Wine

Today, I left work early so I could go to the grocery store and exercise before picking up Camille. The grocery shopping and picking up Camille (of course!) happened but not the exercising. That’s okay though, I exercised yesterday even though it wasn’t for long, but I did get myself to the gym. As I was grocery shopping, I started thinking of what to cook. I decided on a salad recipe that a friend at work had shared with me earlier as we talk about travels to the Society of Women Engineers Conference.

As soon as I got home, I fixed dinner for my little one, got started on the salad and wowsa, here it is! When I am in the kitchen, I get really happy and excited, I am so fulfilled that I almost cannot stop singing (yes, I sometimes sing when I cook!). I really think that this is a passion that I must not ignore. I love tossing salads in a bowl, making up recipes, and combining different kinds of food textures.

This is not a passion I knew about simply because I never enjoyed cooking when I was young. It was too much of a hassle cooking for a family of 10 and most of the time we had visitors staying with us that it’s almost a full-time job cooking three-square meal. So, when my Mom calls on me to cook, I quickly reply with a huge NO, and make up excuses about an upcoming test or exam. That got me off the hook most of the time.

My goal is to start an organic restaurant here in the United States and also in Nigeria. I started researching about starting a restaurant and what it would cost and almost every article I could find suggests to wait till you have enough capital. The average cost of starting a restaurant is about $500,000 (no shit!). Capital is key in the restaurant business and you have to always bend to market prices, and most especially customer needs.

According to Forbes, starting a restaurant is a sexy idea, until you realize how hard starting and running a restaurant actually is.

My love for cooking is beginning to knock hard on the door and I am convinced that its a passion I will never regret growing. I am currently thinking of enrolling for some cooking class to see if this is really something that I am into (outside of my own kitchen) or if its an hobby. I am okay with whatever this turns out to be….but I am doing all I can to make sure I am not passing up a great opportunity that may lead to my dream of becoming an entrepreneur.

PS: I have a lot of business ideas, one of them is starting a green energy/environmental consulting firm. It’s somehow aligned with starting an organic restaurant right?