Friday, March 06, 2009
Cook & Digest
Being a professional chef I'm often being asked:
and the most frequent question is: Do I cook at home?
I love to entertain and cook for my family and friends (even though sometimes I feel so exhausted that I don't feel like cooking or going out so I'm just as happy to get a pizza delivered to my house so I can relax in my PJ's...).
Till not even a half a year ago I didn't mind spending my day off in the kitchen trying to impress my house guests - baking brioche, making seafood sausages and cleaning the artichokes to get those precious hearts out. As a chef I don't believe in short cuts - jarred marinara - absolutely a NO No. But now my life has changed significantly: we had a beautiful baby girl, Tessa. So I prefer to spend as much time as I can playing with her, making her laugh. I also make her baby food - quinoa meal cereal, organic fruit and vegetable purees, ext..
We still love to go out, but most of the time instead of enjoying my meal I keep frantically looking at my daughter with fear that she would start crying. As much as I love my baby I don't think it is fair to share my screaming bundle of joy with the other diners! Of course I could hire a sitter but that would add another $50-$60 to the night out. So I stick with what I know how to do the best - COOK. But now I take a different approach - I don't try to wow my husband or my friends with the homemade gnocchi and irresistibly smoky speck (where I have to drive 45 min each way to Philly just to get it!). I still can make a sublime homemade pasta (make extra, dry and keep it in your pantry till you need it!) with great quality prosciutto Di parma from Wegmans or even substitute homemade pasta with the store bought if I'm in time jam..Don't get me wrong I'm still going to make gnocchi and take a trip to Di Bruno's brothers sometimes, but the most of the time I prefer to stick to the delicious yet easy to make recipes that will take 1/3 of the time I used to spend in the kitchen.
So I decided to create Cook & Digest where I will be posting the dishes I cook for my family on daily basis. It is going to be seasonal, delicious, yet easy to make and not time consuming food. So I hope you will find it to be a great source of recipes and ideas for those of you who love food and enjoy cooking but don't have unlimited amount of time to do it.
Bon appetit!
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