"Rut" is such a weird word

It's me again, Margret. The last time I wrote in this thingamablog (see what I did there?) I was in Texas with 2 very large basset hounds and an infant. Now I'm back home with 1 largely obnoxious cat and a toddler. It amazes me how fast kids grow. And you never fully understand just how fast until you have one of your own. Or until you have one at close proximity to you on a daily basis. Whichever.

I'm not going to make any promises I can't keep. So there will be no talk of a series of posts (because that always works out so well!) or a vow to write so many times a month. There is simply my hope of writing more to improve my writing, share my thoughts with those who care to hear/see them, and maybe bring myself a little closer to figure out just exactly where I fit in to the culinary world.

I've been reading more and more blogs and am honestly incredibly intimidated. Have I mentioned this before? I'm having an acute Deja Vu attack right about now. I'll go back and check later. Anyway I really feel the need to improve. There are so many people out there that blog for a cause or blog for a living. People make money for writing whatever they want on the Internet. Seriously. And can I just say that, while I'm only 26, I remember a time less than 20 years ago when the Internet was strange and foreign and most people were still trying to figure out what exactly it's purpose was. Hell, computers were still confusing to me until high school. The only thing I ever used them for was Mario Teaches Typing (I will forever be grateful to my Daddy for that one) and Claris Works word processing. I was taught DOS in middle school, okay. We still used floppy disks. And now that I've made many of you, including myself, feel incredibly old, how 'bout a little chat about food?
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I've been working on staying out of a food rut when it comes to cooking at home. I know a lot of people complain about it and it happens quite often around here. A few weeks back it seemed like all I ever cooked in this house was bacon and eggs or cheeseburgers. We are also trying to trying to seriously get into healthier habits in my household. Not in the New Year's resolution kind of way where you keep at it for a month or so and then go back to your old, self-destructive ways. More of the subtle lifestyle changes that will become routine kind of way. In order to accomplish this my husband and I sat down and came up with 30 meal ideas that we'd like to have over the next few weeks. I've been adding to that list every time I come up with something new and now I think we're up to 56 individual meals? Something like that. They must all include a veggie and most of them have left-overs potential. For instance the pot roast left over from dinner on Thursday was turned into a component for my umm...knock-off version of poutine is about the only way I can describe it. I used the cooking liquid to make a yummy gravy, chopped the roast into smaller pieces, and added it back to the gravy. Then I made some twice baked potatoes, topped them with some aged, raw milk cheddar, and stuck them under the broiler. I put the potato(es) on a plate, topped with the "new" roast creation, and ate. I was pretty proud of myself. Serve some steamed or sauteed veggies on the side and it's complete, healthful meal. The roast was extremely lean (eye of round), I used a tablespoon of butter to make about 3 servings of gravy. I used another tablespoon of butter, 2 tablespoons of sour cream, and about a quarter of a cup of cheese to make 6 twice baked potatoes (3 medium potatoes cut in half). So per serving, these really aren't that bad at all.

I think we're off to a good start. Staying out of a food rut and cooking/eating in a more healthy way is just the beginning, though. Next is portion control, exercise, and paying attention to the numbers.Lucky for y'all I'm more about posting recipes and talking about food than I am talking about numbers and calorie counting and math!

And with that, I have to go dig myself out of another rut- the "I don't ever want to do laundry again" rut. Here's hoping I post again soon!

Elle