I am not one to have many 'creative' or 'original' ideas....which you get used to eventually. Business name ideas, using "old" names for your kids thinking the trends are still edging toward new more "trendy" names....and then running in to no fewer than 8 little boys with the same nickname. And one with the same first & middle. Yeah. Well, at least I know it's a good name, right?

This is a common theme in my life...and it extends to the kitchen. I cook what I know...and I don't know squat! But, I love watching 'cooking shows'. Master Chef, Hell's Kitchen, Iron Chef these are some of my favorites. Probably because the only time I get to watch Food Network or Food TV, whatever it's called now, is when Paula Dean is on. Now, there is nothing wrong with Paula Dean, but, we can't eat "southern style" all the time with out greatly increasing our pants sizes. And quite frankly, I'd like mine to get SMALLER!! Not that my idea will actually achieve that goal either.

Last night as I was cleaning up the kitchen I opened that cabinet over the fridge (you know the one you can't reach so the stuff you never use gets shoved in there when you unpack?...yeah that one) and I pulled out a book my grandmother sent me when I got married. Every time I had attempted to use the book before I either didn't have the proper equipment, or couldn't find enough of the ingredients, or both. Well, now there are still a lot of things I don't have, and probably a lot of things I can't find, but now I know I can find substitutions by doing a Google search.

So I went through the cookbook, and I cut apart post-it notes (I have an over-abundance of regular post it notes) and marked roughly 72 NEW things to try to cook, or to draw inspiration from. This is also in an effort to learn how to cook, so I can come up with some things of my own. Sometime I would really love is a great cookbook for veggies, mostly as sides, but as the main dish would be ok...I just don't know how to cook veggies and they're ALWAYS gross. Overcooked, undercooked, or just, yucky.

So, in a perfect world I would cook 4 new things a week, but if I go by budget it will probably just be 1 or two. I *have* to have a 'back up' I do have kids to feed!! The next step in this task will be deciding when to cook what. I need to look at ingredients and see what I can get and what I'll need to wait for....AND what I can plan to GROW! YAY! Garden ideas!! Another thing I needed. Too bad it's fracking December and the ground is nearly rock hard and I did zero prepping.

Well, I should get back to the cookbook, and my menu planning :D