Every meal tells a story. Just regular food cooked by regular people. Who doesn’t love to see what real people are eating and drinking - not just for special occasions, but every day cooking as well. I’m lucky that my family not only loves to travel, eat and drink, but we all also love to cook and share our culinary exploits with one another. My husband (known fondly as The BF) and my kids – Charlie, Joe, Sara, Matt, Ben and Josh – have always been enthusiastic eaters. As they got older and started their own lives or went away to college, they would often call me up and ask how I made meatloaf, or mac and cheese, or simply how to poach an egg. As I would share this information with them, the idea emerged that maybe I should write a cookbook. Of course, our family is certainly not the first family to want their repertoire of family recipes to be organized in one place. So as I cooked, I started taking pictures and documenting what I was cooking. I looked for a template for a family cookbook, but couldn’t find anything to my liking, so I used iworks Pages to create my own. Cooking was the easy part. Learning new software, and making the book look the way I wanted was the challenge! I decided that this would be no ordinary family cookbook, rather I would incorporate pictures of family cooking and eating, and since my husband, Alan, and I love to travel and try regional specialties, I decided to include pictures of our travel culinary adventures as well. So after 10 years of saying, “I’m almost done with the cookbook,” I finally finished it in December, and proudly presented it to my family. I immediately started getting texts with pictures of what they were cooking, and thought this would be cool to share with everyone else. Now that the cookbook is complete, it seems like the logical next step is to create an interactive environment where we can all share pictures, comment about the recipes, and add new ones. Again, I am faced with learning new software, so it may take a little while for me to really get the hang of blogging, but if you can bear with me, I promise I will try to make this interesting and worthwhile, as I tend to never do anything halfway. I started cooking when I was about 12, but it’s never too late to start. As Julia Childs once said, “I was 32 when I started cooking: up until then, I just ate.” I am open for ideas and any and all comments. If you cook a dish, and change ingredients or do something to enhance it, add that in the comments so others can benefit from your changes. (If you don’t like it, that’s ok to say too.) Anyone can post any relevant comments here, as long as they are not mean spirited. I’ve organized this site as follows: What's New: Here I will add posts of new dishes we are cooking that are not already in the cookbook. By “we” I mean Alan and me, or anyone else who sends me a picture and the recipe. (It may take another week or so to get content here, as our kitchen isn’t done yet and we have no stove.) What's Cooking: This section will be you guys cooking the Cookbook recipes. Now don’t be discouraged if initially all the recipes are basic, easy ones. There are cookbook recipes that are more challenging as well, so stay tuned! In fact, you can post anything here that you think others might be interested in. In the Glass: We can share tips about wine, beer, or other spirits that we’re enjoying at the moment. For example, I tried the sommelier wine of the day recommendation from one of our favorite restaurants recently; I liked it so much I went home and ordered a case. I thought it would be a great place to share such finds here, as it was a delicious and very affordable wine. Favorite Eats: Short reviews and pictures from various restaurants will be posted here, including from areas any of us travel to. Having reviews from various contributors should make this an interesting read. Gadgets & Cookware: Special cookware and culinary gadgets that we find useful or interesting will be featured here. Just For Fun: This section is simply fun stuff related to cooking and eating. Download Cookbook: The Cookbook is now available for download.