We’re about a week into 2018. I’m two days into the spring semester of school. In between finishing a physics lab assigned first period on the first day back and working on Fundamental Theorem of Calculus problems, I decided I needed a 2018 project (I definitely do not have time for another project, but that’s not gonna stop me!). Since stress baking and cooking is regular habit of mine, I decided a more major cooking project would be good to practice my skills and learn new ones!
Luckily for me, I had the perfect source material: a newly gifted copy of Alison Roman’s Dining In. Not only is this cookbook one of the most beautiful I’ve ever encountered, the recipes are not overly difficult, and they are often introduced with charming personal anecdotes and relatable opinions from Roman. In short, Alison Roman is one of my cooking idols (and has been since her time at Bon Appétit)!
So, like any sane person with a (completely healthy) cookbook obsession, I decided my project for 2018 will be: cooking my way through Roman’s cookbook (aka my 2018 cooking bible). Unlike previous entries, I will not be posting the recipe in its entirety. If I can find one, I’ll post an online link to the recipe, or you can go out and buy a copy of this cookbook, I highly recommend it! (this recommendation will become more credible as the year goes on.)
(This project will not bridge my distaste for seafood, I will abstain from cooking those recipes. Maybe I’ll draft my parents for a guest Alison Roman seafood recipe post? We’ll see where 2018 takes us). So, for my purposes, there are 95 recipes in the cookbook that I need to cook my way through. With 52 weeks in the year, I have to cook approximately 2 recipes a week to finish by the end of 2018. So far, I’m off to an OK start– I’ve tested two of Roman’s recipes, both with great success.
The first was crispy chickpeas and lamb with greens and garlicky yogurt. I made this for my family and I during a surprisingly frigid winter holiday, and it was warm and garlicky and delicious and just Mediterranean enough. (This post is mainly meant to introduce my project, not talk about recipes, but future posts will go WAY more in-depth about specific recipes. I promise).
The second recipe I attempted was Everyone’s Favorite Celebration Cake, which I made for a party for some of my friends. It certainly lived up to it’s name: everyone adored the cake, including my parents, who were able to snag a piece at the end of the night. The cake was a project in of itself (it probably took 4.5 hours from start to very end), but it was definitely worth it.
I will be blogging through (hopefully) all 95 recipes by the end of the year, but this is it for post one of what will become many. My parents and I are certainly going to be Dining In a lot with Alison Roman’s recipes this year. (This cookbook has an optimal name for delightful puns. Keep an eye out for them– they will be interspersed in my 2018 posts).
**It’s “not-a-resolution” because calling it a resolution means that it will ultimately fail in about 2 months. Tops. But I am going to succeed with this project!
Food, Friends, Odds & Ends 