This column is dedicated to married men, single men and their long-suffering spouses and significant others:

Imagine yourself as the newest member of a six-member crew of a seiner/dragger on the coast of Maine. The money will be good, because the reputation of the fishing vessel is well known.

The skipper says to you before you leave port, “Would you consider being the cook on this boat?”

It was a loaded question. Glenn, the skipper, knew the other four had neither the aptitude nor the interest in the job. Roger was 6’4″ and 300 pounds, much more able to put food away than put it on the table. Chuck, the bug boat man, liked to drink way more than eat. John Boy, barely 20, had no idea about cooking and most other things, and Neville, in his 50s, shunned almost any task except his job of reeling in the lead lines as we drew the big seine closer to the boat.

That left me, and, looking around, I realized I wouldn’t want any one else cooking for me. So I agreed to be the cook.

Now, every one’s situation is different. If you are a man who’s been married for a number of years, you probably expect dinner (breakfast and lunch) on the table when you are ready to eat. Much like you expect clean floors, bathrooms and clothes, as if by magic, since most likely, you and your spouse work full-time jobs.

Of course, on a seiner/dragger work is primary, and we all share the tasks, whether it is a six-day seining trip to catch as many herring as we can, or a three-day dragging trip to bring in 10,000 pounds of ground fish (cod, haddock and flat fish).

Everyone eats, and the work on a fishing boat produces prodigious appetites.

So my strategy was to produce large amounts of food I knew how to produce:

* Spaghetti from my mother’s recipe.

* Big batches of corned beef and cabbage, the first meal my mother fixed for my dad when they returned from their honeymoon in 1942. (That may have been more a testament to her lack of cooking skill, rather than a symbol of their shared Irish background.)

* Massive amounts of bacon and eggs, pancakes and French toast for breakfast, which I had learned to cook out of necessity as a hungry teenager while my parents slept in Saturday and Sunday mornings.

And then I had a brilliant idea: I asked the other crewmen to get their wives and mothers to give me recipes for Maine dinners. I got some great chowder recipes, which I put together for a rapt audience. I learned how to add crisp bits of salt pork to a fish chowder, and to be careful not to boil milk and cream — the consequences are disastrous if you do.

I had been raised on a clam chowder made by my grandmother when we dug clams with our toes in Peconic Bay, at the end of Long Island, N.Y. She cooked them with tomatoes, potatoes and celery into a delicious Manhattan-style chowder. I regret I never tried that on my fellow crewmen, mostly because you can’t find cherrystone clams anywhere around here and soft-shell clams would make a gloppy mess of it.

I never made dessert, but the cupboard drawers were filled with snacks to grab on your way on deck — candy bars, chocolate sandwich cookies, ginger snaps, etc.

The mark of a good cook is the ability to clean up the mess when the eating is done. On our boat, the hot water came from the kettle on a gas stove, and the dishes were rinsed with cold water from the tap. Then they were dried and put away, since a strong sea or storm will scatter dishes, pots and pans everywhere. The refrigerator door was tied shut when we were steaming.

Although I don’t need to tie the refrigerator door now, I still wash, dry and put away everything after a meal. If you do the same, everyone (your spouse or girlfriend) will be very happy.

Cook some other satisfying multi-meal recipes:

* Shepherd’s pie: mashed potatoes, kernel corn, fried hamburger and onions.

* Meat loaf: hamburger, sage, bread crumbs (or toasted bread cubes) onion and garlic.

* Curizzo sausage and kale soup with potatoes or barley.

Use lots of garlic, hot sauce, salt and pepper, sage, oregano and anything else you want to try on your food.

You are the cook! People will love you. I know.

Just don’t expect that dinner, or lunch, or breakfast will magically appear.

Denis Thoet owns and manages Long Meadow Farm in West Gardiner. www.longmeadowfarmmaine.com.

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