Skinny Chef Kickoff!!

Well, here it is. A blog totally dedicated to my love of cooking, baking...ok, let's just get down to it...my love of food!!! I love all things food. Food shows, cooking food, baking food, buying food, eating food...my love affair with food has been a long one. Not always a healthy one, but maybe we'll get to more of that at another time. Let's kick this thing off right!

Ok, first let me explain the title. I am many things but skinny and a chef are not on the list. But I like to think that somewhere deep inside is a skinny little hot mama waiting to come out. Her only hindrance is, you guessed it, food!!! I am so far from being a chef, it kind of makes me chuckle to even use that word. Ask my husband when we first married! I was FAR from even being a decent cook. I think my couch potato-ness led to a dear relationship with Food Network. It all started with Rachel Ray. The appeal of cooking a meal in 30 minutes was definitely for me!! Although I've never actually been able to cook a meal from one of her cookbooks in less than an hour (not to mention the aimless wandering in the store looking for obscure ingredients. What the heck are pignoli nuts anyways?) Now I love watching cooking competition shows. I've learned so much about cooking from watching these shows. They've given me a little more confidence to step out of the box and try some new things. Last night I received a huge compliment from my hubby. He said "you know, you've really become a great cook!" This from the man who grew up with a momma that can cook anything and everything tastes amazing! Another reason I am not in the chef category, not even close to it, is I don't really make up new recipes on my own. On the rare occassion that I'm feeling super adventurous (and pretty confident that it will turn out half way decent) I will just go for it and be creative, but mostly I cook/bake things that I find in a cookbook or online. Some of my recent favorites include:
-Italian Cream Cake
-Bread Pudding
-Prailine Chicken
-Papas con Chile (just like Abuelo's!)
-Anything from bakerella.com (gotta love anything that you can put on a stick)
-my dad's chili recipe
-Banana bread
and the list goes on and on...... (can you see why I'm not skinny?)

If you want recipes for any of these let me know, I'll share!

So I'm going to give this blog a try. I will include pictures and recipes of things I make and I'll let you know how successful (or unsuccessful) the dishes are. Trust me, I'm my own worst critic. I will not let you waste your time on a bad dish. If it's not good, or not worth the time it takes to make it, I'll let you know. You can also send me any recipes you think I should try. I'm up for anything! My family is used to being the guinea pigs by now. I've made some pretty intersting (aka, nasty) meals over the past 4 1/2 years. Happy reading (and eating)!