The Rules and Reasons for this Madness

Anyone who knows me will not be surprised to see that my first blogging experience is dedicated to food. Ever since I can remember I have been obsessed with food. My roommates in college were afraid of me because I had the pantry so well organized/memorized that I could tell what they ate for a snack within seconds of looking at the shelves. In fact, I still do this to Paul. When we go on vacation I start planning where we will go for lunch and dinner five seconds after we order breakfast. When my mom goes on vacation without me, which has gotten to be all too common lately, I first ask her about her dining experiences before anything else when I call her. In fact, during her most recent vacation to Vegas she sent me three pictures of food via her Blackberry just to torment me.

If a stranger were to ask me what my favorite thing to do is other than spend time with my family I would without question respond with, "go out to eat." I love going to restaurants. Everything about it thrills me. I love looking over the menu, deciding what to order, having it brought to the table and leaving without cleaning up. Those whom have dined with me will find this comical because I have been deemed Sally from When Harry Met Sally several times. I guess I can be a little picky , but my theory is if I'm paying for it it should be exactly how I like it. Until we had children, Paul and I would typically eat out or order in 3-4 times a week. We thought it was more cost effective to do this than cook for two and I was not raised on leftovers so any time I did cook the remainder of the meal ended up in the trash. Both of my grandmothers would die if they just heard me admit that. Once Austin arrived things got worse as far as cooking went. I was tired and wanted to spend every second with him not in the kitchen cooking a meal for 2 hours. So we starting ordering in even more. Things started looking up when Austin began solid foods because now I was cooking for three. However, my lack of skills meant that "cooking" was polish sausage and pierogis(frozen). So often we'd end up at a restaurant anyway.

I have recently realized that aside from the HUGE cost of eating out, it also is not very healthy. I always thought I was making healthy choices but who am I kidding that Turkey Burger from Ruby Tuesdays the night I said "I'm going to eat healthy," is 1112 calories and my favorite SALAD from Claimjumper is 2672 calories...WTF!!!

Peyton is here now and has single handedly forced me to cook dinner because her bedtime is between 5-5:30pm EVERY night. This so far has been a huge blessing in disguise because we have saved a TON of money by eating at home. But, I have found myself "cooking" for lack of a better term CRAP. Mac n cheese, creamed soup base casseroles, and tacos are my go to staples. I love all of these things and in moderation they are great but I repeat the same 10 things every month .Also, I don't want to teach our kids to eat the same not so healthy meals that Paul and I have learned to love during the last few years. So that brings me here challenging myself to do the impossible...cook for 30 days straight(Dinner only). Because I know that I could easily fall back into my cooking trap, I'm setting some ground rules.

Rule 1
The meal must contain at least one vegetable(POTATOES DO NOT COUNT)

Rule 2
The weekly menu must be a variety of cuisines. Specifically each week must include a meal from each of the following categories:
Chicken
Meat(beef, pork, turkey)
Pasta
Childhood Favorite(Recipe from either of our mothers' recipe box)
Casserole
Crock Pot
5 ingredients or less
Dessert(only one night)

Rule 3
Prep time can be no longer than 20 minutes( I have 2 kids under 3...no need to explain further)

Rule 4
It must be kid friendly. No intense spice or really strange ingredients.

Rule 5
No Fish. I love it, but Paul hates it and Austin cannot eat it yet.

Rule 6
Two of the Seven meals must be completely, never tried before, new recipes.

Rule 7
The monthly dinner grocery bill cannot exceed $175( I will take this into account while planning the weekly menus based on what is on sale and what I have coupons for)

Those are the rules for cooking. I will post my weekly menu online and each day provide the recipe for what I am cooking as well as a play by play of how my time in the kitchen played out. Paul and I will both rate the recipe on a scale of one to five.
Scale:
1 What the hell is this shit, I wouldn't even feed it to our dog
2 In a desperate circumstance, I'd eat it
3 It was worth the time/money
4 Congratulations, you have earned a permanent spot in the recipe box
5 Sweet Jesus!!! That was the best damn thing I've ever eaten!

I will also include what Austin has to say about it. I have some recipes up my sleeve but with 30 days to fill I clearly need more so If you have a favorite recipe or find one on the web send it my way. Time to get cookin!!!!

Start Date: April 5, 2010
Menu to be posted soon.