What's for dinner?

This is what Anna does when I'm cooking. I put her in there sitting up but it doesn't take long for her to scoot down. I'm just waiting for her to scoot out.

When we first got here, we thought about getting a cook. There are a couple of people in the office who have them and we thought about hiring one of them to cook at least a few days a week especially since I had forgotten to pack any recipes. Then I remembered allrecipes.com and have started cooking (also, it never actually got to the cook what meals we wanted her for so it was kind of out of necessity).

I started cooking this week. There have been a few challenges. For example, I don't have anything that measures amounts. The closest I have are two 5 oz bottles that I have been using as a rough guide and spoons that we eat with. Also, I have a hard time getting to the grocery store. Grace from work did get us some staples (like a 200 g bag of a cumin-coriander mix) so we have the basics but anything specific I have had to either go without or try a substitution with something that I have (like chili powder for cayenne pepper). I have been able to get a few things from a little market nearby but there are a lot of things on my list that weren't there. And I have yet to get any meat so everything has to be veg (as they say here).

The recipes have been a little bit tricky too. On allrecipes.com, there are reader comments which can be conflicting. The title may say that something is spicy, then one comment says it's bland and the spices need to be tripled while the next one says it's just right. Fortunately with my lack of measuring spoons I'm just guessing on the amounts anyway. Also, I have no idea what anything is so I'm just guessing on how it will taste. I basically choose what to make based on what we have.

So far, the things that I have made have turned out ok. They are often kind of bland though. I guess that's a sign that we are adjusting to the spiciness here. Or they will be hot but not flavorful. Last night we had to add a lot of spices to taste anything at all. This was surprising with the 6 cloves of garlic I put in there but at least it turned out ok in the end. The meals are easy to do. Mostly it's just sauteing all of the ingredients and letting it simmer for a while. Not having an oven really simplifies things. I made a flat bread called Roti and was so proud of myself. It turned out so good I had to stop myself from eating them as I was making them because otherwise there wouldn't have been any left.