Chatterbox: Down to Earth

Cooking and Baking!

My family is the type that will buy food from a Filipino restaraunt/take-out place, freeze, then microwave when needed. The only "freshly cooked" food we eat is steak and fried chicken. Both are only born/cooked during the summer and New Year's in the former's case. (and when we have Magic Sarap! seasoning for the latter) Baking is during the holidays and is normally reserved to box mixes.

But on one fateful day, my class was cutting out magazine clippings and I stumbled upon a recipe for chocolate chunk cookies with pecans. And the recipe did not call for any brand of box mixes. (It did call for a brand of chocolate- Baker's semisweet- but that doesn't count.)

The cookies were pretty good. So on a snow day, I looked through the cabinets and found enough ingredients for a type of brownie that is partly baked in a skillet.

And it tasted pretty good.

So my parents' had regained faith in my cooking (though it somewhat waned after a slightly-dry ((secretly over-floured and I-forgot-the-vanilla-extract)) banana bread). Alors (therefore), I embarked on a new mission.

DINNER

I made fettucine alfredo with mushrooms and bacon because my parents love mushrooms and my parents and I love bacon. The first time it was pretty good but the recipe only served 2 people with medium stomachs, not 2 people with large stomachs and 1 person with a small stomach. The second time the sauce needed more bacon and mushrooms. The third time I got it right. ;)

Tomorrow I'm moving on to mushroom marsala pasta with artichokes. I'm so excited! (And yes, I'm aware that marsala is a wine. I'm currently trying to find a substitute.)

I have had a cooking nightmare though. It was something along the lines of me trying to see if the range was on by using my hand. ;) And then a few days ago I found out that pot lids held over boiling water are very hot...

Does anybuggy cook and/or bake? And do you guys have any tips for a newbie like moi?

It sounds like you're off to a good start, Olive. Like any new skill, the more you do it, the better you'll get. When you cook with wine, the alcohol boils off so what is left is just the flavor. Really, if you can read, you can cook. So many recipes can be found online. Or you could look for a beginner's cookbook. Usually dishes that have fewer ingredients are easier to make. Buon apetit!

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