We’re hours away from a new year.  A fresh start.  It’s a time when many people make New Year’s resolutions.  Of course most people end up abandoning their resolutions after a few weeks or a month or two.  But right now people are still looking at ways to make this year better than the last.  Since one of our goals is encouraging people to expand their home cooking skills, we’ve come up with some food and cooking resolutions that may be helpful (if you’re in the market for New Year’s resolutions).

1. To cook more meals in, and eat fewer meals out – life gets busy, we all know that. And sometimes you don’t have much choice but to grab a quick bite on the road. But making an effort to cook your own meals at home and eat out less will help both your wallet and your waistline.
2. To eat and use all my leftovers – either food from a restaurant you’ve brought home, or leftover food you’ve cooked yourself, always try to eat or use all your leftovers. Anything you throw out is essentially just throwing away money, since you’re throwing away something you already paid for.
3. Try eating a new food – new foods can be scary. And I openly admit I’m not always the most adventurous when it comes to new foods. But it’s always worth it to try something new. In the best case you’ll discover a new food you really like. And in the worst case, you can finally tell people who bug you about trying a certain food that you did and didn’t like it and stick your tongue out at them.
4. Try cooking a new food – cooking a new food can also be kind of scary or intimidating. But it can also be fun! And you can learn some valuable skills. Besides, you don’t want to get in a food rut, so expand your cooking world this year.
5. Visit a farm – I realize this may not be the easiest thing for everyone to do – not everyone lives in an area like we do where there are farms open to the public a half hour away. Yet getting the chance to see where your food comes from is a really good experience. Whether it be buying fresh vegetables straight from the source, or visiting with some dairy cows and egg-laying chickens, farms are fun places to visit and a nice reminder of how fresh food can really be.
   

   Moo.

6. Plan meals ahead – this kind of plays in to resolution #1, since planning meals ahead gives you a better chance of keeping that one. If you plan your meals for the week in advance, you’ll have a better idea of what ingredients you need to buy when you go shopping, which can ultimately help save you money. It will also just help you be more organized in general, since you won’t need to waste potential cooking time sitting around trying to figure out what to make.

So there are some food and cooking related New Year’s resolutions you could make for yourself this year.  Whether you choose to take one or more of these on or not, Erik and I wish you a happy 2015, full of good food and good times!  And we hope you’ll keep checking back for all the yummy posts we have planned.