The Cook Crook

When I planned this post in my head, I was thinking about reveling in the start of Spring, the sun,and the fresh veggies at the Farmer’s Market. As I wrote it, it was raining and cold and my friends and family  in the Northeast were due to get a rude April Fool’s joke of snow! But, it’s still the first of the month, it’s meal planning time and I will forge ahead with my plans confident that Spring will eventually arrive.

This time of year, I start moving away from stews and heavier dishes and move towards more grilling and less use of the oven inside. I have decided this year to experiment more with the crock-pot since it is such a huge time saver. I think it’s a good time especially the cookbook my mom gave me for Christmas specifically has a seasonal section of crock-pot meals. Seasonality starts to equal cost savings for the items that are coming in now like strawberries and asparagus that can be purchased at wonderful prices. The weather forecast has improved for the weekend so I am hopeful I can still make a trip to the local Farmer’s Market and get some more inspiration.

I am also committed to at least one night a month that will be kid’s cook night. I believe like this article from WebMD believes that cooking is not only great bonding time, but learning time and time to build healthy habits as well.

Finally, there is also a holiday to consider with Easter being April 24 and this year, for the first time, I plan to make an Easter Brunch. Not sure if I can do it avoiding real baking but I am going to give it a try.

So for now, I have most of April planned out. Here is the calendar as it stands today:

Some recipes you will recognize and others are new.  I have a personal goal of trying at least one new recipe per week. The bonus is I get to share my successes (and failures) with you! You will also notice a few days are still blank. I will fill those by this weekend when I make my Sunday coupon shopping trip.

As always, I love reading your comments and getting messages from you with tips and ideas. Keep ‘em coming!