My year long experiment has reached the conclusion of its first month. My metrics for success are that I continue to enjoy both cooking and logging my ideas/recipes/experiments. Cooking has become more fun because we are now having longer discussions about how to style the food for the pictures, what we would change next time, what everyone wants to eat for the day/week depending on how far in advance we are planning. Having never cataloged what we eat, I am amazed that within a month, we never ate the same thing. This wasn’t planned, this is just how we live. Even better I have had conversation with friends, coworkers, yoga teachers about what we are thinking about tonight/this weekend. It has been a success in the first month and am happy I am doing this. Best comment I have received from someone was “I tried your Bao recipe with some small modifications in the cut of meat and my wife said it was the best thing I have made. I told her it was your recipe and her response was, sorry.”
11 months (or more) to go and hopefully I will start repeating some recipes so that the cataloging is faster. But 31 days in, 34 posts, 2 dinners out, and lots of fun experimenting and cooking.
The best thing I have learned is that my love of fermentation has been renewed though not with beer but with food. I will be sharing my “fermentation station” in the future as a ode to Brad Leone from Bon Appetite. We had to make a special place in the kitchen for all the experiments that I have in mind. Living in the suburbs has its advantages of having a huge kitchen.
Keep cooking and experimenting and getting the kids involved.
Working Dad Cooks 