It thickened out real nice boii!

A lovely quote by my lovely boyfriend Davis, who of course will be joining me on this little ride. He make corned chip beef this morning, a.k.a shit on a shingle. He has been talking about it since the beginning of our times, a little over a year ago.I had  always hesitated a little bit to try dry beef with thick cream on toast. But told him I would. Of course. Well,  this morning I had a small case of bad girlfriend. Tired and achy I felt like eating nothing. Still now all I've had is a cup of real, tart cranberry juice. I'll blame this on my stomach and mind hating me after the most awful lunch on Sunday. Seriously, the worst. No details needed. I could not even feel hungry while watching Julie and Julia. Which came latter of about two hours of Harry Porter. And four and some hours after the barely touched awful lunch I really hoped this delicious movie would bring be back. But is did not. Very unlikely of me, I did not whine about having to somehow eat a French meal in the honor of the one and only Julia. Something I've been dreaming about since the first preview I watched. What a shame. See what an awful lunch can do. It can really damage important moments in your life...

We attempted to have a good rainy Monday morning. I laid in bed for a while reading Orangette, my first discovery of a food blog that I now expect myself to read all of. However, things got stressful with the arrival of the mail. Again, no details needed. Now I seat here, listening to Karen Dalton and struggling with HTML, which to me was so much easier at the age of eighteen when I was just trying to make my Myspace pretty. I seat here wishing I was in Paris as I came across friends current photos. None of these melancholy feelings are at all helped my being a woman and also being an avid dreamer. So I think that in honor of Paris which somehow surrounds my life, I will bake Macorons.

 

These little pieces of heaven that were just recently introduced to my life.I went full on with obsession and of course, I had to attempt my own. Last week I received a copy of this beautiful book.

At only 80 pages the book is strictly about macarons. Plenty of eye candy too! Staying true to simplicity,the book shines on basics.Making the batter, making cream and jam fillings, combining the two and a small chapter on gift wrapping ideas for macarons.It also has a few recipes on desserts that can be made with the remaining egg yolk, being thatmacarons only needs the love of egg-whites. I made two batters of the lovelies. One from the book listed above, and also one from this book.  I had to test both. I was not feeling too confident with the batter from the macaron book. I did follow directions but I thought my batter was not as thick as the authors. My mistake is that I should have waited until they were fully baked. They came out perfect! I was very happy and quite impressed with myself. The second batter came out horrible. No comments. For Christmas this year, I intend to make all of my loved ones, surprise surprise, macarons. Probably a dozen a person. I also intend to make little bottles of home made winter inspired liqueurs to go with it. Lot of work, but I'm cut out for it I think. Except for the small burden that is constantly upon me. Not having my own kitchen that I can be in 24/7. I'm currently back at my parents house. My mother happens to be an avid home cook and does not like sharing space. She also does not understand the need for these little experiments as she calls them. Oh, it makes no sense for her why I would ever make some things from scratch. So basically she thinks I'm just playing house or something.

Well, it has taken me a little of an hour to write this. The HTML kicked my ass. So I'm headed to the kitchen. My brother has his appetite and his camera ready. Let's see what comes out of this...

In the beginning.

I'm excited about this. Of course now "this", to me, has the feeling of journal. But I have always loved journals. I suppose this journal will take a different direction. No more writing about confusion and happiness and all that goes with that. Now I intended to write about the two things I love the most (and I just happened to be around it everyday for hours.) It's what I read about before going to bed. What I dream about. Always the best dreams too! It's what I somehow came to cherish the most. It makes me smile inside. A lot. Now I will be writing about food. Of course. Why not!?! Great idea. But writing about food to me means there will be a lot eating, drinking and of couse cooking. I'm okay with that.

I guess a little background. Not my name, age, and where I am from and all that. ( Cora, 22, Brazil but I currently live in the north burbs of Atlanta.) More like what and how I became who I am today. Keeping it very short. I was a very shy kid who was thrown in the restaurant business at the very young age of 14. A breakfast joint. Didn't think much of it at the time. But I kept going of course and because restaurants are all I knew and the money was great. By the time I was eighteen I began working at an absolutely tasty and yet cool little Mexican restaurant.And later at a beautiful French restaurant by the same owners. That's really the beginning. The French place. Wine tasting and menu talking everyday. And because I am always so serious about work, I listened. Being very naive I asked questions. And I ate. And drank. Yes, at age nineteen. Of course I read. And did a little cooking. Then I moved and lost complete access to anything remotely closed to a real kitchen. Having 12 roommates didn't help food storage either. But I still ate. Alone. But always my favorite part of the day. Then I moved back, went back into everything and long story short years later I'm still working in a restaurant. Italian now. Still reading. Still cooking and still thinking about food, a lot. But now I hope to add a little something to my repertoire. Baking, building my own kitchen, and writing about it all.

I do think a lot of myself is going to come out into this. This is going to be a ride. Right now there are no real goals and direction, but only an experiment. Many experiments. I know I will enjoy this and hopefully it will be my motivation to keep learning and eating. I am certain of a few things. There will be a lot of messes to clean up, a few pounds that I don't need to gain, probably a lot of money spent, and a lot of precious good times. Sounding good, except the extra pound or five...