About Me

The Self-Proclaimed Foodie

Three years ago I fell in love. I fell in love with cooking and the feeling I get when I am in a kitchen surrounded by food. The smell of garlic and onion sautéing away in a saucepan and the way a pot of homemade spaghetti sauce fills the house with its irresistible aroma as it simmers away half the day. The crispy, perfectly charred pieces of a rare steak that has been perfectly barbequed. Bacon!.Do I even need to explain my love for bacon? And the way that lasagna feels like a big hug on a bad day when you pull it out of the oven with its browned edges, melting cheese and bubbling sauce. Ahhhh, its love!

Before this time the kitchen was the only place in my house that was spotless. In fact the sign hanging in my kitchen was “The reason I have a kitchen is because it came with the house”. I feared the kitchen and hated it at the same time. Cooking was something that I just did not do. Calling for take-out was more my speed. Maybe it was because I was the manager in restaurants or the Food and Beverage Manager at a golf course that caused this. In all of these jobs my role was always the Front of House and the kitchen was always a place that I seldom ventured to unless it was to taste the food that was being served or to make sure that my servers were getting the food from the kitchen on a timely basis and not letting it sit. I did not dare tell the Chef what to do in his or her kitchen and risk a sauté pan flung at my head  and yes this has happened (I have worked with some very temperamental chefs).  

Most of my life has revolved around food and cooking so it never really made sense to anyone, especially me now looking back why cooking was such a repellent.  My father was a chef and managed a restaurant before I was born and continued his passion for cooking even after he left life in the restaurant business. Parties at my house meant a detailed menu and food that looked like it came straight out of a magazine. Even now he is my go to person for food questions. My first job was a server in a family owned Mexican food restaurant where I worked on and off for 8 years throughout school until the opportunity to manage an Italian restaurant presented itself. Part of that job was three weeks in the kitchen and I do not know who was more excited to see the completion of that time. Me or my Kitchen Trainer? Let’s just say I was less than graceful in the kitchen. My career in the field of Hospitality evolved and changed over years from Restaurant Manager to Wedding Planner to the Food and Beverage Manager but my feelings for the kitchen never changed. I loved food; I just hated to be the one cooking it. I even loved entertaining so long as it was catered.  

Then something happened, a change in the way that I thought about the experience of cooking itself. I stopped putting pressure on my food to be perfect (which was difficult to say the least as a perfectionist) and I no longer stress out about if my sauce will come together or if I overcooked the chicken. I stopped second guessing every step and gained confidence in the kitchen and in my food. I went into it with the thought that, “Oh well, if it doesn't turn out we can always order pizza”. That simple change in the way I thought was all I needed to unleash years of tension over cooking. There was no longer all the pressure to be perfect. Now I revel in the recipes that turn out fabulous and laugh at the ones that are a disaster. I look at the disasters as another opportunity to try it again.  I even use cooking it as a way of connecting with places I have visited or when I feel homesick for the town I grew up in.

This blog is an ode to the places I have been, the food that I fell in love with, the recipes that come to me at two in the morning and the ones that I continue to try but are just never the same as my Nini’s (what I called my grandma).