When I was young, the last place I wanted to be was in the kitchen. I remember my mom yelling up to me to come down from my room and help her in the kitchen. Trust me, there was always something going on in her kitchen. My mother was born in Italy to a family of chefs…brother, father, uncles, grandfathers… all chefs. Being in the kitchen was in her DNA. But I had no interest in helping her make pasta, pizza, or bread. The last place I wanted to be was up to my eyeballs in tomatoes that needed to be canned, or fresh fruit that needed to be made into jams or jellies. I especially detested having to pick through the mountains of “highway weeds” (aka rapini and dandelion greens) before they could be blanched and stored in the freezer.

Fast forward thirty years (yikes!) and where do I spend the majority of my time? You guessed it..in the kitchen. It could be because I have two teenage boys who eat like today is their last meal. It could be that aside from talking, eating is my favorite thing to do. Or it could be that the “chef gene” is part of my DNA, too, and there is no escaping genetic programming.

There is a certain satisfaction that comes from preparing a meal and sharing it with the people you love. I am firm believer that good food does not have to be fancy or expensive. In fact, the simpler, the better. With this blog, I hope to share some of my craziness for food and cooking. So whether you have the “chef gene” or not, sit back, relax, and I will see you in the kitchen!

Be yourself; Everyone else is already taken.

— Oscar Wilde.

This is the first post on my new blog. I’m just getting this new blog going, so stay tuned for more. Subscribe below to get notified when I post new updates.

This is an example post, originally published as part of Blogging University. Enroll in one of our ten programs, and start your blog right.

You’re going to publish a post today. Don’t worry about how your blog looks. Don’t worry if you haven’t given it a name yet, or you’re feeling overwhelmed. Just click the “New Post” button, and tell us why you’re here.

Why do this?

• Because it gives new readers context. What are you about? Why should they read your blog?
• Because it will help you focus you own ideas about your blog and what you’d like to do with it.

The post can be short or long, a personal intro to your life or a bloggy mission statement, a manifesto for the future or a simple outline of your the types of things you hope to publish.

To help you get started, here are a few questions:

• Why are you blogging publicly, rather than keeping a personal journal?
• What topics do you think you’ll write about?
• Who would you love to connect with via your blog?
• If you blog successfully throughout the next year, what would you hope to have accomplished?

You’re not locked into any of this; one of the wonderful things about blogs is how they constantly evolve as we learn, grow, and interact with one another — but it’s good to know where and why you started, and articulating your goals may just give you a few other post ideas.

Can’t think how to get started? Just write the first thing that pops into your head. Anne Lamott, author of a book on writing we love, says that you need to give yourself permission to write a “crappy first draft”. Anne makes a great point — just start writing, and worry about editing it later.

When you’re ready to publish, give your post three to five tags that describe your blog’s focus — writing, photography, fiction, parenting, food, cars, movies, sports, whatever. These tags will help others who care about your topics find you in the Reader. Make sure one of the tags is “zerotohero,” so other new bloggers can find you, too.