I'm a full-time career girl who finds it rewarding to prepare a tasty dish for a dinner guest, experiment with new recipes and new foods, try new cooking tools, and use new food prep techniques. If I wasn't so good at my current profession, I'd consider becoming a professional chef and spend all my time in the kitchen. My ultimate kitchen will be the centerpiece of my home and will feature lots of natural light, including sky light, and will serve as an in-eat kitchen. While I enjoy cooking most kinds of foods, I truly love preparing a special family recipe. It fills my kitchen with the familiar scents of my childhood and eases the loneliness of missing my relatives, especially on a holiday. I also love making coffee from any whole-bean variety. It fills the house with that inviting coffee aroma and makes me want to call a friend who I've been wanting to catch up with. Spaghetti sauce (gravy if you're Italian), cheese lasagna, Thanksgiving sausage stuffing, stuffed mushrooms, stuffed artichokes, french toast, turnip, squash, and pizza. Over the past few years, I've spent my holidays in the kitchen with my mother learning the secrets to our family recipes. These are sacred traditions that I want to pass on, and I'm so grateful I had the opportunity to learn them. With just one taste of a family recipe, I revisit my childhood all over again, and the holiday spirit brings out the whimsical child in me. For me, there's nothing more nostalgic and treasured than these family traditions. I don't enjoy preparing foods like custards and puddings that are milk and/or egg-based that can burn easily or change consistency in varying temps. I've tried several recipes on my own, but knowing that I've wasted time and money on a recipe that went kablooey has conditioned me to avoid them altogether.