About

I am not a born domestic goddess. As a child, I was shooed out of the kitchen. In high school, I almost set fire to the school by grilling bread with the grill door closed. And my university friends still remember me offering them cereal for dinner. I guess you could say my cooking skills were… non-existent.

In 2002 I followed the well-trodden path of many young Australians, and embarked on a working holiday in the UK. The working part involved living (and eating) in an isolated pub in the Hertfordshire countryside. A diet of steak and ale pie, jacket potatoes and nachos finally drove me into the kitchen.

My first attempt was disastrous. One of the pub’s chefs recommended adding tomato and basil dressing to the pasta sauce. I can’t blame it all on the dressing, but the resulting dish promptly ended up in the bin. However, that triggered a trip to the library, experimentation with an Italian cookbook and resulted in some great Spaghetti Carbonara.

So from those humble beginnings, I record my journey – learning how to cook.

I’ve also co-opted my husband into building a site to store and share recipes – so for any other recipe hoarders, take a look at meltingfood.com