Project Food Blog - Ready, Set, Blog!

I am meant to describe myself as a food blogger.

(Excuse me a minute while I hyperventilate and get writer's block.)

I've never been good at writing about myself. I find it awkward and out of my element, as if I'm setting up an online dating profile.

"My name is Christina and I like quiet walks on the beach..."

No really, I do.

I started this blog almost exactly two years ago. After researching my boyfriend Johnny's whey allergy online for hours, I eventually came across a few blogs.

I had kept a LiveJournal online for years, so the idea of a digital record of my life's occurances was not foreign to me. However, in my mind the term "blogger" seemed to be reserved for political ranters and contributing news correspondants. Up until this point, I had no idea regular, everyday people also kept blogs. I was hooked right away. I read a few blogs daily for a couple weeks until I got the guts to start my own.

The topic of my blog was an easy one because I love food. My love for food came from several relatives and the way in which I was brought up.

This is my dad, Michael. He worked for a butcher when he was younger and makes homemade sausage from their secret family recipe. He also cooked dinner several nights a week while I was growing up, so I never learned the kitchen was a gender-specific place. He was very good about letting my brother and me watch and help so we learned through doing. With almost everything my dad cooked, he'd make a little "taste tester" and let my brother and me try it first to see how it was coming along.

This is my mom, Debbie-Lyn. She packed my lunch for me every day of school. And I don't mean peanut butter and jelly sandwiches with a bag of chips and a juice box. I mean sandwiches on potato bread or pitas with things my classmates had never heard of like alfalfa sprouts. There was also a variety of sides including fresh veggies and fruit, yogurt, and applesauce. A lot of nights she worked teaching piano right up until we ate dinner. I learned many meal planning routines and crockpot recipes from her. She never had the excuse that it was too late, or there wasn't enough time. Regardless, we had a home-cooked meal on the table.

This is my brother, also Michael. Oh, wait - wrong picture.

There we go, much better! I've written in length about him in a previous post. He was the pickiest eater growing up and I was so annoyed by it. But, he's since graduated from the Culinary Institute of America and gone on to earn his Wine Professional Certification. He has worked at some amazing restaurants, including Studio at Montage Resort and Spa, a Mobil 5 Star winner and Elizabeth's Cafe and Winery, which has waaaaay too many awards for me to list here and stay within the word restraint.

These are my Grandmas. Antoinette, my late paternal "Grammy" is on the left and Deborah, my maternal "Gramma" is on the right. Grammy had 6 children - 5 boys and 1 girl. Gramma had 5 children - 4 girls and 1 boy. As I cook for two I don't know how they did it, but they did. Grammy was 100% Italian and the majority of my sauce, lasagna, and parmigiana recipes are modeled after watching her. She also loved my blog from the beginning, always asking about it. Gramma sure can cook, but is really known for her baking. Every Christmas she would bake up literally thousands of everybody's favorite treats, each of us grandkids helping. For many years, she baked hundreds of breads and pies every week to sell at a local farm stand.

With a family like that, it's no wonder food has manifested in my life in some form, right?

I'm a firm believer that food is love. The recipes and meals I feature are made-from-scratch, at home, in my kitchen. These are meals like my grandparents fed to my parents and my parents fed to me. Tried and true, I never post anything unless I have made it first and can vouch for it.

The recipes might not always be the hippest, I might not take the best photographs, my stats might not be as high as more popular blogs, but this is me. Food is love and I love to share food with the world, just as my family shared food with me. This blog is my outlet and resource to do that, that's why I believe I should be the next food blog star.

You're a guest here for "Dinner at Christina's," so pull up a chair to my table and enjoy!