Why did I decided to start a Blog?

      Let me be clear as I begin this blog. I have never blogged, I have never even really read a blog.  I am not a writer, I am not a professional chef. I am someone who loves to cook and believe I do it well.  I admit it - I am a huge copycat, having been inspired by seeing the film Julie and Julia last night.  I have a friend about to embark into cooking school and this weekend we were sharing our passion for food.  Another friend with professional kitchen background and I chat regularly about food. This is added inspiration as to why to embark on this experiment.
     My passion for food started as a child as do many people's, watching my mother and my grandmother cook.  When I was 12, my mother signed me up for a cooking for kids class to get me out of the house on Saturday's.  It was given by the head chef at the Hotel-Intercontinental in NYC.  Every Saturday we would take the PATH train into the city and change to the E Train to Lex and 53 and go to this class, where at 12 years old, I got to experience something that many people ever do.  I got to cook amazing food in a huge gourmet professional kitchen.  I was hooked. I still have most of my recipes from that class and now 27 years later, still make many of these recipes ( some which are in my memory by now) .  I learned to make puff pastry from scratch, which became croissants and Beef Wellingtons. We made quiches, chicken dishes, beef dishes, chocolate and cheese souffles and chocolate mousse. Whatever we asked Chef Daniel to teach us, he did.  At the end of the class we had an article written about us in American Airlines magazine where I am quoted and we appeared on Patricia McCann's radio show on WOR talk radio. Needless to say it was an amazing experience.  I was sure I wanted to cook for a living.
      I never did embark to culinary school.  I graduated from high school young, and cooking school would have meant being completed with school and out in the working world by 18, and I wasn't quite ready to speed my life along, so I opted for traditional 4 year college. Life proceeded, and I pursued a different career that I still love, and I became a wife and a working mother. I continue to cook and throw cocktail and dinner parties for my family and friends from all kinds of recipes from cookbooks, memoirs, internet and magazines.
      One of my friends years ago lent me Ruth Reichl's first Memoir, Tender to the Bone and I adored it.  Some time after the same friend attended a Great Cooks dinner in Washington, DC and gave me an autographed copy of The Gourmet Cookbook edited by Ruth Reichl.  Ruth is quoted on the back of the book "Our goal was to give you a book with every recipe you would ever want", and they came damn near close. It is rare that I venture to this book and can't find something I am looking for.  I have many other sources of recipes I use, and might like better than in this book, but I have yet to make anything from this book that hasn't been amazing.
    So here, I begin an experiment to see how much I can cook from this book, and along the way will comment about other things I cook and eat along the way. I would like to be as determined as Julie Powell to set a deadline for myself, but given that I am not a writer or a professional chef with a particular goal, I will set no deadline or promises to enter every day.  This is about my own self discovery and let's see where it takes me. Hopefully I won't make my husband and son crazy along the way.

Happy cooking and eating everyone!