New food meme!

I am behind in blogs (what's new, right?). So keep checking old blogs or add me on Facebook and I'll update when I go through an updating binge.

Some questions for you! Please answer :) I'm begging! How many of you read this blog from a blog reader? That's one thing I always wonder. And how did you find my blog? How long have you been reading?

A reader was recently pointing out that I never write about myself. That's true for a couple reasons: I don't have a very interesting personal life and I hear too many horror stories about people getting fired for their blogs. Do you want to hear anything about my life outside the kitchen? Or are you here entirely for the cooking?

Here is a meme (actually, several memes, formed into one):

1. Can you cook? If yes, do you like to cook?
Sure! I'm beginning to be a pretty good cook. And I do like cooking. Which is a good thing when you are cooking through a cookbook with a bazillion recipes in it.

2. When do you eat with your whole family?
On holidays. Unless you are talking about just Josh and I, we eat together about half the time.

3. What do you eat for breakfast?
Nothing. I haven't consistently eaten breakfast since I had a say in the matter. I don't like eating in the morning.

4. When, where and how do you eat on weekdays?
I love eating lunch out, just my book and me. But now that we are having monatary issues, I limit eating out to once a week. Most of the time I just eat dinner (I have a really slow metabolism and I'm not hungry most of the time) but sometimes I eat lunch too.

5. How often do you eat out (in a restaurant)?
As often as possible. A few times a week for dinner, more for lunch, when we aren't having money issues :)

6. How often do you order delivery/take-out?
We live a block out of the delivery range for most restaurants, so we rarely get it. There is an AMAZING pizza place in town, so we get pizza take-out at least once every two weeks.

7. Regarding no. 5 and 6: Say there weren’t financial reasons would you do this more often?
Absolutely!

8. Are there any “standard dishes” you serve regularly?
Sure. I make tortilla soup all the time. My blue cheese dressing is requested by everyone I know. I make pasta a lot (like a good Italian-American). I, like my mother and grandmother, make a great pork roast and roasted potatoes.

9. Have you ever cooked for more than 6 persons?
Yes! I've done Thanksgiving for the last three years and my graduation dinner was for nine.

10. Do you cook every day?
No, although I do cook a lot of days.

11. Have you ever tried recipes from blogs?
Yes, although not often. I tend to cook from cookbooks or magazines a lot more frequently.

12. Who cooks more frequently at your home?
Me.

13. And who cooks better?
Probably me :)

14. Do you cook totally different compared to your mother/parents?
No, not really.

15. If yes, do you nevertheless eat at your parents?
Absolutely! They are absolutely terrific cooks.

16. Are you a vegetarian or could you imagine being one?
No and no. It would be challenging to be a vegetarian meat scientist. I eat a lot of vegetarian meals but I feel sorry for people who don't eat meat every time I have a delicious BLT.

17. What would you like to cook which you haven’t dared to make yet?
A souffle. I'm just too scared to make one at high altitude. Are they difficult?

18. Do you prefer cooking or baking?
Baking, hands down, but not in Colorado. I like to measure and I like precision, so baking is my thing. In fact, I like the sort of baking that requires absolute precision and measurement--candy-making.

19. What is your greatest misery in the kitchen?
Washing those damn dishes. And we don't have nearly enough counter space.

20. What do you dislike?
Foodwise? I hate bell peppers. I also can't stand canned tuna--it actually makes my stomach roll to think about tuna.
And another :)

21. What’s your #1 comfort food? Right now it's tortilla soup with homemade tortilla chips. I gorge myself. I also love stuffed artichokes. Esp. stuffed baby artichokes.

22. If you were on a deserted island, what one food would you want to have with you? Fresh, potable water, so I didn't die of dehydration. Is that too practical of an answer?

23. What is/are your signature dishes? (What dishes are you ‘known’ for?) Blue cheese dressing, as boring as that is. Honestly, this dressing can make dyed-in-the-wool blue cheese haters believe.

24. It’s Friday night, you don’t know what to cook. You opt for…Ordering in a pizza.

25. What’s your biggest weakness when it comes to food? Soda. I love Coke.

26. What food can you absolutely not eat? I posted above what I don't like. What I can not eat is most fruit, since I'm allergic to it. I want to eat pineapple and mango but I can't. My allergist thinks I'm heading right towards deadly fruit allergies and I have to carry an epi-pen around.

27. You need a drink. You grab a….Coke. Or an iced tea. I love iced tea (no sugar, no lemon).

28. What’s the most decadent dish you’ve had? High grade Kobe beef teppanyaki in Tokyo. It was amazing. And ladies in kimono served us.

29. What’s your favorite type of food? Italian, if my family is making it. French, if we are at a restaurant.

30. Favorite dish? Depends on my mood!

31. If your partner could take you to any restaurant you wanted, which one would it be? Depends on the city! Here in Fort Collins, I would choose The Melting Pot. In Des Moines I would choose Django (terrific French food!). In Chicago, The Russian Tea Room (my favorite restaurant of all time). I could name off my favorite place in almost every city I've spent a significant chunk of time in.

32. Are you a soup or salad person? Soup, soup, soup. I love soup.

33. Buffet, take-out or sit-down restaurant? I've taken a lot of food microbiology classes and they've frightened me away from buffets. Plus, I'm not a binge eater, so I don't really require the amount of variety that buffets offer. I don't like eating at fast food restaurants or any place that reminds me of a fast food restaurant, so I always take those away. I like sit-down restaurants the best.

34. What’s the most impressive dinner you’ve ever made? I don't know. I think my graduation dinner was pretty impressive. So was this New Year's Eve. (Look them up!)

35. Do you consider yourself a good cook? I do. And I'm getting better all the time.

36. Do you know what vichyssoise is? I sure do! A French potato-leek soup, usually served cold. I like it but I like it hot (I'm not that into cold soups). My Uncle Denny makes a great version of it.

37. Who’s your favorite TV cook? I don't watch cooking shows (the how-to type).

38. Can you name at least three TV cooking personalities? Sure. But could I name three I like? Anthony Bourdain, Mario Batali, Bobby Flay. I love Top Chef and Top Chef Masters. I have a strange addiction to The Next Food Network Star, even though I'm very unlikely to ever watch the winner's show. On the Food Network I like Chopped.

39. Homemade or homemade from a box? Homemade for most things. I will admit to relying on canned frosting most of the time and boxed Kraft macaroni and cheese hits a very special comfort food spot for me. I think I eat far less boxed foods than most people--I could easily live without a microwave. I pretty much only use ours to melt butter for recipes.

***If you decide to do this meme on your own blog, please let me know in the comments and link back***