We are The Amiable Cooks and we are so happy that you’ve found us. We love to cook, but that is not why we blog. We love our family and know by experience that cooking and eating together helps friends and families bond and socialize. It builds confidence and sponsors creativity. Most people seem to agree with this, however, we have learned in talking with people that too many don’t cook together or eat together as a family. We then realized that what may come easily to us doesn’t come so easily to everyone else. Our true desire is to inspire, motivate and illuminate you. We want to dispel your fears and confusion. We want to help you gain cooking confidence and involve your friends and family in the process, because you really CAN do it.
We are not the fanciest blog you will find. We have four kids from ages 2 to 10 and they all like to “help” cook, whether invited or not! It is truly a family affair, for better or worse. We love to try new dishes from different parts of the world. More often than not we find success in new recipes—conversely, we uncover failure at times too. Failure is part of the experience. It is also part of the effort we think drives many away from cooking. These ideas lead us to the three main goals of the The Amiable Cooks blog:
- Cook together
- Cook something new
- Cook the world
Cook Together
We hope to help you discover or rediscover the excitement and fulfillment that is the product of making nourishing and enticing dishes with your family. Your kitchen will become “THE place to be” by the time our work is done. We will show you that cooking up a new, exotic recipe is well worth the time and effort – the benefits will be felt for generations to come and are immeasurable. We will discuss those benefits.
Cook Something New
Here, you can expect to find recipes that have been tried and tested. You will see our notes of “things we wished we knew” the first time making each dish, eliminating the guesswork for you. Along with each recipe, you will find a photo (go easy on us, we’re still learning how to use a camera) because, if you’re anything like us, a picture of the dish is essential to invoke that important feeling of “I must make this or die.” Unlike many of the stunning cooking blogs that are en vogue today, (you know, the ones where the recipes are things like “goat cheese sorbet with sour balsamic cherries”), here you will find wonderful yet practical recipes – some for weeknights (taking about 40 minutes, on average) and some that are more time-consuming and meant for a Saturday or Sunday when you find yourself with a little more time to relax and enjoy a longer cooking experience with those you love. Don’t get me wrong, we drool over the magnificent imagery and admire the poetic pontifications from the authors of those blogs, but you won’t find that with The Amiable Cooks. We want to offer you recipes you KNOW your family and friends will enjoy.
We will also show you that creating delightfully healthful meals isn’t expensive. Along with most recipes, you will find the approximate total costs. Satisfying meals do not require meat – the most expensive ingredient. Most of our all-time favorites are meatless or contain very little meat. We will also list a few of the health benefits of the ingredients you will use for each dish so that you can teach those you care for the benefits they are providing their bodies, helping them connect with those ingredients in a way that will result in a proper relationship with food as they mature. Take the classic spaghetti, pizza, taco and chicken nugget nights off your weekly rotation, because things are about to get much more interesting.
Cook the World
There is such amazing food in this world prepared by wonderfully different people in vastly different cultures and geographies. We want to taste some of it from the comfort of our kitchen. There are amazing cuisines from India, China, the Caribbean, and Mexico, just to name a few, that can make you feel like you’ve been transported there!
We don’t stop with the cooking. The natives are essential to understanding the food. We want to learn about the cultures and lands where the food comes from. We will briefly explore the people and the food to enrich the experience with your family so that they can see that we are all connected.
We have a large map of the world visible from the dinner table and a few questions usually arise: “What country do you think this dish is from? (child points to the country) ,“What flavors are you tasting and what ingredients are you seeing that lead you to believe that?” And then we teach them just a few interesting things about that country. Sometimes we google a picture of some natives on a phone really quickly.
How did we get to this point as a family?
Perhaps by now you have gathered that we are passionate about food and cooking. This wasn’t always the case. I (the mom of these Amiable Cooks) grew up the oldest of seven children with a mom who dreaded cooking. And, worse, we lived on the dreaded classic casserole dinners laden with cans of cream of mushroom soup. We were never exposed to seafood or a fruit or vegetable other than apples, bananas, canned green beans, and corn. (I do realize that more “exotic” foods than these were harder to come by back then and were very expensive. I know that my parents did their best). My weight wasn’t ever what I wished it was, and it was because of my relationship with food. When I was 9 months pregnant with my first child, Juel, I quit work and went to my mom’s house to veg. My 16-year-old brother was channel surfing and landed on a program unlike anything I had ever seen before. The beautiful woman behind the counter who showed a little too much cleavage mesmerized him. I was mesmerized by what she was doing with the ingredients she had in her possession. She made it look so easy. Could cooking a beautiful meal REALLY be so simple? I bolted (as fast as one can who is great with child) to the kitchen to grab a pen and paper and began taking copious notes (not yet realizing that I could simply visit a website and hit “print”). I was hooked and so was my husband.
Cooking became the most exciting thing imaginable. We felt such a sense of pride after we’d worked to get an amazing (and amazingly simple) meal on our very own dinner table. After a few months of pasta dishes by Giada de Laurentis—and expanding waistlines—I began to learn how a person SHOULD eat. I learned that I didn’t need to eat meat for every meal. I learned that there is more to vegetables than the canned variety, mashed potatoes, and the occasional carrot. I learned how to nourish my body and to have a blast doing it. We became total foodies, almost overnight.
We are not chefs or trained cooks. The recipes we share mainly come from Food Network Magazine. We have been subscribers since the beginning and we appreciate how recipe-dense each issue is, the nutritional information provided with many recipes, and how simple and fresh the ingredients are. We love the variety of recipes available—from very simple to more complex “weekend meals,” as well as the international feel. We can honestly say that out of all the volumes we have cooked from since February of 2009, we have maybe come across 10 recipes that we haven’t enjoyed. That’s a pretty great track record!
Let our journey together begin! Please connect with me on Instagram, Facebook, and Pinterest. Think of anyone else who would enjoy what The Amiable Cooks have to offer? We would be flattered if you shared us with your friends and family.
