Food bio

Dena's already met me, and even eaten my cooking (such as it was), but I'll do this anyway, to keep the ball rolling.

Skill level: Medium, but erratic. I have a tiny number of mainstays that I've been making once every couple of weeks or so for basically my entire adult life, and I'm good at thinking up endless variations on them based on what's in season or what I have on hand. When it comes to learning new recipes sometimes I can get things to come out well, and sometimes I feel like a Typical Guy who can't even find the "on" button on the microwave.

Favorite cuisine: Do I have to pick just one? Mexican, Chinese, Indian, Korean, Thai, Vietnamese, Italian, Northwest fusion, Peruvian, North African, Malaysian (think Thai plus mangoes), Japanese of course... None of which I can really make.

Cooking or baking: Definitely cooking. Which is great because Akiko has gotten really interested in baking over the last few years. But doesn't really like to cook.

Favorite appliance: Slow cooker, among those acquired recently. But our fancypants Japanese rice cooker is the one we really can't live without.

Favorite junk food: Chips, yes, all kinds. We went to a city 4th of July festival over the weekend and got these - potato chipper swirls - basically a whole potato sliced into swirly curly chips and fried to perfection, somehow both crispy and chewy... Pardon me, what were we talking about?

Favorite real food: Oh, my, this is going to be hard. Pizza, curries, any kind of cheese. Fish'n'chips. Deep-fried clams, New England-style. Taryn's Hopi corn salad. Fresh berries.

As you can see from the above lists my tastes run entirely toward the heart-attack-by-age-45 end of the spectrum - which gives me about four years to change my ways, come to think of it! One of the great things about this family food blog is that almost every recipe y'all post is healthier than almost anything I habitually make. So it's been great: I hope we keep it going.