The Family That Cooks and Blogs Together
My dad often told me to look at the silver lining when the going gets rough. An old quote says that “THE OPTIMIST sees the doughnut; the pessimist sees the hole.” Two wonderful opportunities came out of the family’s financial challenges in 2004: (1) More Family Meals at home and (2) Butch learning to cook.
I learned to bake before I tried my hand at cooking because I grew up in a bake shop that mom started when I was nine years old. By the time I was 21, I lived off-campus with my dorm mates which forced me to learn how to cook. Even the sauteeing and frying scared the hell out of me. I learned from watching. Soon, I got tired living in apartments that I built a house with my dad’s funds by the time I was 23 years old. Having my own home paved the way for me to experiment on cooking fancy dishes. I relied on my mom’s dishes and experimented or innovated on existing recipes. Having a degree in BS Food Technology helped me to be more creative with recipes. Through the years, I’ve accumulated these perfected recipes in a black notebook.
Baking hit the peak of my life when the girls were very little. I baked and iced their birthday cakes because the commercial cakes tasted dry and ordinary. How my girls marvelled at my Barbie or Disney themed cakes. Not only did they look magical, my cake tasted special. These days, I bake simple pies or desserts. Recently, I purchased a convection oven which ensures even temperature throughout the baking. Friends often wished I start a bake shop but I believed the bake shop’ stress caused mom to die early from breast cancer. I vowed never to venture into a large scale bake shop operation like mom did. Maybe one day, I will open a small coffee shop with baked goodies.