Born in Germany, but have lived most of my 45 years in the U.S. Married for 24 years. I did NOT like helping my mother cook as a child, but as I grew up things of course, changed. At age 13 my mom spent a month overseas, visiting relatives in Germany. She left pages and pages of detailed instructions for me to cook about 20 different dinners. THAT was my introduction to cooking. Although she was was raised on traditional 'meat and potatoes', she LOVED the idea of American casseroles and that's what we usually ate. As a newlywed, I brought with me my little collection of fairly easy casserole meals. I couldn't imagine a new wife not knowing how to cook. As the years went on I realized that many women/wives/moms aren't into cooking and many don't know how. I did not want to become one of those 'packaged products' cooks, where you just add the meat and simmer everything for 20 minutes. I like a variety of cuisines and usually cook something Mexican, Asian, and Italian each week. I also love discovering restaurant clone recipes on the web and elsewhere (Cinnamon Rolls III is one I've contributed here). I've been interested lately in traditional German cooking, making Rouladen, German meatballs, meatloaf, and a variety of baked desserts passed down from my mother. The first time I made German rouladen I could not believe how easy it was the make (once the prep work is done) and how wonderful it smelled while cooking! I remember making my first lasagna: I'd cooked the noodles and was draining them into what I thought was a strainer. There was no strainer and the noodles ended up prompty in the bottom of the garbage disposal, where I fished them out, rinsed them off and didn't tell a soul. One Thanksgiving I was in charge of bringing the pumpkin pie. It had a strange taste to it and I realized that I'd left the sugar out of it. Yuck!