The story begins much further back than last year. I am a product of my upbringing, as are we all. I guess it is just my extreme good fortune that I grew up in Santa Cruz, on the coast and amid the bounty of the Central Coast. My taste palette is derived from a lifetime of well prepared food, fresh flavors and the pride of a "good fix." The food of our childhood, what we all relate to as comfort food is so infinately different for each of us. It wasn't until I was in my late teens did I realize I was part of something extraordinary.
My Dad was a man of descerning taste, but prided in being a good cook not a chef. He was a child raised in the Great Depression where the notion of eating local meant food on the table from the family garden, fresh fish obtained from a side job, deer hunting or, waking up to the tide clock so we could go clamming or diving for abalone when the bounty was plentiful at New Year's Island. As a teen he was a short order cook for the Coleman's in Capitola. He could make a mean pototo salad despite a lifelong dislike of cold mayonaise salads. Not the least of his talents. No doubt I will be talking more about that.
If anything this journal is a tribute to him. Food, for me is about love. Memories are tied to the taste, smells and the preparation of something special for those I care about the most. I don't cook for the show. Somehow I get this wild hair of an idea, a taste in my mouth, a vision in my mind's eye. Then suddenly I am a whirling dervish of activity.
Yeah, I'm one of those that changes recipes... "make it my own" etc. I wing it, I don't always measure (unless it is baking, and sometimes not even then..) and when the taste in my imagination fits the end product on my plate I hear my Dad say, "Sis, you got a good fix." No greater praise could be expected.
So I invite you to play along and see what's cooking at my house. I hope it is not ordinary, that something creative is sparked and that you enjoy the journey along with me. If you email me, I will do my best to respond. email: robin0red <at> gmail.com
