Welcome to my blog, He's Cooking.
Bob and I have been married for forty years and although we both love to cook, Bob does most of the cooking. Early in our relationship, Bob was living in an apartment with four other guys while attending The University at Albany (in New York) and I was living at home. Once we got engaged, we began collecting cookbooks, our first being the Woman's Day Encyclopedia of Cooking, bought weekly in a grocery store.
That was the beginning of our co-cooking experiences, though I did most of the cooking then.
As the children arrived (Matt, Bryn, Sean), we took turns cooking. While they were young, I did most of the cooking, but as they began to grow up and left our wonderful home one by one, Bob took over the cooking almost exclusively.
I am a cookbook cook, except for those recipes I know by heart and change each time I use them (spaghetti sauce, meatloaf, apple pie, etc.). Bob is a scientist and cooks like a chemist. He has a great palate so whenever we go out to eat, Bob can taste the herbs, spices and can usually recreate the recipe at home.
We are a member of the "Tastebuds," made up of three couples in our neighborhood here in Glendale, Arizona. We try to meet monthly, either at a designated home or a new restaurant. When we get together at a home, the host/hostess chooses the menu theme (Italian, Caribbean, German, French--) and each couple provides part of the meal (appetizers/salad, entree, dessert). We're all beer and wine afficionados as well with each of the husbands home beer brewers. All of us have great wine collections and love going to wineries and wine tastings. More about that later.
My husband has a wonderful repertoire of recipes--from Blue Cheese Chicken to Barbecued Jerk Pork to any Italian dish you can think of. He doesn't bake, though, so I'm the designated dessert chef.
I'm very proud of all of my children who also cook. Matt likes to cook anything that uses every pot in the cupboard, any kind of chile pepper in existence, and tons of spices--many of which I've never heard of. Bryn is creative and makes simple dishes that are very sophisticated in taste, use of herbs, and healthy, though she has made her share of sinful dishes. She's more like Bob. Sean can cook, but mostly chooses not to. I don't think it's something he really enjoys (so whose kid is he?).
That's our cooking background (except to say we are an Italian-Irish-American family).
