romantic.

You don’t need to cook like Emeril Lagasse (http://www.emerils.com/) to snag a few dates. All you have to do is have a few (4-5) solid dishes you can pull out on occasion.  I tend to go for more Italian style cooking but as a general rule, cooking a dish of a certain country (i.e. “Spanish” dish, “Italian”, “Mediterranean”) will win you more points with her than Hamburgers and Fries cooked on your Foreman Grill.

She may not be up for "body sushi" on a first date, but Hey, there's a first time for everything!

If American food is all you know, there is a real simple solution to this –  Buy some exotic seasoning (ask someone working at the store for advice), and give it a clever name.  If all you cooked was chicken with some lemon juice on it, pick a language that your date doesn’t know (If she’s Chinese, pick Farsi; If she’s French; pick Swahili; If she’s German, pick Cherokee).  There are a ton of resources on the web for translating into a foreign language on the fly, but by far my favorite is Google’s Translation Dictionary: http://translate.google.com/translate_t# .  Whatever language you choose  – make sure it’s a language she doesn’t know so you aren’t forced to explain why you just cooked her “Frog Testicles”.

The TIMING of when you offer to fix her a dish is crucial. Women are inclined to turn down any offer that requires them to be at your place of residence BEFORE its established that there is any sort of romantic/sexual connection between the two of you. This will send up red flags in her head.  So, leave a cooking date until after you’ve been out with her a few times and you’ve kissed her once or twice or she has given you the “It’s on” look. Yes, of course you may get the girls that meet you on Tuesday and she feels comfortable enough around you to come over that Friday but these types of girls are few and far between so don’t bank on it. She may genuinely be interested in you but turn down any invitations that are remotely close to your bedroom.

As mentioned before, it’s even better if you two cook dinner together – Offer to fix the main dish and she prepares the appetizer and desert.  For some reason, this act of cooking unlocks some dormant aphrodisiac and causes the pheromones to shoot through the roof.  If she’s weary of going to your home right away, take her out to a picnic. Go to a grocery store together and shop for ingredients. Locate a nice place beforehand such as a local park or a lake, grab a blanket, an iPod with portable MP3 speakers,  throw on some music, pop a bottle of wine, and you just gave her one of the best dates she’s been on in the past year.

A picnic at a remote location is one of Man's Best Kept Secret. Search around your area for scenic parks that would be conducive to this! They are literally everywhere!

So, ditch the Ramen noodles and McDonalds and cook for yourself, your friends and family to build up your culinary skills.  If a community center is offering cooking, take a few classes there.  You’ll have an UNCANNY power at your hands and because so few guys are willing to do this, it will set you light years ahead of your competition…Bon Appetite Gentlemen, and your woman will thank you later.

There are a ton of sites dedicated to easy recipes on the web, here are just a few:

• About.com – Southern Food Steak Recipe
• Buzzle.com – Easy Recipes for Two
• Food Network – Easy Dinner