Goodness, it has been a while. I actually spent the last year trying to explore my dreams, I started working in a professional kitchen. While it was a very interesting experience the particular restaurant I was working for was very new and being run by people who had never owned a restaurant before. Unfortunately this amounted to a much less professional working environment than I was hoping for. I was hired as a prep cook and within a month became the sole cook doing all the menu planning, ordering, and kitchen maintenance. It was certainly a way to learn about the industry, baptism by fire. One thing I learned about working in a restaurant is that it really took the fun out of cooking weeknight dinners! Working for a year in a professional kitchen resulted in taking a long break from experimenting and trying new things in my home kitchen. All the experimenting became work and took some of the fun out of it.
Today I will leave you with a tip.
When I squeeze the juice out of a lemon I always feel strange just throwing out the rind and peel. I also feel terrible when I let that really great fresh rosemary I purchased, get dry and brown.
My solution to both of these problems?
A simmer pot.
Save your lemon peels and sad looking rosemary. Throw it in a saucepan with 3 cups or so of water and a teaspoon of vanilla. Bring the ingredients to a boil and make your house smell pretty in a natural way.
