I live and eat like it is the 1950s. You know, when people (mostly moms/wives/grandmas) made everything that was eaten in the house from scratch.
Except that I am a guy. How 2020s.
Anyway, anyone can do it, although I won't sugar-coat it - it takes a lot of planning, time, and sweating over a hot stove.
But as is said, "Either make time for cooking, or make time for being sick."
You see, Big Food Inc. does not exist to make you healthy, only feeling full. Really full. Their focus is not wholesome ingredients, but profit, profit, profit. I get a stomach ache just thinking about it.
Here are a few things that we have found help us do what it takes to make virtually everything we eat from scratch.
1. Keep a clean kitchen. All the time. A dirty kitchen is a cooking killer. No one wants to start a cooking session by cleaning a sink overflowing with dishes.
2. Always have everything you need to make the dishes you love. Having to "run out" for a missing ingredient can make the difference between cooking and ordering in.
We have backup stores for everything so when something is finished, there is a back up in the pantry. Then we put another on our shopping list to replace it so we always have what we need.
3. Have homemade "fast food" ready for the times you are too busy or don't feel like cooking. We keep ready-to-eat foods in our freezer.
For example, when we make chilli, we make a lot, then freeze several 500ml jars. We also have frozen jars of Dahl, soups, tomato pasta sauce, beans, and whatever else we make in large batches. We also make foods like samosa and freeze bags of them for quick snacks.
4. Make breakfast easy. Not having to plan for three meals a day helps. We almost always have old fashioned rolled oats for our first meal of the day. That is one meal we never have to think about, and it is an easy to make and healthful food.
5. Notice how your own food is so much better than foods of the fast or processed variety. Super yummy food is a great motivator.
6. Watch your bank account grow. Cooking at home saves money.
7. Enjoy feeling better. Processed foods contain some pretty dodgy ingredients. I can pronounce every single simple ingredient in the home cooked meals I make, and they all promote health and wellness.
I understand if this is not for you. Sometimes I wonder how I do it, as it really does feel like it takes monumental effort for two of us working in the kitchen together full time.
Luckily, both of us love cooking, and that really helps. But even more, we love good food, and have found that our kitchen is the best place to find that.
If cooking everything you eat is unrealistic for you, and it is for most people considering how busy life keeps a person, then think about cooking from scratch more often. Not all the time, just more often.
Who knows, you might fall in love with it, too, and every little bit helps.
Good cooking and eating to you!
In my 20s I proudly never cooked. Now, in my 40s, I cook almost every meal from scratch. I consider myself a really good home cook now—who would have thought?! Growing some of my own veggies makes it even more special.
ReplyDeleteGregg, your list of benefits is right on. I usually cook according to what I have and what feels good—no recipes. But lately I've been using a cookbook I received as a gift (PlantYou) and it has been so fun and delicious. To serve a fresh vegetable coconut curry to myself and my husband feels really good. And I am so proud to have made a delicious meal.
Batch cooking is the best. Making lots of breakfast cookies, muffins, legumes, and grains makes feeding myself so easy. And I feel good! I can't imagine going back to eating every meal from Whole Foods prepared food section, like I used to.
Happy cooking, friends,
Erin
Congratulations! That is a major life change, and a good one, too. Linda and I have never eaten as well as we do now, and it does feel great. Mentally, and physically. Good food is medicine.
Delete- Gregg
During the months of working at home during the worst of Covid-19 I was able to finally take the time to try to find the solution to a lifelong issue with my digestion that doctors and specialists and nutritionists had been unable to help me resolve except for shrugging their shoulders, calling it IBS (Irritable Bowel Syndrome) and advising me to learn to live with it. I took a month to set a baseline by eating exactly the same wholesome, healthy foods I had always eaten at exactly the same time every day. As always, things went back and forth between really good days, really bad days and days that were just okay. I then went through the process - again giving each stage a full month to test the waters - of eliminating food groups, either alone or in combination and keeping accurate records of the results of my "great experiment." Turned out that eliminating all grains and dried legumes from my diet also eliminated a lifetime (well, 65+ years of one anyway) of constantly coping with fluctuating diarrhea, constipation, bloating and, at times, debilitating abdominal pain.
ReplyDeleteA lot of painstaking research has given me possible reasons (this article present a brief précis: https://www.amymyersmd.com/article/problem-grains-legumes/) and I have combined this with a personal intuition that this issue may be more common among those of us who are part of northern First Nations - these things were not part of the standard diet of the relatives that were on the move constantly following their food sources.
I have always spent a lot of time in the kitchen. Except for a few notable times in my life - like having a newborn in the household - I had always baked all our bread and cooked all our food from scratch. I now spend much more time, not only because I still cook all my food from raw ingredients, but because food is now such a joy. No longer is eating something done with trepidation. No longer is the very first thing I do upon entering a place noting the location of the nearest bathroom. Food is wonderful and food is fun. (Sorry this got so long.)
Wow, that is some super sleuthing. It doesn't surprise me that the "experts" couldn't help you - I don't think they know anything about nutrition at all. When it come to health they know little. Sickness is what they know, kind of. Congratulations on your successful efforts. That is really quite impressive. But you are, after all, an expert on you.
Delete- Gregg
I plan to have leftovers by cooking large amounts, especially proteins.
ReplyDeleteI love to cook, and I love to eat good food, so I learned after moving away from home that I needed to learn asap and I did. I'm lucky now that we live in a small agricultural town and local meat, fruit, veg and eggs are all around me. It does take a lot of planning like you said but it is so worth it and yes, it does save money as well.
ReplyDeleteEnjoying quality food is a prerequisite for cooking from scratch. It is the best way to get to eat good food, and a major motivator to get busy in the kitchen. In my home we are eating the best we have ever eaten before. We never get cravings for fast or prepared foods, or restaurant food any more. We like our own cooking the most.
Delete- Gregg