Amateur Cook

Hi, my name is Kim. I am 44 years old, happily married and a mother to four sons; one of whom also shares a love for cooking. I have always enjoyed cooking, although I lost sight of that for awhile due to feeling discouraged. The job that I now have has brought that love for cooking back in sight for me. What is that job? Well, I'll tell you. I work in our town's local grocery store in the deli. I am responsible for the production case, which I fill with sandwiches, salads, and other items that I prepare there each day.

Being busy has kept me away from the joy and achievement that I feel when I actually go all out on preparing a meal that does not come prepared in a box or the frozen food section. It is hard for me to excel in the whole learning process of becoming a better cook and learning new skills related to cooking, due to the fact that my family is pretty picky about what types of foods they like. This has kept me in a little box of what I can prepare. But  have decided that this is something that I want to become better at, so I am going to try out these recipes regardless. So, since I had the day off from work today, I decided that today would be the day that I start. I have been excited all day about this and it turned out fairly well.

Tonight for dinner I prepared sweet and sour pork, which is a stir fry dish; and for dessert I made a mandarin orange cake. Between my husband and I, we came up with some things that we would change about the recipe and the qualities of each recipe, including textures and flavors. I thoroughly enjoyed myself tonight, even though I was very nervous about how well my family would accept these new dishes.

 I will type out the recipes in my following blog post, for anyone who would like to try them out and then explain the alterations that my husband and I decided for the next time I may prepare these dishes.