I was raised by a single mom with a very bland taste palette and in my world, dinner came from a box. Cooking, therefore, is a whole new world for me and I'm enjoying it a great deal. However, I've been baking breads, bagels and decorating cakes since I was about 15. I have a knack for all things baked and the irony is that I'm not much of a sweets eater. Chicken paprikash, bagels, semi-homemade pizza, pomegranate chicken, steak and Bearnaise sauce, pumpkin gingerbread, any type of pasta. My mom used to let me lick my fingers after spreading the (corn-syrup laden) pizza sauce on the Chef Boyardee Pizza Kit. See, I really wasn't exaggerating about the boxed meals thing. I still love and will always lick the beaters and the spatula after baking. Gumbo. It is both my nemesis and my triumph. I still haven't made a great gumbo but I did finally make one that we didn't have to order pizza. I made a roux, used andouille sausage and chicken and it was pretty good! Gumbo gets this award too. I never ate much Okra until I came here to Oklahoma. I didn't know that when you use frozen okra, you probably shouldn't pour all the slime into the gumbo too. Add to that, I was using a low-fat (read: no taste) recipe to begin with. It was the nastiest goup I ever made!