What’s for Dinner? Finding Inspiration.

Red Pepper Pasta

Photo Credit: Pioneer Woman

I seem to go in waves with cooking. One week I find a ton of recipes that inspire me to buy vegetables and defrost meats and poultry and the next I’m ready to call for a pizza.

I was in desperate need of a trip to the grocery store earlier this week, but couldn’t seem to find the time between play dates and nap schedules to make it happen. On Tuesday I searched through the fruit and vegetable bin and created an unbelievably tasty mango curry dish from a hodge-podge of random ingredients.

I’m feeling a bit more confident about my ability to whip up dinner without a recipe. I added a pinch of cayenne and a tablespoon or two of curry. Salted and peppered along the way and added a bit of pineapple preserves for sweetness. I don’t think it was the best thing I’ve ever made, but my husband said it was delicious. To be honest I think he was happy I wasn’t feeding him buffalo chicken (my default dinner) or leftovers.

Yesterday I had the brilliant idea of asking our fourteen year old neighbor to watch my son while I ran out for groceries. It’s the first time I’ve ever left him with anyone other than family, but the truth is it needed to be done sometime, and yesterday was as good a day as any other.

Before heading out I searched the internet for inspiration and found the following recipes:

Since I wanted to minimize my time out of the house I created a list broken down by aisle. I swear I’ve never moved through the store with such purpose before. Of course, my son was perfectly happy when I arrived home an hour later.

I gathered up my ingredients and plan to prepare my first recipe this evening. I’m looking forward to trying something new.

Do you get bored with cooking? Where do you search for inspiration?

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