First post: Welcome!

I love food. I love cooking, eating, looking at, looking for, buying, smelling, sharing, taking pictures of, reading about, hearing about, writing about, telling people about, and- most of all- reminiscing about it. Hence the name of my blog. I have been blessed with a foodographic memory. What is that? Well, simply put I remember my life through food. Food = memories. I can tell you exactly when I first ate a breakfast sausage. (I was 7 years old and on an Eastern Airlines plane en route to Orlando for a vacation to Walt Disney World. The ham sandwich on the return flight was not as glorious.) My first meal in Europe introduced me to the very sublime Taleggio cheese and, upon ordering my first gelato, I quickly learned how to say “Another” in Italian. (“Un altro,” by the way.) Now when I see recipes that use Taleggio, I am immediately transported to Nilus Bar on Lake Como in Varenna. And don’t even get me started on getting chocolate for our Easter baskets… that might warrant its own post!

Many of my memories, as you will learn, are tied to travel, though some just revolve around my family’s everyday life and traditions. I consider myself fortunate to have traveled quite a bit both as a child and as an adult. Thank you to my parents who saw travel as valuable family time and took us to many great places with lots of tasty food! Mom was a travel agent for a spell while I was still in school, so that helped. Thanks also to Don for continuing to feed my travel bug. Fortunately, he really does not mind at all!  I also chalk up my love of food to genetics. I’m Polish and Italian. Say no more. Pierogi, kielbasa, pasta. Not a bunch of salad eaters, we! Come to think of it, all we seemed to do was eat. I don’t remember ever doing homework. Did we ever walk the dog? I don’t think anyone ever gave me birthday presents. I’m pretty sure we just ate. When I visit my parents or they visit us today, all we do is eat. We go to kitchen stores as part of a fun day’s shopping. My Christmas list always has some kind of cooking item(s) on it. It’s all about food.

So where do I go from here? Now that you know a little about my quirky life in food, I will relive various foodographic memories for anyone who cares to care. As time permits. Being a teacher keeps me busy, though I always manage to involve food in my classroom any way I can! Do you remember what you learned in March of Fourth or Fifth grade? No. Do you remember the killer spread you had at the Kindergarten Thanksgiving feast? Of course you do! Do you remember the kid in preschool who freaked out and refused to eat a Twinkie because it had fuzz on it? Probably not, but I do.

Again, food = memories.