I'm Getting Better at This

Update for this week: cooking, and life in general, just keeps getting better! We have both had a great week! Ben's been busy working, as have I, getting ready for this next week to start! My days as a teacher officially start Monday. I will post pics of my room next week as soon as its worthy to be shown. We have also had two successful home cooked meals! Well, maybe one semi-successful and one very successful. As I said earlier, Ben and I are attempting to lose a few pounds. Ben bought P90x a while back, and it comes with a diet plan. I am going to try to make meals according to their plan. I found this cool site (myp90xnutritionplan.com) that gave me some great ideas & recipes. Tuesday night I cooked barbeque chicken, burnt green beans, and twice baked potatoes from this lady's recipe collection. The barbeque chicken was great, beans were pretty good, and potatoes could have used a lot of help. As always, Ben said everything was great and went back for seconds. I can be my own worst critic, though. I admit the potatoes were dry, very dry. I will have to find out the tricks to cooking those correctly. I also made lowfat banana pudding! It was a hit! Last night I tried the lady's spaghetti and grilled parmesan zucchini. I believe this was my best meal yet! Her spaghetti recipe was very very good, but the zucchini was incredible. I believe it will become one of my staples for cooking. The recipe said you could grill or broil them. Since our grill takes a long time to heat up, I decided to broil them. They were delicious & so easy! I will not be cooking for the next couple of days as we are about to leave to go to the beach until Sunday. Maybe I'll get some ideas for seafood while I'm there. I would love to do more with seafood! I hope you all have a great weekend & please say a prayer for me as I begin my career on Monday!

The Man's Turn

So I know that I haven't posted in a few days, but we are alive! Plus our lives have been pretty regular, or should I say routine, for the past few days. I didn't have any more cooking stories to tell from last week because we mostly ate out the rest of the week. Don't worry, I will have more coming in the next few days. Ben has already started the week off by wanting to know what I would be cooking tonight. I had to turn him down though because we have been lazy mostly all day and I have not had time to prepare a menu. I think he could get used to my cooking! I'm not to the point, yet, that I can just go in the kitchen and whip something together. As my parents keep reminding me, I'll get there!

This weekend was pretty low-key. We did try a new place to eat Friday! I subscribe to Groupon and LivingSocial (and strongly suggest you do too if there's one in your area). Both have a list of places to go in Chattanooga along with dishes that their known for. So Friday we tried a sushi place on the North side of the river. We really have a thing for sushi these days! That's also on my list of things to learn how to make! I'll get there! Ben had to work on Saturday, so I went to Coolidge Park by the river to walk, read, and sunbathe. It was such a beautiful afternoon, and lots of families were at the park with their children. This city is truly one of the most gorgeous places ever! And if I'm still here one day when I have kids, I know now that their is entertainment that doesn't cost for them here. There is an area at the park where water squirts up from the ground, and tons of kids were having the best time running through them! We decided to grill out on Saturday night. This is where the man's turn comes in. I know nothing about grilling, but I'll get there. Or maybe not on second thought because Ben always does a fabulous job with it! It was his turn to nourish me, and nourish me he did! Steak and veggies were the order for the night. It was all divine! We have had a pretty restful day today, and an altogether great weekend! I hope it was the same for all of you!

Cubans and Pudding

Settling in in Chattanooga is going very well! My room is looking and feeling much better, and I began working on my classroom yesterday as well! I am also feeling much more accomplished in the cooking field as well. The roast turned out pretty well the other night. However, I had to get pork instead of beef which wasn't as tasty to me. (Ran out of time & had to get meat at Wal-Mart) Ben did not complain though! He did not complain about the dessert either. In fact, he practically licked the container it was in. We still had leftover roast though. Yesterday I tried to find recipes for leftover pork. My Googling brought me to a recipe for cuban sandwiches. I knew that Ben really likes those, and I wanted to do something more than barbeque pork sandwiches. I am writing a blog about cooking after all! My first attempt at cuban sandwiches was a success! I also had leftover blueberries, so I decided to make blueberry bread pudding with those. It was also a success, a rather huge success even! I think I'm going to enjoy making desserts more than dishes! Side note: Ben and I are supposed to be starting a workout and diet plan, so I'll probably need to cut those out soon, especially when adding ice cream on top!

The other thing that I have learned from the past two days of cooking is that cooking is expensive! I really started to understand this even after 2 days of cooking. Not to mention I am not getting a paycheck yet! I decided to compare, so we went out for dinner tonight instead of cooking. However, it was a little hard to compare since Ben is a growing boy and requires a large amount to fill him up. From now on I think I will include the words cheap and easy in front of recipes that I Google! Or please pass along any that fit that criteria! Here's my first picture to prove that I can not only make things that taste delicious but that also look pretty tasty too:

Setting up the nest!

I have created this blog to share with all of our loved ones miles away the fun times (and possible craziness) that are bound to occur now that Ben and I are finally in the same city! Just a way to keep up with us since it'll be hard to call each of you everyday and still get in that time together we've been patiently waiting for! I'll start with the past few days...talk about craziness. My move from Auburn was pretty smooth thanks to my amazing parents! However, when we started unloading in Chattanooga, I quickly discovered that all of my things were going to have a hard time fitting into our house. Of course I was going to need more closet space! I began rearranging Ben's things to make room for my own. This included making half of his closet my own by going through his things and giving some of it away. (Majority did not fit; we can both be a bit of a hoarder) My dad kept saying, "Poor boy. You come in here and give away his stuff. He's going to want to send you back!" Luckily, Ben decided to keep me here, and we've agreed on a pretty nice setup. With the addition of an armoire and some laps controlled by dimmers (compliments of the man of course), our nest is starting to feel very "homey"! There is still some work to do, but we are just both very glad to be starting this adventure together even if it does have to begin with some chaos!

I also want this blog to be a learning tool for me, primarily with respect to the kitchen. Most of you know that I am by no means the best cook in the world, but I do like to try new things! I want to let you in on these fun times too. If you have any advice, recipes, or anything to possibly help me out, throw it my way! Hopefully you'll find some enjoyment in hearing about my cooking adventures and whether or not Ben survived them! Jk! Tonight I'm starting off with something simple: pot roast. Ben actually requested it, and it happens to be one of my favorites! I have made pot roast before, so I was not new to this one. However, I did have to call my mom to get confirmation on the recipe! I don't think this will change for many years mom! I'm also making a fruit and yogurt concoction! I found something online very similar that's called a red, white, and blue parfait. It's just strawberries, blueberries, and bananas mixed with yogurt, almond extract, and some whipped cream on top. Nice summer treat! Don't worry, I'll be trying more complicated dishes later this week. I was too busy setting up the nest today! Tune in tomorrow!