My Story (in 250 words)

I was raised on Kraft and Girl Scout cookies.  My mom was a single mom and did the best she could do.  As long as we were fed, that’s all that really mattered.  But we didn’t mind; we loved that mac-n-cheese and Pasta Roni, so there were no complaints from us.

My teen years were spent being a vegetarian who didn’t eat vegetables, and I ate veggie-meat like it was going out of style.  This, however, was before veggie-meat was in style to begin with and had yet been ‘perfected’ to Morningstar Farms quality.  One year I even got a case of 24 large cans of Tuno (not Tuna) for Christmas, which I gladly accepted and promptly ate. 

I dropped the vegetarian thing about the same time I went to college. I moved abroad and then back, never needing to cook for myself, still relying on ready-made food. A close friend of mine joked that I shouldn’t worry about the fact my someday-children would be eating mac-n-cheese everyday… they would have a mommy who played with them, and that was much better. 

I laughed.  It was the truth.

Two years later, a combination of marrying a Brazilian who never ate boxed food in his life and watching Jamie Oliver start his Food Revolution, that something started to change in me. I wanted to cook, and I wanted to cook real food.

And that is precisely what I set out to do… still munching on Girl Scout cookies along the way.

(Yes, I jumped on the blog-everyday-in-May bandwagon.  I liked the idea, community behind it, and the challenge.  You can join if you want to.  Click the button above.  PS -- That post was EXACTLY 250 words ;) )