The first one!

Hello! My name is Melissa. A year and a half ago I moved to the beautiful city of Granada in southern Spain from the states. Like most fresh-out-of-college kids with a useless major and without any real ambitions, I decided to become an English teacher abroad. With very little preparation, and no cooking experience, I moved halfway across the globe. So here I am, with copious amounts of free time to learn how to cook, travel, and live life.

At first, not knowing how to cook was pretty hard. Then I quickly realized that adding garlic and onions to anything dramatically improved the taste. It soon became addictive. I would come home from work each day, head straight for the kitchen and throw chopped onions and roughly minced garlic into a pan with whatever else I had in the fridge. The sizzling sound in hot oil was music to my ears and the smell, intoxicating.

But eating pasta with store-bought tomato sauce and toast all day wasn't going to cut it for me. I started collecting my mother's Chinese recipes because I missed her cooking so much. My mother is an incredible cook and it was from her that I learned how to appreciate good food. I began stealing recipes from Spanish friends, American expats, and of course, Ina Garten, my favorite Food Network chef. And every once in a while I’ll get inspired to create my own strange concoctions.

So, I propose an experiment! Let's see how my Chinese-American-Spanish dishes turn out. Hopefully they’ll taste better than they appear in the photos.



The first dish I ever made, dated back to 2009: pasta with tomatoes, mushrooms, and fresh basil. A dish I learned from my dear friend Annie Ha while traveling in Italy together.

Recipe? Easy! Make the pasta, toss everything in a pan until cooked, add salt, eat!
Canned tuna is optional. Annie made it that way, and as do many Spaniards.