Progress! Menu Ideas for the Occasionally Befuddled Home Chef

While I am still many many years away from anything approaching expertise, lately I've been finally feeling like I have a handle of some of the things that have been challenging me in the food arena lo these many years.

One of the things that I have been trying to learn throughout all of this isn't just the foodie side of cooking, but rather the home ec side.  How do I keep myself fed in a way that is efficient and realistic, but still tasty?

After much trial and error, I'm starting to compile a list of not just individual recipes but full meals and/or recipes+strategies that is making it a little easier for me to be satisfied with what I make at home, without it always devolving to the 13-hour cook-a-thon.  

Or if it does, it's a strategic cook-a-thon that is done at a convenient time on a weekend and pays off with many quickly-prepared lunchs or dinners later that week or month.  My Slow Fast Food thing: spending a lot of time on a meal, but maybe not when the meal is actually going to happen.

I've started posting some of the recipes and strategies I've found in the Breakfast, Lunch, Dinner and Desserts/Snacks/Gifts sections to the right there.

None of them is groundbreaking or revolutionary.  It's just some ideas, in case you, too, sometimes get stuck and are not sure what else to do for lunch or dinner and maybe just want somebody else's idea to help get your own imagination going.

Where appropriate, I'm putting in the steps I've taken that can be done in advance or other strategies and tweaks I've liked that I did with other folks' recipes.

It's a start for now, but I hope to continue to add on a regular basis.  I also want to try to increase my Fast Fast Food skillz, i.e., weeknight dinners that do NOT require a big investment of time on the weekend, but rather can be thrown together quickly at the last minute.  This is a weak spot of mine.  

But the great thing about all this food learning that I've done is that I've also learned HOW to learn (somehow I missed that through all my years of schooling, thanks, honor classes and film school!), and know that even though a subject feel daunting and foreign, it can be attempted. 

New Year, New Look, New Features, New Goals

What?

What is it?

Why are you looking at me funny?

Okay, all right, I’ll admit it (lowers voice, gestures for you to come closer): I’ve had a little work done.

Nothing too major. Brightened things with a new background and color scheme, plumped up the center column, grafted on the extra column of info to the right there. Minor procedures. I did it down in Mexico; it was much cheaper there.

I feel like a brand new blog!

And that’s not the only change that is happening around here. I have also added a Bookshelf page (up top) with some of the books I have been referring to a lot here.  Right now, it's just the books and links (click on the book).  I will add the why's soon.

I am most excited about my plans for the Menu Idea sections to the right there.

The major impetus for me learning to cook was that I was really clueless about how to eat. Every time I was able to assemble a plate that looked like what I thought the Platonic ideal of a meal was supposed to be – protein, starch, veg – I felt triumphant.

Even with all the cooking I’ve been doing, I still fall back into that occasional total confusion as to what the heck to put together for a meal. As I’ve mentioned before, actually writing things down is pretty much the only way I learn something, so I'm hoping the Menu Ideas will help me be a little less mouth-breathy next time I have a guest and need to cook something on the fly.  I know I can't always rely on my brain to remember this stuff, but now I will be able to rely on my blog.

One of the big categories within the Menu Ideas will be what I am calling Slow Fast Food, or making something ahead of time that might be time- or labor-intensive, but that can make for a fast and really satisfying meal with less time during a work week, etc.

So keep an eye on those sections (just placeholders for now) as I will be adding recipes and links over the coming months.

And beyond that, I have some other goals for what I’m doing in the kitchen and therefore on this blog. That’s right: it’s time for some resolutions. For a lot of resolutions, in fact.

I have six cooking resolutions planned for the New Year, and just to be all cutesy about it, they all start with R. For the next week or so, I’ll be posting a new resolution about them. Here’s a sneak peek:

1. Resourcefulness
2. Repetition
3. Research
4. Restraint
5. Readiness
6. Reward