Julia & Julia

Lyndsay Beneteau and Tom Reiber - both of whom write memoirs - find their lives intertwined. Though seperated by time and space, both women are at loose ends... until they discover that with the right combination of passion, fearlessnessness and olive oil, anything is possible.

So, my name is Tom, and I have decided to write a blog in which I cook everything on Lyndsay's blog. It's a wonderful blog full of delicious recipes for you and your families, and with Holly needing a boost, and loving food, the idea hit me that this would be the perfect way to make her happy, have fun, and make a lot of great food.

Let me start of by saying that I have very limited cooking experience, or had. I was mainly a barbecue specialist, and a meat guy. At my parents I wouldn't cook at all, my mom did that stuff. She never asked for help, and if she did we knew that it was a joke.

In the apartment, and the early months in the house, I learnt how to make spaghetti, taco's, cook chicken and use it for indian food (mix it with a store bought sauce and rice), and the rest was pretty well barbecue. Not too exciting for my princess who needs a new meal every night.

I've tried online recipes, and recipe books, but the foods turned out like shit. The ingredients couldn't be found, or they wouldn't rise, or they were too complex, surely someone out there could help.

Along came my Julia.

Here is my first attempt, and success with Coconut Shrimp. I doubled, and maybe tripled the recipe to cook a whole bag. I'm always thinking about lunch the next day. I hate spending money on lunch. I'm a jew at heart. Here's the comment I left Lyndz.

Bing bam, boom, out of the park.

Note, if you make a whole bag of shrimp like me, you will end up with your coco being a paste at the end. This is okay, just put the paste on the platter and it will taste the same, although you will be docked major points for presentation.

One thing to stress is to not get sweetened coconut stuff, it's ok Turkish, I'm sweet enough.

This next one, I think I made the next night, Holly also made a beautiful fruit salad with a recipe I can acquire for you if you want it. It's called a Jerk Chicken. You make the sauce, rub it on (with a brush), then cook. The comment I left:

Ok, we ate this last night. Once again I am a cooking hero. It was easy, quick and delicious.

I ran into a problem with my blender creating smoke and then the smoke burning my eyes. I think it had green onion something rather in it. My eyes got healed up and this really grilled up nice even from a frozen state.

Thanks again!

This one, was a real fish out of water story for me. Like a what the fuck am I doing here kind of thing. I can't believe I made this, but I'm very glad I did. Potato and Leek soup. We made sandwitches to get our protein in. Notice the hot sauce on top, really gave it a kick.

The leeks smelt so nice when they were cooking. I felt like a real chef. The comment:

Another winner!

I had to call Ben to make sure that you blended it after it was cooked. I have never heard of doing such a thing. But also I have never made a soup.

I also had to send Holly out for some chicken broth cause I forgot that vegetable stock cannot make chicken broth.

Other than that, everything went very smoothly. Other than when you say big pot, you mean BIG POT. I had to use a big pot Massive, it was transplanted from a medium one. I had enough for lunch today and more at home, I put the leftovers in a juice jug!

Anyways, it was delicious, fucking fantastic. We combo'd it with some sandwiches. I had chicken with hummus on multi grain with a pickle.

The hot sauce really made it pop!

Look at how happy the little monster is!!

Oh man, this one was amazing again, how can Lyndsay be so good. Lyndsay and Ben ooze talent. Curry is my fav, Indian is my fav, this one was special. Chickpea carrot salad with Mango curry chicken sandwiches. The sauce was unbelievable. I doubled it to have some leftover to dip pita into.

The salad was awesome. Very quick to make, I will probably make this for my parents.

The comment:

This one worked out really well for us in a few ways.

We got to make it together (Holly worked on the salad.)

We didn't have to make a salad too.

It gave us something to make my rents when we have them over sometime.

I got to do a few new things that I had never done before which improved my confidence! It's silly but when I was cooking the spice I was like, "what the hell am I doing, wait, it's working, wow, I'm not totally retarded."

Thanks again!! The next one looks like a winner for next week, tonight I'm making the ribs again!

And finally the Rootbeer Ribs. Absolutely delicious. Better I'm sure if we had a slowcooker, I would get one, but I want the rents to have something fun to get us for xmas.

This is the second time I made them, notice this time I made them with some Garlicky baked potato fries. I found the recipe online.

This recipe started it all and got me hooked on the blog and my goal to cook it all. Although, some have fish and non-rib pork, so those won't be cooked.

The comment:

These ribs were fucking brilliant. Holly said they were better than Baton Rouge.

Instead of a slow cooker, I popped them into the oven at 300 in a tented foil contraption inside a platter like you would use for Lasagna. I filled it 2/3 of the way full with rootbeer, I bought two litres and didn't use too much, haha.

Anyways, you are the Queen of cooking, more simple type recipes like this are needed. Just awesome stuff!

In conclusion, I'm really glad I've learnt a bit more of how to cook. My confidence has gone way up. Lyndsay's blog is just amazing. I recommend you make some of the things on it. They are mostly easy, and always delicious.

Next time you come over for dinner I promise to make you more than just hamburgers or sausages. Unless the sausages are in a potato and olive "stew".

Now I raise my glass to you and say "Bon Appétit."