A Little About Me

Welcome and mangiamo!  My name is Jackie, and I’m a mom to a son and a golden doodle, and wife to an amazing husband.  We live just outside of Atlanta in the ‘burbs, on 6 acres.  You would think with all of the land we have, I would have a garden and grow food for us … but, the only things that grow are the wild yard onions.  C’est la vie.  Maybe some day.

I got into the idea of blogging after friends and family would constantly ask for my recipes for the food I posted on social media.  Thus, Just Made. Simply was born.  Because I was so used to cooking with a dash of this and a splash of that, I had to go back and redo and write down the recipes and take more photos.  No biggie, we all like to eat around here.  And who doesn’t like to have a food sample party complete with some adult beverages?

I learned to love food and cooking from some of my family members.  I watched, countless times, my grandma make her famous potato salad.  She’d peel SO MANY potatoes, cut up the eggs, and throw it all together.  Or, I watched as she made a homemade crust for her apple pie; rolling the dough until it was to her liking.  The bubbling apple filling made you want to eat it as soon as it came out of the oven, even though you know you would burn your face off.  I was always amazed at how my dad would make up his own spaghetti sauce just from a can of tomatoes.  A little bit of this, and a little bit of that.  BOOM.

I love food (obviously).  My other loves are my family, dogs, traveling, farmhouse style decor, country music, Burn Bootcamp, and a perfectly chilled glass of amazing red wine.  I also have an obscene collection of coffee mugs, and I’m always looking for more!

Cooking is an outlet that lets me be creative and pour my heart into the food that I make for others to experience and enjoy.  Saluti!