This is me

My name is Jennifer. I came about cooking in a round about way. Growing up dinner almost always consisted of a lb. of this and a box of that (hamburger helper style). My parents had a couple good meals up their sleeves but those meals didn't happen all that often. When I went away to college I was studying dietetics. I was encouraged to volunteer at the hospital since that is what my program was basically preparing us to do with our degree. While there I had to go around to the rooms and pick up menu cards with the patients desired meals circled. I remember one day walking into a woman's room who was being discharged in a couple hours after giving birth - she feebly told me to get the menu card off the table and to circle items for her "honey, do you want any of that?" she called to her baby daddy. I circled what she told me and left. A few halls away a very old man was moved into a room after recovery from open heart surgery. He didn't have too much strength but he had made the faintest little dots next to the items he wanted. Later that day I also got a pepsi thrown at me by a man in detox. I left the hospital, giving up on my volunteer efforts. The next term I was enrolled in a class called Cooking for Quantity. In this class we learned how to cook large amounts of food (for retirements homes, the other option for utilizing my degree). We learned that people do not like to eat a plate of food that is all one color, if there is a checkerboard floor, people with walkers might feel overwhelmed and just not come down to the dining room to eat. Again I felt frustrated by the classes teachings. I decided I wanted to give people good food, in happy atmospheres, and on occasion be able to teach a customer something new. I switched my degree to Food Service Management. To round out my classes I learned about the history of food, worldly cuisine, how to run a bar, and how to design food spaces. My flame was lit.
After school I began teaching myself to cook by watching Food Network. At the time it was Rachel Ray, Paula Deen, Ina Garten, and Giada DeLaurentiis. I loved them all for what they offered. I moved back home for a while and I introduced my parents to new foods; red leaf lettuce, mango, lentils. I also taught them that you can make mayonnaise, mom's family recipe that we called 'barbeque beef stew' was actually a goulash, and that the microwave is the worst way to thaw food.
After a quarter life crisis I decided to move from Alaska to Oregon. With the economy in a slump I decided to go to culinary school. I enrolled in a diploma program for Baking and Patisserie in the fall of 2010. Sadly, many of the classes I was scheduled to take had nothing to do with baking but I learned about all the cooking methods, the mother sauces, regional foods, how to break down a lamb, that a raspberry hole is not sightly.
In my days off I like to get in the kitchen. My goods come from farmers markets when I get a chance. If I want to try something new I often visit Martha Stewart's website first because I believe her team has developed a well tested recipe - and then I tweak the recipe once I'm comfortable. I feel like I am able to show my love for my friends by sharing my cooked goods.

My hope for this blog is a creative outlet where I can share a new cookbook, a recipe and picture of something yummy, and maybe even a great experience with food in a restaurant. Here goes...