Excitement

I have noticed that my interest in cooking at home goes up when the weather gets nicer. When it's gloomy and dark outside, I just want to curl up on the couch with a good book, my laptop or a movie. I might think about food, but I don't want to get out from under my blanket. It's easier to order some takeout. But the weather is finally getting nicer here and my cooking will continue especially since the opening of the farmer's market is on April 11th! I can't tell you how excited I am for the farmer's market. Shopping at the grocery store just isn't the same!

On Thursday night, I took another cooking class with Chef Nancy. It was nice because Jackie brought along some friends and we talked about doing a huge cooking party at Jackie's house in the future (she has a lovely kitchen that I just LOVE). This class was a new concept at the Merc, where you pay a little more and receive a cookbook with your enrollment. I loved this idea (which adds another cookbook to my ever growing collection)! This class was called Vegetarian Thai and she choose the cookbook Real Vegetarian Thai by Nancie McDermott. Unfortunately, this cookbook is no longer in print, but you can try getting used copies of it from various sources. I was a little iffy on taking a vegetarian class because we love meat in this family. It's not to say that we don't eat vegetables, but we do usually eat meat during dinner. Since Chef Nancy was teaching the class, I put my worries aside and still enrolled. She is also a meat eater, so I knew that I was in good hands. She picked four recipes for the class (not the real names of the dishes, but I don't have my cookbook with me at the moment); two potato pot stickers, a rice salad dish, a coconut sauce noodle dish and a sorbet. I will be making all of these in the future once I get to the Asian market in Kansas City, but I was especially impressed with the noodle dish. I can't wait to make this one myself! Expect future blog posts of the recipes from this class.

Other news is that we are going to New Orleans this weekend for a foodie weekend. Chris' favorite food website Roadfood.com is hosting a New Orleans food festival. We use their website a lot when traveling and have about a 90% success rate with the choices that they have picked on their website. I am really excited because one of my food blog idols will be there. Ed Levine, the creator of Serious Eats, will be part of the Q&A on Sunday and also join us at the crawfish boil/pig roast on Saturday night that we are attending. I read Serious Eats almost daily. It's a combination of recipes, food news and restaurant reviews. They also have a lovely weekly newsletter that you can subscribe to. When I read that Mr Levine would be there this weekend, I was thrilled. Can't wait to eat my weight (plus some) in food this weekend in NOLA!

I have a few new recipes that I haven't posted on here yet. I'll get them up before I leave!