I live in Massachusetts and I'm a mother of 13 year old twins and a 12 year old. They're my three favorite people in the world. I love to cook for them and my wonderful husband of four years. I work part-time as a paralegal and I love to bake, bake, bake. Cooking is awesome too, but there's something about baking that helps relax me and puts me in a very peaceful place. I love cooking italian food and baking. Since I have trouble sleeping, it's not uncommon for me to get up and start making cookies in the wee hours of the morning. I love to make cheesecakes, ricotta pies, veal and chicken dishes, lots of pasta with meatballs, sausages and braciola, and traditional desserts that my mother and grandmother make. Christmas eve dinner when we make fish, fish and more fish. We always cook seven fishes because that's our tradition. As a beginning course we start of with linguine with garlic and oil and linguine with lobster sauce. We then eat shrimp, smelts, haddock, bacala, scallops and shrimp. It's very important for me to keep these traditions up with my own children. My whole family is from Italy and I've learned so much by growing up in a house that was always filled with people, wonderful smells, plenty of delicious food and love. I guess my triumph would have to be my sauce with all the meaat simmering in it. My meatballs are almost like my grandmothers and hers are heavenly and perfect. I'll keep trying. One of my favorite things to do is to wake up on a Sunday morning and start a fabulous sauce. As the day goes by there's nothing better than pouring a nice glass of wine and grabbing some crunchy bread and tasting how it's coming along. Anything that's bland. I learned at an early age that salt is the great equalizer when it comes to taste. It brings out the flavors of the foods you're cooking. I've made quite a few bland dishes that taught me to make use of seasonings and too cook with them from the bottom up. I also have a terrible habit of making something over and over until I get it right. One time I was making an apple crisp. Well I made seven of them and had my neighbor keep tasting them until I came up with the one that I thought was best. Let's just say that the first two were pretty disastrous. It was all she could do to keep a look of disgust off her face!