My resident Chef

For those that don't already know...I'm married to a trained, professional, full-time chef. Yes, it certainly has its perks so I certainly don't expect anyone to fully relate to the following comment but...here goes...it can be a real pain in the (expletive) arse! I know...wah-wah, cry me a river! So in his defense and to help justify his 24/7 chef-like mentality here are the 'perks'

1. He does, in fact cook just about every meal (98% of them)
2. We have amazing culinary concoctions that most people would pay a great deal of money for.
3. Dinner is on the table or completely prepared when I get home from work.
4. Does the shopping (98% at least. Hey, he's trained to shop efficiently and effectively, something I supposedly interfere with when attending any grocery store outings).

Okay really the list could go on so I've probably already negated my upcoming complaint but that's what we women do best. I like to consider it more of an observation than a complaint anyway. Bear with me as you follow me through my 'observation'.

Over the weekend we decided to have a quiet, low-key little family outing. The location of choice...Charlottesville. Of course! It is one of our favorite places to explore. What's not to love about the beautiful scenic drive, the lovely mountain setting, the history, the....okay, sorry got off topic. Back on track. We had 2 main goals. 1. Get yummy food. 2. Antique-ing (Junk-tique-ing) and explore something/somewhere new. Needless to say, food ALWAYS comes first in this family.

After arriving to the downtown walking mall (practicing my greatest restraint from shopping) we began walking down the mall, reading menu's...and back up the mall...and back down...and back up. No menu was suitable, no location sufficed and when both of those checked out...there were too many people so the quality would probably suffer. AHHH! I was losing patience but also thoroughly entertained. I could have easily settled for the 1st, 2nd...5th choice but what do I know?

It's times like these that having a resident chef isn't always as grandiose as it may seem. Don't get me wrong, I wouldn't have it any other way but PICK A RESTAURANT ALREADY, sweetie!

The decision was made (on our drive out of the city). The lucky winner? Guadalajara. A very good, authentic Mexican restaurant. It didn't take me long to discover that my chef's weakness lied within the food he couldn't easily prepare himself. This pretty much ruled out Italian (to my own dismay) and the obvious "chain restaurants". Both of which I am totally fine with as his Italian cuisine is more than a sufficient replacement for the (now lacking) Italian dinner outing. Chain restaurants tend to bore me and rarely impress me so eliminating them is quite fine with me too (although the basic, simplicity of a cheap quick meal is tempting from time to time). We are now left with Asian inspired cuisine, a good quality, authentic Mexican/Spanish menu and a unique, homemade food, special recipes, hole in the wall kind of dive/diner/pub/cafe.

Charlottesville has all of these but something about that day had my resident chef's taste buds being particularly picky. Why then, did he so easily settle for Guadalajara? Well a number of reasons. 1. He told himself he would agree with the next restaurant I named (as a joke I said, Taco Bell so my opinions became quickly eliminated) 2. After saying that he thought of Mexican food and seeing as we were heading OUT of town Guadalajara was next on the map. Done!

((Side note on: The mention of Taco Bell, reminded him of Mexican food so we had to go to a Mexican restaurant. This is a prime example of how the children's book "If You Give A Mouse A Cookie" relates to our daily life. If you haven't read it, I recommend you do so!))

Welcome to my world! All the gripes aside, my resident chef makes my world go round. I don't know where I'd be without him! (Yuck, wipe the sappy-sap off)

There are still so many stories to be shared on the topic of my resident chef so please stayed tuned, we've only just 'braised' the surface. We haven't even touched menu critiquing, ordering etiquette, restaurant performance and so many more topics to cover.

Thanks for visiting,
Cheers!

Megan