When my daughter moves into her first apartment or goes off to college, I will never have to worry about her starving to death. Neither is she likely to be forced to live on cold leftover pizza or discount ramen noodles. My girl can COOK! At 10 years old she may not be quite up to the standards of the kids you see on Food Network junior chef competitions, nor does she have her own mini-cupcake empire…yet. However, she has the serenity to accept and create great food, the courage to cook quality food instead of crap, and the wisdom to know the difference!
But it wasn’t always this way… Cooking is my passion, and I always hoped my children would follow in my footsteps. I had fantasies of one day cooking side by side with them in the kitchen, producing gourmet dishes, and having in-depth chats about flavor profiles, international cuisine, and umami. (Ok, no one has long talks about umami!) In reality, I spent the last several years waging all-out battles at nearly every meal, culminating in the 2016 Mac and Cheese Standoff. After one complaint too many, I told my kids if they weren’t going to eat what I served, they were getting mac and cheese for every meal. And they did. For six weeks, all that showed up on the dinner table was neon-yellow pasta and hotdogs. I continued cooking and baking delicious dinners and desserts for myself. And what did the kids eat while I enjoyed steaks, seafood, poultry and pork dishes? That’s right; hot dog mystery meat. Some say cruel and unusual, I say it taught a valuable lesson. When they finally caved and BEGGED me to start cooking for them again, they ate anything I put on the table with gusto, and with compliments!
Fast forward two years, and I am “living the dream”, as they say! My son is quite accomplished in the kitchen, and my daughter is now my sous chef-in-training.
Which brings me to where I am today, cooking recipe #131: Burrito Bowls, with my little girl. This was a fun one to bring her in on, because there are a ton of components to this dish! 
Onions, zucchini, squash, bell peppers (AGAIN!), jalapenos, two kinds of meat, lots of seasonings and all kinds of “optional” ingredients kept us plenty busy. Trust me, we weren’t missing the tortillas we got to skip by just layering everything in a bowl! She was able to work on her multitasking skills, as she juggled cooking chicken along with dicing veggies and making citrus rice. My biggest challenges were directing traffic in the kitchen and trying not to micromanage! That’s hard for this mama… She was a little champ though, braving her way through the pain of popping oil while sautéing meat and the uncertainty of using new kitchen tools.
A great aspect of this meal is that we got to use up a lot of “this and that” from the fridge, including a leftover steak instead of cooking a whole new one, some extra ears of corn that were already boiled and just needed to come off the cob to be thrown in the mix, and that last half an onion that seems to always be at the back of the produce drawer. 
The BEST part of it was that I could make it with my kid and she got to enjoy tasting what she had created. Ree’s recipes are all about feeding friends and family, and feeding my little family has definitely been a challenge over the years. Thanks to her good old homestyle recipes, I feel like I am making memories and teaching important life skills. And that’s something you just can’t get out of the Kraft mac and cheese box!
Have Book, Will Cook 