Epicurious

Got salmon, arugula and mint in your fridge, don't know what to do with them? How about not having a great pecan pie recipe? Avocado, artichoke and leeks?

If you're like me and jealous of the natural cooks...those who can just take whatever seemingly disparate ingredients already in the kitchen and turn it into a gourmet feast...you can go to your computer and click on Epicurious.com, plug in the stuff you want to use and get a list of recipes. You can sort them by ratings, ingredients or whatever. There's this online recipe box so you can save the ones you get addicted to. There are comments with people sharing how they altered the recipe,what worked and what didn't. Because I sort by fork rating, the dishes I've made are always excellent.

I keep learning lots and doing more and more intuitive cooking. I just found out about a book that should teach me even more. Will review it here some day. But in the meantime, thank GAWD for epicurious.com!!! No longer have to buy tons of recipe books (unless that's your thing, which I guess for "real" cooks it often is). I've been introduced to foodie dishes I never would have thought of, just by plugging in a few ingredients: Fennel/Fig cookies which were the star Christmas cookie this year turned out to the best foodie Fig Newtons with oomph I've ever had...who wudda thunk? Salmon With Arugula and Tomatoes; Salmon Mint and Basil... just tons of stuff, really.

So for those of us who didn't get the inborn ingredient-combination-gene and have to keep learning, we now have a friend. Enjoy the experimenting!