I love cook books. I spend hours peering over them, looking for a great new receipe to try. I make lists of the receipes I would like to try along with the ingredients I'll need. I especially love Company's Coming Cookbooks because they have great pictures.
But when it comes to actually buying the groceries and cooking the meals, I'm afraid I fall short. I have a tendency to stick with my old stand by's of chicken and potatoes, spaghetti, tacos, and home made pizza.
I'd really like to try something new and sometimes I do, but I never know if my family will like it. If they don't I'll have gone to all the effort of making something new only for them to end up having a bowl of cereal.
Sometimes I do this with writing. As I started writing a new project I realized there are certain settings, character types, and even names that I like to use. For some reason I like my tunnels and caves. I love the name Oliver and I'm fond of dark forests. Evidently I need to get out of my comfort zone and try to make some new receipes of maybe a big city, skyscrapers, and no one named Oliver.
How about you are stuck using the same old receipes or do you try to mix it up a bit?
9 comments:
I'm guilty of using the same ole, same ole all the time. I don't know if there is a cure, but if you find one, please pass it on. :)
Unfortunately, I mix it up perhaps far too much. :-) But variety is the spice of life, and all that.
I love cookbooks too!
I admit..I'm sort of guilty there as well. Maybe there's something to be said about writing what you know...I wonder though how long that works before it get stale?
I love looking at cookbooks, but I hardly ever make something new. My husband, however, is always experimenting in the kitchen (much to my delight... usually).
With food, it's the same old recipes--spaghetti, shake and bake pork chops, hamburger helper and sweet and sour chicken. I'm afraid I just don't like cooking...
With my writing, I can fall into a pattern too. I think that's why my new WiP has some fantasy aspects to it--I wanted to try something different for once...
I have very little creativity when it comes to cooking. I have a stable of comfortable easy recipes that I know my family likes and I pretty much stick with those. I let my creativity ooze into my writing.
All great comments. It appears we all leave our creativity on the page instead of the frying pan.
Actually, I love to try new things when it comes to cooking, but unfortunately, my husband is soooooooo picky (pickier than our 3year-old) that I don't venture out and try as much as I'd like. I love to look through cookbooks, too. As for writing, I find that when I come to a scene that should go somewhere bold and daring and crazy, I'm too afraid, and keep it as a lower profile scene. I know this isn't exactly what you were talking about, but it made me think about it. If there is a really intense scene in a book I'm reading, it makes me nervous. It makes me nervous to write it, too.
Susan: I think I need to step further out of my comfort zone and try writing something completely different.
JKB: I will look to your example to widen my array of writing.
Laura: It's definitely easier to stay with what you know and for me what I've written before.
Natalie: Lucky dog, I wish my husband cooked more than breakfast food.
Dara: See I only write fantasy right now so I'm thinking I need to try something new.
Jenn: I'll have to bring some creativity to the page and perhaps the dinner table.
Jessie: I know what you're talking about. I often turn the TV station when I get too embarrassed for the characters on TV or it's too intense.
Post a Comment