My cooking is influenced by moving around the world, thanks to the military, and by standing beside my mother in her kitchen. She was a transplant from the Northeast that adapted to southern living and cooking. I love to cook, plan meals and attempt anything new and exciting. I enjoy cooking everything but I really like to try my hand at new and interesting foods. Home-made yeast breads, elaborate desserts, and complicated recipes are a lot of fun for me. My family eats seafood on Christmas eve and a traditional ham on Christmas Day. Turkey is reserved for Thanksgiving and my mother always makes a sweet potato casserole that today. My Aunt, who never cooked, used to make a surprisingly wonderful crab imperial that I have adopted for my family. The holiday season is ushered in by my grandmother's gingerbread recipe. At the tender age of 15, I cooked a french meal from Julia Child's French Cooking Cookbook for my grandmother. My mother still claims it was the best meal I've ever made and, believe me, that was a very long time ago. My husband states that my North Carolina Pulled Pork BBQ beats any that he's ever eaten from a restaurant. I believe him, we've finally altered the recipe down to an art form. Fifth grade home economics class. My best friend and I were supposed to make molasses ginger cookies. We forgot the ginger and attempted to add it after we had cooled the dough in the school's walk-in cooler. The cookies were baked and they had pockets of powdered ginger that were terrible to bite into, we ate them anyway.