one new goal.

so i'll let you in on a little 2013 goal of ours. it's going to sound dumb. but let me preface it with this:

we are vegetarians. i am allergic to about one million foods. while i completely maintain that there are so many delicious things that we both can and do eat in the nelson home,  i will also admit to this: i used to be a lot more passionate about cooking. when i was little i was wild about cooking. and in high school it was all i wanted to do. i decided i was going to go to the culinary institute of america for college. my dad said no you are not. so i didn't. but that tells you something about how much i loved to cook. correction, how much i do love to cook. but i've lost some of my cooking excitement. and it's harder when your diets are a bit more limited. it could also be the wife factor. you know, trying to make good meals for two every night is much harder than cooking for one, and throwing the occasional dinner party. wow, this preface is getting much longer than i had intended. i guess this whole post is basically one big preface for this:

this year i am going to make one new recipe each week. i never cook with recipes. i just buy ingredients that we like and make stuff with them. it always tastes good but it gets a little repetitive. any repetitive meal makers out there? i mean, each season has its few staple things that we eat over and over and over...

for example: spaghetti squash. sooo much spaghetti squash.

so that's all. i'm going to make something new each week. we had one of our most favorite people in the world over for dinner monday night, so we made these things: 

shepherd's stew with these yummy mashed po-tats. also, this salad. are you surprised that it's a kale salad? we eat kale every day. i'm not lying. see? repetitive.  

i left the potatoes out of the stew and served it over the mashed potatoes instead. but if you are a potato lover, you could leave 'em in there too. to each, his own.

i probably won't blog about every new recipe. there are way too many good food blogs out there to try to take on the world of food blogging. but perhaps each month i'll share the best ones. who knows. 

if you feel stuck in the same rut, feel free to try this too. and let me know what turns out well. i am a fan of recipe sharing!

wish me luck!