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Welcome to Practical Recipes
Everything is just better at home!
- Sandra Posey
About Me and PRACTICAL RECIPES
How I started?
Welcome to my blog and recipe share. I am so glad you landed here! You can read a little bit about me below or go directly to the "Dinners" tab or the "Sweet Treats" tab to find some quick ideas, go straight to recipes and come back here later. If you'd like to explore some easy "Ethnic" recipes, there is that section too. I will be posting more of my favorite dishes from around the world under that tab.
Eating healthy is not always easy or affordable to all, that is why, I would like to share some of my tips and ideas for cooking comfort foods, preparing quick and easy home cooked meals with tried and true recipes and shopping for the right ingredients to have in your pantry. Some of these recipes date back to my childhood and yes, many of them call for oil and even real butter and cream. My thought on that, is that there is no substitute for real and natural and when possible, locally sourced ingredients. I do not like things like margarine, processed foods under the "non-fat" category, high sodium canned foods, bottled salad dressings which contain additives and preservatives, aspartame or any artificial sweeteners, food with hard to read ingredients that are not in plain language, or food that is not real and wholesome period. I strongly believe that you can eat everything that is delicious, rich in healthy fats and full of goodness, even have your daily dessert, all in mo—de—ra—tion! Although, I am not so moderate when it comes to the use of spices and herbs. I do like abundance and flavor there. If you are looking for very low fat diet dishes you will probably not find it here, but you can always tailor any recipe to your taste and needs.
In my extremely busy life as a Northern Virginia working mom, raising half a dozen children in a span of thirty years, time was always a hot commodity! I didn't have the luxury of spending hours preparing dinner, for this reason, I have always sought practicality. However, as crazy busy as life was, and continues to be—and that's a story for another day—I have to at least tell you for now, that I was blessed to have lived in places where ingredients and food choices were never a problem. The state of Virginia is one of them, and for many years, I lived in one of the most picturesque counties in the U.S, Loudoun County, where life is rich and diverse, with breathtaking rural areas and farms out of a post card, historic landmarks, a myriad of wineries, good breweries, food venues and ever growing farmers markets, all intertwined with high profile technology companies and modern affluent neighborhoods. In addition to savoring all four seasons in Virginia, DC and Maryland, and having access to any grocery store and delicatessen you can think of, I am now spending long periods of time in Southwest Florida, another fascinating place that I get to call home.
Far and away from D.C. rush hour, when I am in South Florida, I find myself surrounded by nature—and if I must add—a fauna that really tests your bravery. Straight out of the backyard, comes your welcoming committee, consisting of giant lizards, poisonous toads, raccoons, snakes, wild bore, panthers and the like. But there is the side that delights the senses, with wide rivers, a turquoise ocean, the most amazing sunsets, breezes, the white sands of the Gulf of Mexico, boats and piers everywhere you turn. This climate and geography allows for an abundance of fresh picked citrus and tropical fruit, like the juiciest and sweetest mangos I have ever tried, local seafood and culinary influences like Italian, German, Brazilian, Mexican, Puerto Rican, South American and Cuban, all accessible for "snowbirds" (people from the north with winter residences in Florida) to indulge. You can almost find any ingredient and any type of food if you set your mind to it, from the best versions of the sandwich Cubano, all the way to alligator nuggets!
I have been blessed to be able to travel to other continents, be immersed in other cultures and be enriched by them. I have the utmost appreciation for cultural gastronomy and love to try new dishes. As a child, I was never a picky eater, so I ate all my veggies in any form and even organ meats deliciously prepared by my mother and grandmother and pretty much everything that was offered to me. I have learned from many culinary gifted people through the years and collected recipes, shared, and even created my own. I have come to realize that the secret to eating well and cooking well, is a combination of the love and the ingredients that go into the dish, even if it is something as simple as a sandwich, it can be elevated by those two things.
I also commuted to Washington D.C. on a regular basis for one of my jobs and for decades, I spent a fair amount of time enjoying the nation's capital, and although I have traveled internationally a decent amount, the District of Columbia is one of my favorite cities period. I love this vibrant city because it's brimming with culture new and old, rich with history, shops, awe inspiring monuments, interesting people and crazy politics. With its sights, sounds and smells, D.C amazes me and lures me in. I love the simple pleasure of just sitting down at a Georgetown cafe and watch people from all walks of life just go by or stop and listen to a street musician—coffee in hand. I will never be able to express with the appropriate words, what I feel when I am in the middle of the diversity and complexity of this magnificent city, so I will always keep coming back for more.
My parents migrated to the United States from Guatemala city when I was a young girl. According to my DNA I'm mostly of European descent mainly from Spain, the Basque region, and Northwestern Europe mainly Belgium, with about twenty seven percent Native American indigenous blood, some of it from the Yucantán Peninsula, and some from other regions of America. As an old friend from Britain used to put it —"Sandra, you are Euro-cocktail".
When I was a child, my mother worked in advertising and my father was a young dentist, but it was still hard for them to make ends meet with the economic downturns of Guatemala. My father was offered a job contract to work in a dental laboratory in Northern Virginia and he gladly accepted, that determined my fate. The U.S. is the country that I love and call my home, although my heart is split in half when it comes to that love. One should never forget their roots. I left behind many friends that I hold dear and close family in Guatemala city. My parents did not ask me if I wanted to come or stay, yet this is where I made a life, where fate brought me and eventually this is where my children were born and raised.
The one thing that has always followed me around from birth until now, wherever life has led me, is good food. Good food has been a constant in my life. To understand the how's and the why's of loving food this much, not only eating it but also preparing it for people to enjoy, I needed to go back to my origins and place myself in my grandmother's kitchen. I needed to revisit what it was like, growing up in Latin America, where farm to table is a way of life, especially growing up in the 70's. For people to understand why this is is so important to me and so ingrained in me, I have to tell you that my first exposure to cooking was on a kitchen hearth, cooking with charcoal—yes—charcoal. I started cooking at a very early age with my "abuelita" (grandma) while standing on a little step stool. Her name was Clara de Putzeys or "Doña Clarita", sort of a term of endearment, a diminutive way to say Clara or little Clara and the word "Doña" simply means Mrs.,as a gesture of respect. I think I remember the exact moment when I fell in love with cooking. Her house, my childhood home, was the Mecca of extended family entertaining, abundant family meals, and holiday gatherings which took a lot of preparation and team work and always felt like a big event. Although she had help, she was ever present in her kitchen. She taught me how to make my very first dishes. She taught me how to bake my very first cakes and yummy strawberry pies. But it was not as if she was trying to teach me, it all happened in a very natural, organic, loving way. It was perhaps the interest in me, the curiosity that at five, six, seven years old, drew me to her side, coupled with her immense love of homemaking and her giving spirit. I was always in awe of her.
My grandmother always used the best and freshest aromatics and quality ingredients as she shopped for our groceries from local corner stores, specialty stores and vegetable stands and food markets on a daily basis. People used to rave about her cooking. Anything from homemade black beans to the most elaborate foods you can imagine, from candied fruit, Christmas cakes, pasta always made from scratch, to authentic European fare to the classic Tamales and other Guatemalan staples and everything in between. Every single thing she made was simply delicious and abundant. In our fun extended family kitchen, of which I have the fondest childhood memories, nothing came out of the freezer except for ice cubes—this is a hundred percent true—on my honor!
Before social media, which can transport us places in seconds, it was hard to imagine a place where in this day and age it's still customary for local indigenous farmers to be pulling an old ox cart or even traveling by foot. With them, a big basket in tow, only to knock on your door, offering their daily pickings of fresh, in season, fruits and veggies—what I call the original version of food home delivery. The kind of soliciting that is always welcome. The kind of farm to table mentality that I was so very fortunate to witness growing up. One of those places is my birth place. The fertile, beautiful and picturesque Guatemala, which we can now all appreciate in the many social media posts about its customs and traditions, especially its agriculture. Many of the vegetables and fruits that we eat in the U.S come from Guatemala. There, the person ringing your doorbell at ten in the morning or so, dressed in colorful traditional clothes, made with intricately embroidered textiles known as "trajes típicos", "huipil"or "corte", and beaming with a smile, proceeds to offer the fresh pickings he or she has that day. With an old scale in hand, they then show you a perfectly ripe pineapple, some plump juicy tomatoes, or one of the many varieties of beautiful squash or carrots. Perhaps a magnificent avocado with almost black but firm skin —I would say is the best avocado variety in the world. Oh!—and they also tell you that they're ready to eat today. No waiting necessary because they've ripened perfectly in their tree or vine. All at insanely affordable prices! This is like a dream, for us cooks and foodies alike, and it's something we truly appreciate and long for, isn't it?. That kind of simplicity is still the case in many corners of the world, where rustic vendors line the streets. Little mom and pop outdoor diners with huge friers, open makeshift kitchens and crooked chairs are available to all the fortunate locals to go grab a bite, even late at night. Impressive food markets, produce stands for miles, and colorful spice bazaars, where people shop daily, have been a way of life for centuries and a huge part of these economies. This tradition of eating well and fresh is definitely very much alive in some places. A less idyllic version of this, is gaining popularity in the modern world, starting with trendy farmers markets, farm to table restaurants, and the fun and innovative food trucks of today as people become more culinarily curious, health-conscious, and broad-minded.
To learn more, go to my blog section where I will be posting more of my experiences, as well as my journey as a practical cook focusing on healthy, wholesome, and fresh but at the same time easy and less pretentious recipes. It will be my absolute pleasure and enjoyment to share these recipes!
-Sandra Putzeys Posey, Domestic Engineer. Food Enthusiast.
Why I started?
Information out there is vast with social media and technology at the center of our lives, sometimes relevant and sometimes not. We all get caught in life's race and the stress of daily life and we run out of fuel, run out of ideas or simply want something different. Our eating habits also change when the need to eat better arises. I have been a working mother for a long time. I also love to eat and cook foods from around the world, so I want to share my ideas and tips for practical, tested and economical meals while trying not to use cans and artificial ingredients. I strive for freshness and good flavors.
The logical and inevitable trend, due to what I consider our dietary missteps of the past and bad eating habits as a society for generations, is really going back to basics. We are all going back to natural and wholesome, incorporating healthy fats and fresh and locally sourced organic ingredients. The decision to eat right, eat less junk food, eat better, could come either because our doctor told us or because we want to stop the damage to our bodies before it is too late. Also, if you notice, official dietary guidelines change every certain amount of years, we just have to apply our own personal responsibility to what we eat.
One of my goals is helping people with dietary restrictions with cooking ideas and I want to keep those people in mind at all times because it means so much to me personally. Although not all my recipes are gluten free or lactose free, most of them could be tailored to be and I will always try to make sure that I provide alternatives, as well as practical advise on my blog for people who need to stick to that diet without sacrificing flavor.
Mission
The mission is simple: Helping people eat well and prepare delicious and complete meals in less time, using fresh ingredients, smart tips, new products, shortcuts and cooking methods while collaborating with others to make our lives easier. I was born to serve and give back, as a matter of fact it humbles me. I love feeding people, can't help it. By having this little blog, if I can help one single person to learn how to cook, I will be very happy. It fills me with joy when people send me pictures of the finished product after following one of my recipes. My desire is to have a forum of ideas and amazing recipes that are tried and true and also simple and delicious.
If you are reading this and you love to cook like I do, I want us to learn from each other, I want to enhance and improve our cooking skills, because cooking is fun and it is a never ending learning adventure. My grown children call me up sometimes to ask for a recipe and I simply direct them to the appropriate place or video, however primitive it may be because it is my recipe and how I make the dishes that they've enjoyed. I tell them this is for them because it is. I know that anybody can cook if they set their mind to it and we all have to eat, right? So we might as well learn how to cook a few dishes.
The dreaded question we face when we are going about our lives is —what's for dinner"—even if we are asking ourselves that question at the office, at the gym. Maybe you have some hungry kids, husband, partner or wife waiting at home calling or texting you for the answer. Well, whether you're cooking for one or ten, the answer is not always easy. So, why not come up with something healthy, homemade and wholesome that takes very little time to prepare and still looks and tastes like you spent all day in the kitchen?
Please check my latest videos on Youtube channel Practical Recipes and in my Blog section which will be updated periodically with fresh content, new videos and ideas. Also check my Facebook Practical Recipes page. Feel free to Email any questions or tips you may have.
*Note that this page is still under construction.