I'm always looking for new books

I was at a local Barnes & Noble this weekend. I could live in a bookstore if they had a place to sleep. I mean, they have everything these days anyway. Name one big book store that doesn't have a cafe in it...

Can't do it, can you? I know I can't.

At any rate, I was there this weekend with my boyfriend, fiance-to-be, A. He had found a couple books he liked and was reading through them to decide what he wanted to get, so I took my time to peruse. In having contemplated opening my own bakery, and knowing very little about business, I headed there second.

I always look through the cooking section first, just to see if there is anything I can't live without. There was plenty I wanted, but with a birthday coming up in a month, I need to leave things for other people to get me so I won't become that impossible person to shop for. I hate those people. Grr.

Anywho. I was browsing through the business section. There were a few books on opening your own business, being an entrepeneur, owning a small business for dummies. All looked like they had the potential to be helpful, but not exactly what I was looking for. I was about to leave when a book jumped out at me "How to Start a Home-Based Catering Business". I do not want to be a caterer, but aI thought it still might have relevant information. Food is food, after all. I flipped through it and seemed to be fairly thorough for an introductory book so I decided to get it.

I finished reading through it yesterday. I'm going back through it again and taking notes, jotting down info for myself, making lists. It goes over everything! It helps that it's written by a home-based caterer. Imagine. She spends a lot of time going over the business side of it and not just the catering of parties. I'm learning all about the laws and regulations around serving food, insurance for your protection and that of your customer, health codes, fire safety, business law, and how to start a ledger (or for the more technologically minded, accoutning software).

I'm starting to take notes about what I have, what I need, what I will need, what I need to think about, what I need to do, and other general ideas to get me going.

Right now, the list of things I have is pretty small, which is to be expected. I have tons of cooking equipment for a personal equipment. I have next to zero storage as we are living in an apartment. I have pretty much no desk. The computer takes up the whole thing. (We are in the market for a new computer desk that's fairly sturdy if anyone is looking to sell in the NW Ohio area.)

Mostly what I need is fairly simple, at this point. I need new batteries for my digital camera. I also need a USB port connector for my memory card as at some point in the last 4 years in the 6-10 times I've moved, the cord that came with my camera got lost. My cell phone takes pictures, but they are pretty horrible, and there is no flash. I need to either get a start-up ledger or investigate some accounting software and get familiar with it. I need a desk...and a way to organize said desk.

And most of all, I need to organize my recipes. I have more recipes than I know what to do with, but I can hardly ever find the one I'm looking for because so many are tear-outs from magazines, print-offs from the web, or jotted down by a friend or family member and they all get places on this one shelf. No organization. No uniform size. Nothing. So, I want hand written copies of all the originals and then software in which to place them all as well. That way it will be MUCH easier to calculate cost per serving, to make more or fewer servings, and to track exactly what it is I'm doing!

I'm part techie. I need a computer program to do things for me because I like using them and I'm used to using them. I did some basic research today and didn't find anything that everyone could agree was useful or useless. I'm looking for any opinions at this point. I'm running Windows XP and not looking to upgrade to Vista at any point. Any and all help would be appreciated!

Tonight I'm making a lemon cake with lemon glaze for my coworkers tomorrow. I will post pictures on my Facebook account. It's a good recipe that's very...zesty. Pun intended. Everyone really seems to like it and it's fairly easy.

The Beginning

I come from a long line of cooks on both sides of my family. My maternal great grandmother, who will be 99 in December of this year, is, by far, the best cook I've ever known. She is astounding. She never measures anything. Never checks a recipe. Never makes anything that isn't the most delicious thing I have ever put in my mouth. My two all time favorites have to be these meatballs she makes in the pressure cooker with a tomato and red wine sauce and mashed potatoes to go with them. These are no ordinary mashed potatoes. She puts loads of sour cream and cream cheese in them. They are delicious, creamy, wonderful, just the perfect taste for mashed potatoes.

My maternal grandmother (daughter in law of the great grandmother above) is much the same way. Her specialty is au gratin potatoes. She uses SO MUCH CHEESE but it never seems like too much. The onions are always in perfect balance. They're amazing.

My paternal grandmother makes the best banana pudding you have ever tasted. If you ever want any, you have to fight my dad for it. Me too. She uses vanilla wafers and peanut butter. DELISH!

Then there's my Mom. The modern cook. If it can be made in a microwave, she makes it! It always came out wonderful, but it's the times. She worked full time. Dad did too. Two kids. Lots of activities between us and for her as well. She made these meatloaf muffins in the microwave when I was a kid. They were half meat, half veggies and all delectable. If only I had that pan...

I only figured out I could bake once I was in college. I worked in a hospital kitchen. I was trained on everything. But baker. But they needed someone to fix desserts for the cafeteria and I was the only one they trusted. I made apple dumplings, no bake cookies, and double layer chocolate cake. They went faster than any other desserts the rest of the weekend.

I got the baking bug then. I started doing box baking. Got that under control then verged into baking from scratch. I prefer that a lot more. I sat down yesterday and wrote out everything that I know I can bake from scratch. I was surprised to see how much it had grown from just a year ago, 5 years ago, 10...

So, I'm slowly putting together this idea in my head about what I want to do, what I want out of life, what will truly make me happy.

Too bad it isn't the first career I chose. But such is life. And now is my chance to do something about it.