Dream Cuisine

Everyone who knows me is well aware of my love of food (and carbohydrates in particular). I would never survive a low carb diet although I do try to eat them in moderation. Also, I am primarily a dinner kind of girl.

Breakfast
While eggs are one of the main staples of my diet and I absolutely love eggs benedict and soufflés, breakfast has never really been my thing. It’s usually option #1 - an egg or two, fruit and coffee, option #2 – oatmeal and coffee, or option #3- a non-breakfast food that is pretty healthy and of course, coffee.

Lunch
Lunch for me is mostly a necessity. I don’t like large lunches because they make me sleepy so I approach them primarily as providing me with fuel to make it through the rest of my day. Today I am feeling lazy and don’t want to go to the grocery store so lunch with be apples and peanut butter, maybe some sautéed zucchini or squash…or both. If I am going to eat leftovers, this is the meal I will do it. I honestly would probably skip lunch if my blood sugar didn’t require me to eat something. It’s just never that exciting.

Snacks
Snacks are few and far between too. If I am at work in DC, I’ll grab a piece of fruit or be bad and have a peppermint patty or whatever else my neighbor Maya and I are hoarding at the moment. I love to drink tea during the day- ginger usually because I try to only have caffeine in the morning, or green tea if I feel like I need a little caffeine.

Dinner
That brings us to dinner. Now that is where it’s at for me! I LOVE dinner. I love long dinners. I love cooking dinner. I love multi-course dinners. I am a realist and know this can’t happen every night, but I really love it when it does. And you can ask Drew, one of my biggest pet peeves is when people don’t put effort into making dinner. I rarely use our microwave but I honestly never use it when it comes to dinner. I love using whole foods for dinner and I love a balanced meal. I loathe highly processed foods in general but really can’t handle them when it comes to dinner. Drew has expressed his love of Stouffer’s lasagna several times but the thought of it just really annoys me to no end. Not in my house! Growing up my mom always cooked us a well balanced dinner so it is ingrained in me that this HAS to happen in my house. I love being the one to do it too.

Dinners at the Christopher’s usually consists of a protein which is almost always fish, chicken or turkey because I don’t eat red meat, brown rice and veggies. This might sound boring but we make it interesting, using recipes influenced by whatever type of cuisine we want that night. Lately we have been really into stuffed peppers, Indian recipes, light and low sodium versions of Chinese restaurant recipes and of course, always Italian.

I would be remiss if I did not admit though that we have been eating out a lot lately due to the craziness of trying to sell a house. Like most any other couple, when we are busy, we generally avoid cooking. While ordering takeout is not my favorite, we try to keep it healthy in sticking with wraps and meals from our local favorite thai place like basil chicken and lots of veggies. Of course every couple months Drew does sneak a pizza in there which I of course love to indulge in too. The fact that I am lactose intolerant and can’t digest pizza very well has been my saving grace – otherwise I think Drew might try to order it on a weekly basis.

Simplicity
Where my food comes from has always been important to me. Until this week, we’ve had all our produce delivered by local farmers in the area and all organic. I try to get to the farmers market every week to buy fruit and veggies as well. We are spoiled because we have a freezer full of wild caught fish from the many Christopher fishing trips this summer. We also buy fabulous wild pacific salmon from Costco that is affordable. We rarely eat Atlantic salmon. That’s a whole other issue but read about it and you won’t either.

When it comes to recipes, the simpler the better. It’s not that I don’t enjoy a challenge but I just love really enjoying and appreciating whole foods. Giada, the cook on Food Network, has some of the best recipes that fall into this category. You have to like Italian but generally her recipes are very healthy and very easy to make.

What’s the point?
So, this brings me to the real reason I thought of this blog post. I was trying to decide what to eat for breakfast and started thinking about what my dream cuisine for an entire day would be if I had access to any and all ingredients. I have so many different variations of this menu. Here is one version! Also, I should add that I would never be able to each this much in a day. Knowing me I would be full for the rest of the day after breakfast.

Dream Breakfast – inspired by breakfasts I used to eat at Grandma Mascelli’s

-shot of expresso, followed by some more strong café Americano (I am pretending I can have all the caffeine I want)
-plate of Italian cold cuts – soppressata, prosciutto, salami, etc.
-plate of aged Italian cheese
-fried egg
-hard Italian bread and butter
-blackberries

Dream Lunch – inspired by my love of southern food thanks to my husband

-small dish of shrimp and grits
-slice of bourbon pecan pie
-sweet tea

Dream Dinner – inspired by family recipes and one of the best meal’s I’ve ever had in Italy

- Italian wine pairings throughout
-1st course: mini salad w oil and vinegar and mini slices of homemade pizza margherita
-2nd course: porchetta or scallops over risotto
-3rd course: grandma’s homemade pasta and sauce
-4th course: Italian wedding cookies, limoncello

SO, what is YOUR dream cuisine? Have you ever thought about it?