In The Begining there was my Mom, Cecilia...

Hello all and welcome to my new Foodie blog...

For those of you who know me, know I LOVE to cook, while recently I focused on grilling anything and everything, I've decided to expand my culinary skills.

While I DVR shows like Hells Kitchen, Master Chef and the F-Word, it is my desire one day to surpass Gordon Ramsay and be able to tell him to F^(# off... 12 Michelin Stars is gonna be hard to beat...

My cooking adventure began when I was pretty young, My Mom (Cecilia) was a great instructor, while my father was a pretty standard menu man, she taught me the basics as well as some of the fun stuff that would never make his plate... She could cook anything and everything simultaneously - I hope that her graces and skills rain down on me while I take on this challenge...

I'm not only trained by my Mom, unfortunately, I worked for Marriott Food Services as well, starting as a short order chef on the grill to being a show "Wok" artist creating meals off of a stir fry cart with my colleague and fraternity brother CJ Curtis "MEAT" - we were good and we were requested every night we weren't on shift...

Since then I went through bachelorhood, yet, I could cook - I was fortunate enough to have the best looking woman accept my proposal of marriage, 10 years later I have an 8 year old son who has been diagnosed with Aspergers Syndrome (A mild form of very high functioning autism) - he is routine, hot dogs, "Daddy's Steak" and Mac 'n Cheese... My Daughter on the other hand, will try and like anything! She'll be like me, her Papa, My Father always said I was the only "market priced" child he had - what goes around comes around, my 6, soon to be 7, year old peanut of a daughter will either work for Epicurious, be a Model or become a Chef...

Anyway, long story short, I love to cook and I'm going Gourmet for 1 day per week for an entire year... I forgot to mention above where I detailed my family, my wife is a pro photographer, she's new too food shoots but she has already made a few of my dishes look better than they tasted - all photos will be from her - she can be found by clicking on Photography by Shawnanne.

I plan to accompany each dish with a recipe, it's origin and some photos - I'll include notes as well, as Chef Ramsay said "Smokin' Hot" and I ended up with charcoal topped raw scallops the first time (I'm sure this was a mis-credit, he knows smoke is no good in a pan)... I make each dish in 3 separate servings, so each time it becomes better and better, I get the first, my wife takes the second and my daughter gets the third, my son loves the Mac n' Cheese I make, LOL...

Anyway, my quest is starting soon - be prepared - please, if you re-create anything and find a better taste, comment, I'm not perfect, many of my recipes lack something, if you come up with something let us know, we'll either praise or say get the F^(# out of my kitchen :-)~

Happy Cooking!

Jeff