Kitchen New Year Resolutions

A new year dawns every January, and we all tend to make them whether we want to or not.  Maybe it’s because for all of us January means a new beginning, fresh start, or we just clean out the old and start new. 

I’m talking about resolutions.  Love them or hate them, we all end up making them in some way or another.  Last year, I had made the choice to start cooking even more from scratch, and with some new gadgets in my cupboards, I surely did.  What am I going to do in 2012?

1. Try out that yogurt maker that was given to me and I haven’t gotten around to playing with yet.  I love yogurt, and in some ways this feels like a science experiment!  Good milk, some starter, and who knows what could happen next?  Surely it will be cheaper and healthier than what I can buy in the store.
2. Make bread a little more often.  Oh, I know how to make bread, my mom taught me years ago.  The thing is that I rarely ever do it but it’s one small thing that makes my guys super happy.   I don’t often take the time to make bread but a little experimenting could be a good thing, right? 
3. Find more ways to make veggies fun.  My husband loves salad, so there’s no problem getting people around here to eat vegetables, but I’m getting bored of salad.  Why not find some new and interesting ways to serve up vegetables, and try some really obscure ones?  Not just that, but I’d like to try new ways of cooking and spicing them up!
4. Spend some time sourcing out local products.  They are here, I’ve been told, I just haven’t found them yet.  Farms are churning out local products and I haven’t taken the time to track them down and bring them home so in 2012, I’m really going to work at eating more locally.  I just found a great kitchen store not far from my house with all sorts of fantastic products, and a grocery store with many obscure things I couldn’t find elsewhere, so I’ll have lots of new ingredients to play with!
5. Eat a better lunch.  When my teenager was in public school, I always packed a healthy lunch.  Now that he’s homeschooling, my lunches are kind of pathetic.  Either I grab whatever is handy in the fridge or I take a bowl of cereal, which doesn’t really get me through the day.  Lunch is important, and I think I need to take it more seriously.
6. Buy a wok and start making more Asian and Thai food, which is something my family really seems to like.  I’ve held off on getting a wok for a long time, but to really get a good Pad Thai or stir fry going, I think I could use one.  I’d also like to add a good digital scale and some quality knives to my supplies. 

Either way, I plan to have fun in 2012 and continue to learn and explore new things to share with all of you.  What are your kitchen resolutions?  Do you have something you’ve always wanted to try?  Are you planning to have the family sit down for a meal once a week?  Go ahead and share, we’d love to hear it.