Matt Adventures, At Home, Cooking, Dad Stuff, Feeding, Food

HANGER PAINS

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My little Chloe is so mellow, easy going, and always has a smile. Even when I have to wake her up out of a dead sleep she smiles and then gets right up. “GOOD MORNING!” Ellie? No way. She’d make a terrible sleeping beauty. Prince Charming would be in for a big surprise if he tried to wake her up. Not Chloe though. She’s easy peasy as they say. Why just the other day I saw her gazing out the window smiling and quietly singing to herself, “laaaa, laaa, laaa, laaa (giggle giggle).”

But don’t let that gentle smile and adorable face fool you, because when she’s hungry, watch out!

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Matt Cooking, Cooking Stuff, Food, Friends, Recipes

FRIENDSGIVING 2014

2014_01_19aWe had originally planned on having a get together with our dear friends Mark and Ksenija (who is an extremely talented photographer. You can check out her work here!) around Thanksgiving (hence the name “Friendsgiving”), but our schedules didn’t line up until now. It worked out because it gave me ample time to plan the epic menu. After we enjoyed an incredible vegetarian meal together at a vegetarian restaurant called Inn Season in Royal Oak, I was inspired to do a complete vegetarian spread. I thought it would be a great contrast to your typical heavy holiday dinners and a great way to start the new year. Continue reading “FRIENDSGIVING 2014” →

Matt Cooking, Dad Stuff, Fall, Family, Holidays, Sick, Thanksgiving

HAPPY? THANKSGIVING

DS_2013_12_04Our big, family Thanksgiving meal is always the Saturday after Thanksgiving at my parent’s house. This leaves our actual Thanksgiving day open to do different things. We’vehad dinner with friends before, watched the parade in downtown Detroit, and even spent it at Denny’s. But this year, we were going to host friends at our house for the first time. I was going to make the whole deal. Turkey (I decided on a chicken because it was just us four adults), stuffing, Brussels sprouts, cranberry relish, mashed potatoes, etc. I even tested dessert recipes so everything would be fantastic. It was going to be my crowning achievement and induction into the ‘club.’ But little did I know, the cards were stacked against me.

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Matt At Home, Cooking, Fall, Food, Making Stuff

I Believe I CAN

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One great thing about the end of summer is the garden harvest. We have tons and tons of tomatoes, zucchinis, eggplants, and green peppers. And every year we plan on making salsas, stews, and sauces and preserving them. And every year, we never do. So we scramble to eat everything or give them away before they go bad. But this year, we canned 22 pint size jars of diced homegrown tomatoes!

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Matt Cooking, Family, Food, Inner Monologue

FOOD FOR THOUGHT

Both my wife and I were fortunate that we grew up in houses where we sat down at the dinner table as a family to a home cooked meal from scratch 98% of the time. We both value meal time around the table and love food. Now that we have our own family, we want to give our kids the same experience we had and appreciated growing up.

Along with this experience we want to expose them to as many different varieties of food as we can. Different vegetables, spices, flavors, ethnic foods, etc. Not only do we want them to experience variety, but also know a little nutrition and not think “healthy = vegetables = yuck.” I’d rather them think, “Yay food! Food is good! We love food!” We want to instill in them a positive, healthy image about food.

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