GOSSIP FROM THE GIRLFRIEND GATHERINGS

Learning from YOU to empower ME !

NaBloPoMo #5 – Using Recipes as A Guide

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When I do prepare a full course meal for the holidays and family gatherings I use recipes.    Normally, I follow them to the letter and when I do make adjustments it is usually a shortcut.   However, I make sure that the shortcut does not compromise the end “taste” result of the dish.    I feel justified in doing this because I do choose complicated and new recipes to try on these rare occasions when I put on my apron.

NaBloPoMo #4 – Have I Ever Invented a Recipe?

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I am an adventurous person and I enjoy tasting new dishes from friends or at a new restaurant.    Call me up and I am that girlfriend that will taste test your new dessert or try out that new pasta dish at the favorite restaurant (i.e., like that wonderful seafood ravioli I had recently at the original, family-owned Carrabba’s Restaurant on Kirby Drive in Houston – www.carrabasoriginal.com ).     However, I have not been adventurous enough to create a recipe in my own kitchen and cooking life.

There have been occasions that I have experimented with grilling beef, pork, chicken and seafood using different seasonings from one of my favorite cooking stores – Penzeys Spices (www.penzeys.com), I have added to an existing soup/entrée recipe and I have even fooled my “bake-from-scratch-only” Mom by doctoring up one of those Duncan Hines box cake mixes but I don’t think these action will count as inventing a recipe.

My life isn’t over.  I still have time.   I think I will add this to my bucket list.

NaBloPoMo #3 – My Choice?- Personal Chef or Self-Prepared Meals

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This is a no-brainer for me.   If I could afford a live-in personal chef, I would gladly hire one because preparing my meals is only a necessary task for me.   It is not something that I am very imaginative about in preparation.    I can be imaginative if I am having a party or visitors in my home but that is not often.

The generation of women in my family immediately preceding my generation were/are fabulous cooks.   My paternal grandmother was a cook for a wealthy family and all of the women in my extended family cooked / baked all of the time.   We had fresh homemade desserts every day at dinner.    They loved to prepare all types of food and I don’t remember myself, my sister, or any of the females in my generation every really being required to cook.   We were given the choice and my choice was to bake not cook.

Living the single-life now, I don’t really spend a lot time preparing meals.   I sort of “put” them together using the Deli, steamed seafood, and Café on the Run at my local HEB store (www.heb.com).  Also, I will pick up a BBQ chicken or other meat at Pappas Barbecue (http://pappasbbq.com/) and then prepare a salad or other side dish at home to accompany it.    Since I am now embracing a healthier lifestyle I have discovered My Fit Foods (http://www.myfitfoods.com/) and I really enjoy their fresh, healthy, and tasty meals.   It is now my plan to use their meals for my dinner meal and self-prepare my breakfast and lunch meals.   I believe this combination will be perfect for my schedule, my budget and my Monday-morning date with the scale.

NaBloPoMo #2 – How Do I Wish I Ate?

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The purpose of food is to nourish our bodies so that we can live and be healthy.    I believe that nourishment is an individual pursuit and we should not get distracted in the feeding patterns of others that have a certain desired physical appearance.   It is important for me to discover and maintain the eating pattern that provides a healthy lifestyle for me.

As I mentioned in the previous post, my daily eating routine is a 3-meals-with-a-snack pattern.    I have tried eating smaller meals 5 – 6 times a day but this did not work for me.    For some reason, when I eat more frequently I am hungry all day long.   My ideal eating pattern is 3 meals a day with the largest meal in the middle of the day and no afternoon snack.    I am weaning away that afternoon snack and actually did not have one today.

I also believe that “where” we eat is important to a healthy lifestyle.   In my childhood, it was required that the family sit down at the dinner table together for meals.  There was no eating on the run or in front of the television.   It seems food is more enjoyable and a person is more cognizant of what/how much they are eating when in this type of setting.   So, my ideal eating pattern is to experience each meal in the manner of my childhood.

NaBloPoMo #1 – Nourish – How Do I Eat My Daily Meals?

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Food is my nemesis.   It is difficult to live with it and impossible to live without it.  Living in Houston where there are great restaurants around every corner makes it very difficult to prepare food at home and then there are those Texas-sized portions.    You can feed 2 ½ persons from 1 restaurant entrée in Texas.   Recently, a colleague was here from Budapest for a month on expense account and he told me even though he was working out every day at the hotel he still gained 6 kilos! (I still need to convert that to pounds in my mind.)

How do I eat my daily meals?   Normally, I eat three meals a day with an afternoon snack – during that 3pm lull.   I sit down to eat lunch, dinner, and breakfast on the weekend but breakfast during the work week is eaten in the car driving to work or in the office while checking email.    I know this is a bad habit but it seems so hard to break because I am always crunched for time in the work week mornings.   Writing this blog post has helped me to see that I really need to make this change.