Yummmm or maybe not.

The food in our household varies greatly. From a very basic tomatoe sauce and pasta for dinner, to occasional gourmet beautifully plated meals. I try to keep it healthy, and I try to include a good variety.

Lately, I have tried to focus more on basics and making things elaborate by using basics and not cream sauces and the like. I have been thinking about the fact that my children will be leaving my home one day and will need to know how to feed themselves, not just healthy eating, but sometimes quick and sometimes to entertain, sometimes to comfort and sometimes to regain health.

Food means so much to me. On the one hand it has always been something I have battled with. Not in your classic sense of an eating disorder, but as the one thing that I could control when I was young. It is also that thing , you know some people buy their kids things to show love, some people will always say good things no matter what to show love. I cook, and bake and experiment with food to show love. I wouldn't say I feed people to death or that I kill people with my love by feeding them. I do enjoy working hard and watching peoples faces when I hit on a recipe that lights up their eyes.

I love the feeling of seeing someone savor their food and relish the moment, or having it take them back to a different happy moment as they remember a smell or taste, texture or temperature. I love to please people with food.

My first experience doing this was probably the first time I made Christmas Dinner for my Grampa and the rest of my family. When dinner was done Grampa gave me a great compliment by putting a piece of bread on his plate and slathering it with gravy. Then the verbal compliment came and I was glowing. That was probably the first time I felt the warmth and love of good food.

Since then I have always put love into the food I make, but sometimes it has been to excess and not very healthy, so lately I have taken to being very careful what I feed my family.

I have been experimenting with different ingredients I can say from my recent experience that my family does not really like tofu. I have tried it in a couple of different recipes and it hasn't gone over well. But after recently watching Ratatouille I decided to make Remy's ratatouille and the family loved it, I served it over couscous and made the presentation lovely, and everyone gobbled it up. Well actually Sammy didn't find it to be his favorite but it was in general a success. So here is the recipe as a link Remy's Ratatouille. So Enjoy and maybe I will include some other recipes that I have made lately in another post. Maybe my Chocolate inspired marital goodies.