Dear Baby New Year,
This year was an alright year in my book. I didn’t do anything completely amazing, but I got through it. I know typically I am not one to make these resolutions simply because I typically stop following through with them around the second weekend of January.
However, for next year I would like to make a change for the better. Not with resolutions, but with “food-olutions.”
Food-olution No. 1: I’ve heard of this great mystical creation that many have been calling the food pyramid. I think I should probably try that out. I’d like to be able to say that I eat the proper amount of servings of each food group most days. At the moment, I can’t even remember the last time I had fruit. Unless strawberry Jell-O counts as a fruit, but I’m almost certain it doesn’t.
Food-olution No. 2: When I was younger, my mom used to decide what dinner would be in the morning and then when we got home it would magically be made. As I’ve grown older I have realized it wasn’t magic — it was a slow cooker. My roommates and I have a slow cooker, maybe two, and none of us have used it once. I want to make more crock pot meals so when I come home from a long day of class, all I have to do is reach in and grab some pot roast.
Food-olution No. 3: These people on Extreme Couponers spend about five cents on groceries for the entire month and I’m spending hundreds of dollars. Clearly there is something I’m doing wrong. I, however, have a leg up on the competition in that my mom is becoming an extreme couponer. She may not be TLC-ready, but she spent five cents on $25 worth of groceries. After the break, with her help and the 60 coupons I have already started collecting, I should be ready to go.
Food-olution No. 4: My pallet needs to be expanded. Really expanded, not just trying-new-cheese-expanded, but trying new food. I have never had organic food, and it’s healthier so I feel like it should be worth a try. I’ve also just recently tried stuffed-pepper soup. I didn’t think I’d like peppers because I never had them. They were amazing! I need to stop being so picky and try new things.
Food-olution No. 5: This time next year, I will be living in the real world and I want to be able to host Thanksgiving dinner at my place. I want to make everything from scratch and I want everything to go smoothly. From past experience, my kitchen experiences are more hectic than smooth, so I will probably have to have some amazing backup plan, like buttered noodles.
Food-olution No. 6: My final food-olution is to not catch anything on fire, waste an entire meal, forget the main ingredient in a meal or give myself food poisoning. All of these things I somehow managed to do — not in a year, but in a semester. I have learned from my mistakes and would really like to make this my top priority.
Food-wise, this was not an incredibly awful year. I had more successes than fails in the kitchen and I was able to try a few new recipes. While I did cave and bribe some freshmen to take me to the dining hall a few times, I survived.
Now it’s time for break, which means it is time for food back home. I hope my mom, Raising Canes, Texas Roadhouse, Steak ‘N Shake and Fazoli’s are ready for me.
Love,
Mesha
Mesha Baylis-Blalock is a senior studying journalism at Ohio University, a novice cook and a columnist for The Post. Tell her about your own food-olutions at mb345109@ohiou.edu.
