International Food Month

There we were, at the table, eating one of those meals.  You know the ones.  They're easy, relatively healthy and tasty, and you've made them a thousand times.  Pasta, red sauce, and salad for instance.  Or maybe some sausages, potatoes, and peas.  Those are just two examples of the sort of menu I fall back on constantly.  There's nothing wrong with those meals, but it just gets boring.  It's boring to prepare the same thing over and over, and it's boring to eat it too.  Why, then, don't I just break out and do something different?  It's mostly laziness plain and simple.  After a long day, it's just so easy to get out that packet of pasta. 

Then one day it struck me.  If I didn't get out of this food rut, we'd be eating the same six or eight meals for the rest of our lives!  I've actually met grannies and aunties who refused to serve (or eat) anything but a few safe and familiar dishes.  That will not happen to us!  I do not want our baby to think that food consists of peas and potatoes baked, boiled, fried.  I want her to taste things that are fresh and flavorful.  Oh and by the way, I want that for us too.  Thus we embarked on International Food Month (hey when you're a stay-at-home mom you need goals)

Here's the plot we hatched.  We would take on twenty-five countries in roughly thirty days (that leaves some nights to go out woo!).  We made a list of the countries in advance, and posted it on the fridge so that we would be inspired to continue.  We would research traditional recipes on the internet and in cookbooks (yay library!), and then we would do our best to prepare a dinner from each country.  The pact also stated that we could buy the ingredients that were needed for the meal, but we should try to stick with recipes that don't require too much money or supplies that we are likely not to use again.  We're trying to be moderate here!

Some of our country picks were fairly familiar ones like Mexico, Italy, and France.  Others were much more "out there" such as Egypt, Vietnam, and Kenya.  We did not order the countries according to the month because we want to be free to cook each one as we find good recipes.  If this all goes as planned, by the end of the thirty days we'll have prepared a whole range of new recipes, and we'll have the chance to try a lot of new flavors too.  Best of all, we won't see the same old, same old fall back meals for at least a month.  Wish us luck.