Chef Paul: Eating Out, Eating In
February 25 2011
We don’t go out for dinner very often.
We quite enjoy eating out but as a couple with a 3 year old we either end up at “family style” restaurants or having to hire a baby sitter…and that adds $$$ to the meal. So, when we do go out, we make sure to do our research first. What I
look for is a restaurant where I’ll get good value for my dollar. I don’t want to go to a restaurant with $30 mains and feel I did not get that level of food or service that that price point warrants. I often feel I could cook the same meal better at home, and at a much lower cost. I’d rather go some place where I know my $15 main course will be worth $15; where the service is good and where I feel comfortable. I’ve dined in and worked at some of the finer restaurants around so I am quite picky when it comes to dining out…but I also love it when someone else cooks for me for a change.
Because we don’t eat out all that much and because we love to socialize, we tend to host dinner parties fairly often. I love trying out new ideas on guests and will often spend a few weeks planning and testing certain dishes. In fact, the weeks leading up to this past Thanksgiving I worked on perfecting my brine recipe for the bird by testing it on roast chicken suppers for three consecutive Sundays.
That’s how many of the MealEasy recipes were developed. Testing and retesting different food combinations until we got something we were proud to put on the site.
