Your cooking style/dishes vs. your S.O.'s style

[Koronin]

I'm the one that does the cooking, DH will do a bunch of grilling during the warmer months. However, if it's not seafood or Italian I'm pretty lost at trying to cook. I never bothered to learn until after I got married. Didn't need to at home (my mom is a really good cook). When I first moved out it was just me and I can easily live on pasta which is the only thing I learned how to cook before I got married. Even though Italian is about all I can cook I am not Italian in anyway. Go figure, I just love Italian food. (Also grew up in a fairly Italian area in Ohio, and when I moved discovered how lucky I was to have so many really good Italian restaurants. There aren't any good ones here, other than Olive Garden which is alright, but not what I'm used to).

[Owlie]

I'm the one that does the cooking, DH will do a bunch of grilling during the warmer months. However, if it's not seafood or Italian I'm pretty lost at trying to cook. I never bothered to learn until after I got married. Didn't need to at home (my mom is a really good cook). When I first moved out it was just me and I can easily live on pasta which is the only thing I learned how to cook before I got married. Even though Italian is about all I can cook I am not Italian in anyway. Go figure, I just love Italian food. (Also grew up in a fairly Italian area in Ohio, and when I moved discovered how lucky I was to have so many really good Italian restaurants. There aren't any good ones here, other than Olive Garden which is alright, but not what I'm used to).

What area are you from, if you don't mind me asking? I went to college within spitting distance of Little Italy (in Cleveland), and I very much miss the cheapish and tasty Italian food. And the gelato...especially the gelato...

[indysteel]

Before I met DH I didn't cook much and I generally found it intimidating. I started cooking more when we both decided that we didn't enjoy eating out all the time. Now I love to cook! DH cooks some, but most of it falls to me. He takes care of a lot of other things around the house, and I take a fair amount of pride in providing us home cooked food. I try to make two big dishes a week, one vegetarian and the other a meat dish. We then get several dinners and often some lunches from that. He generally likes just about everything I make, but we usually agree on what dishes make it into the regular rotation. I read a lot if recipes and make an effort to keep things generally pretty healthy minus a handful of dishes. We eat a lot of soup in the winter and we grill out a lot in the summer (he does the grilling). He also makes a mean chili!

Tonight we had a frittata with spinach, potato, onion, and lean ham, served with a spring green salad dressed in homemade vinaigrette. It was yummy. I also made black bean soup so that we have something fir lunch this week.

[shootingstar]

It's always good to know how to cook some stuff decently for meals. After all our S.O., will not always be around on earth or vice versa.

To me...it's a life skill, in some cases, a survival skill.

He's making herbed spaetzle here (a German side dish). His is kind of lumpy since we just haven't invested in a spaetzle-making instrument. All the stuff on the counter is actually very well-organized with chopped up ingredients for various dishes, etc. That's his style. I'm more messy.

He taught his ex-wife how to cook better (her mom died when she was a teen) who is originally from England (Traditional Brit cooking is not known to be gourmet, if we subtract Britain's former colonies, India, even Hong Kong, etc.).

His mother was a terrific cook and gourmet baker..she did have a personal gentle style that made any teen/kid interested in seeing how she prepared some of their favourite dishes. So that's how he learned.

His son is a sous chef at a restaurant in downtown Toronto and was recently reviewed by local press. It's a Jamie Olivier type of restaurant...you know take in hard-to-employ youth and give them skills. The restaurant is part of the City of Toronto's services, a non-profit effort. So this culinary skill stuff is being passed down naturally to whoever, is interested through his family. He and his son, naturally and occasionally talk about certain dishes and preparation techniques. ie. he learned from his son how to prepare bison in a great way.

The funniest thing one time, was when his son prepared an 8-course meal for him. (No way, he was going to turn that down. He only sees his son once annually...living thousands of km. away.) Dearie then biked 16 km. to join my family's barbecue ..where he politely ate abit more.

He was very stuffed.

[shootingstar]

At university, I cooked my own meals from scratch. To me, it was therapeutic fun -- from studying. It never took me ages to prepare dinner anyway.

Also curbed homesickness at that time, since I often prepared dishes that my mother taught me. And yea, it was healthy cooking, only because I didn't know anything different than what I learned from mother and I didn't make much effort to find recipes during studies.

[Koronin]

What area are you from, if you don't mind me asking? I went to college within spitting distance of Little Italy (in Cleveland), and I very much miss the cheapish and tasty Italian food. And the gelato...especially the gelato...

I'm originally from Warren, Ohio. It's probably an hour and a half or so south to south east of Cleveland. Basically it's right between Cleveland and Pittsburgh, PA. My family still lives there.

[smilingcat]

Taking out stress from cooking.

First and foremost. One of the first classes in cooking school, besides learning about knife safety, is "Mise en Place".

Have all your ingredients ready to go. Measured out, chopped, minced, sliced, marinating. all the ingredients are placed in its own plate or bowl. You only turn on the stove when all the ingredients are prepped. This will make your cooking a lot less stressful.

Another important thing. A honest to goodness recipe should list out the order of ingredients in order of use. It should not be by volume or by weight. Look carefully at even Betty Crocker cookbook. It will list the ingredients in order of use.

So when you get your ingredient prepped, order them according to the recipe.

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OOooo Hooo I just hit 2000 posts.