I'm a college student at CU Boulder. I'm in Air Force ROTC, and I have a bunch of folks that I cook for whenever I can. I tend to be pretty much up for anything, and I love the outdoors. My cooking passion is baking, but I realize that I can't just live off of sweets. I always love trying new recipes and challenging meals. I'm still learning the art of cooking meat and fish, but I've had pretty good results so far. I love rich, hearty meals with lots of flavour, and I tend to do all of my cooking from scratch. My family's not a huge cooking family, but every once in a while when they cook, it's excellent. My father's side tends to stick to more meat-based meals with a lot of German and Czech influences, since that's where our family came over from. My mother's side cooks more Midwestern, veggie-filled meals. Still lots of meat, but different kinds of dishes. Apple pie, pumpkin pie, pumpkin loaf, sugar cookies, oatmeal cookies, beef stew, baked sweet potatoes, and meringue. I've cooked a number of things fairly well over the years, but I'm definitely still learning and improving. Each time I make something, it turns out a little better, so that's reassuring. I like to think that eventually, I'll end up as a great cook. Multi-layer cake, kabobs, grilling, cooking with an open flame, and cooking at altitude. I just recently moved to live at 6,000 feet. It makes a huge difference from what I'm used to, so it's a learning experience. Also, I have problems cooking things with grills and open flames; I have a tendency to either cook the outside too much and the inside not enough, or just overcook the entire thing.