Disclaimers
This is a long, wordy, and possibly boring list of things this blog is and is not, and about who I am and am not.
Short version: I’m not a doctor, nutritionist, scientist or other health/medical professional. I try to be as accurate as I can with nutrition estimates, but these are GUESSES at best. Please be reasonable and use your own best judgement, and always consult your doctor before doing anything possibly stupid.
Long version:
- I don’t like chemicals, added sugars and salt, or hydrogenated oils, partial or otherwise. However, I am not a trained nutrition expert, nor am I a doctor, or in any way employed by, or related to, anyone in the FDA or the food industry anywhere, that I know of (except people I know who may work in restaurants, grocery stores, etc.). I’m happy to share my EXPERIENCES and my OPINIONS. But that’s all they are. If you’re sick, go ask a doctor. And if something I suggest makes you sick, it’s probably user error, ‘cuz I’ll only post things here that didn’t make me or my family sick!
- I’m not a prude in the kitchen, and I do believe everything in moderation. But if I’m going to use a fat, I’ll use a “good” one, like olive oil, if at all possible, with butter as my next choice, never lard. Same for refined foods. Where it works, I’ll substitute whole wheat flour and brown/raw sugar or honey. Where it doesn’t, I’ll make it anyway, but only if I can use butter instead of shortening/hydrogenated oil. That one I’m pretty firm on (although I will tolerate it in small doses, in premade ingredients like chocolate chips, etc.).
- I’m not a vegetarian (ummm, bacon…. er, where was I?), but I do love many vegetarian dishes. If you’re offended by omnivores, this isn’t the site for you. I can and do offer substitutions for many things (lurve me some fried tofu — really!), but if I’m making chicken sausage alfredo, odds are, it’s going to have chicken in it. And maybe bacon. Ummm. Huh? Oh, right. Carry on!
- I love cookbooks, recipe websites, and suggestions from family and friends. If I’ve based my own creation on something someone told me about, I’ll try to credit that person (unless they don’t want me to!). Same for published recipes, although as noted, I’m not always interested in following them, so any (all?) similarity may be lost in translation.
- In regards to the above, if you or your heirs think I’ve “stolen” your recipe for Mac & Cheese, or whatever, please don’t publicly flame me. Email me privately if you must, but please consider that ALL versions of Mac & Cheese involve some form of pasta, and some kind of cheese. In other words, it is in fact possible for several different folks to come up with strikingly similar concoctions, without ever seeing anyone else’s ideas for same beforehand.
- I don’t believe in dieting (see #2 above), but I 100% DO believe in knowing what I’m putting into my body. I weigh all my ingredients, and I use the wonderful website MyFoodDiary.com (opens in new tab/window) to calculate the nutritional content of my creations, usually by appropriate serving sizes. I will always include this information on anything I post to this blog. But. AGAIN. I’m not an expert, and these are GUESSTIMATES ONLY. In other words, please don’t eat an entire apple pie, and then come ask me why you gained 5 lbs overnight.
- On this and my writing blog, I use something called Affiliate Links to highlight books or products I find useful. This means that if you click through AND BUY THIS ITEM, I get a teeny-tiny portion of the sale, from the sponsoring website (e.g., Amazon.com). Like, pennies. However, feel free to click through and DON’T BUY anything, or to re-search for the item yourself, if you don’t wish to “pay” me for linking. I mainly link to things I think might be of interest to readers; any profit I might make on purchases of said items is incidental to the process, and will never make me rich in anything beyond the satisfaction of sharing something useful, with those who might care.
- Finally, objects in mirror may be larger (or smaller) than they appear, and your mileage may vary. Your tastebuds most certainly will. If you like what I’ve made, great. If you have suggestions for improvement, wonderful. If you hate me and everything I espouse here, stop reading.
Cheers,
Kerensa
