Barefoot In the Kitchen (No, I'm NOT Pregnant)

I love cooking. The past few months since the boys were born however, my cooking has largely consisted of pouring cereal and milk into a bowl. For my birthday dinner, I actually asked my parents and husband to let me cook. I can’t remember what meat I cooked, but the side dishes I made are below, all from the The Barefoot Contessa Family Style Cookbook.
I met the Barefoot Contessa, Ina Garten, at a book signing at Central Market recently, and she was very cool. I made the Rosemary Polenta again yesterday, and it was super easy, which inspired me to write this post.
Let me emphasize that I am not at all trying to be the “Yummy Mummy, a humorous foodie who juggles kids, while cooking amazing food. Check out her great blog, The Yummy Mummy Cooks Gourmet. My blog would be, “Crazy Maria Actually Cooked Instead of Getting a Rotisserie Chicken.”

But this blog is not about recipes, it’s about cool stuff we have that our friends would want. I have all five of the Barefoot Contessa Cookbooks and you want them.
The Barefoot Contessa
The Barefoot Contessa Parties!
The Barefoot Contessa Family Style
Barefoot In Paris
The Barefoot Contessa At Home
*Barefoot Contessa Back to Basics (comes out in October)

Go buy one. You’ll love them for several reasons:
1) They have beautiful color photographs for every recipe. Call me a kindergartener, but I like reading cookbooks with pictures. Lots of them. This may be why I have made more recipes from her cookbooks than any others I own.
2) She is big on using quality ingredients, and then featuring them prominently in the recipe. Those of you who like my lemon bars---her recipe.
3) She does a great job explaining how you can make recipes for entertaining so you can enjoy your guests, rather than run around like a crazy person.
4) Every single recipe I have made from her cookbooks has been great. If I spend time cooking, I like it to be worth it. (Note-Ina owned a gourmet food store in the Hamptons, so sometimes a recipe makes a large amount. I have cut some in half.)
5) If you or your friends are vegetarian, she has great side dishes and recipes that could easily convert and be a satisfying vegetarian meal.

All from The Barefoot Contessa Family Style by Ina Garten (The Flickr photos are not photos of the actual recipe, but look like it and are much prettier than if I took one. Ignore the extra stuff in the polenta pic.)

Rosemary Polenta
Photo by SunSirrah on Flickr

Great because you can make it in about 10-15 minutes, chill it, and then slice and cook it in the pan in about 5 minutes, right before you want to eat.
I have made this verbatim and with modifications and they both turned out well. My modifications were extra rosemary, extra parmesan, and using just milk instead of milk and half and half.

Roasted Carrots

Much better than they look in the picture, which is the picture from the book. I used baby carrots because I was lazy.

Garlic Sauteed Spinach
Photo by Laurel Fan on flickr

We make this all the time now. It takes about 5 minutes. My dad, who has always hated spinach, went back for seconds.