Cooking

Cooking at home is the key to controlling what I eat (and also to keeping it reasonably priced).  But I have years and years of a habit of not cooking on week nights.  Am I too old a dog to learn this new trick?

Two days a week I go to the gym, which totally shoots the evening.  I should definitely get a pass those nights.  But other nights - I get home between 6 and 7, depending on work and traffic.  I'm generally in bed before 10 (and sorry if I'm not - a post on sleep and how I crave it will be coming). There is still time in that evening window to cook.  And yet, I rarely do.

What do I eat if I don't cook?  Leftovers, mostly.  I try to have a surplus from when I do cook so I have them. Gym nights, I don't want to eat much if at all before going. Afterwards, I either grab leftovers (as I did last night) or else stop at Whole Foods hot food table.  Often, on gym nights, I end up not eating much at all - sometimes, it's just pistachios. On work nights without the gym, its almost always leftovers. There are also a very few frozen dinners I like and often have on hand.  I don't go out, unless its with one of the kids to a place like Chipotle.

Tuesday, I actually cooked.  I have an internal debate about what constitutes truly cooking. Heating up something from the freezer or fridge that was already cooked does not count.  But tonight, I had all the ingredients at home because I'd intended to cook Sunday night, and instead went out to a restaurant with the family.  So tuesday night I made italian sausages, spaghetti squash, and a fresh tomato sauce from raw ingredients, and by almost anyone's definition that was cooking.  I thought about it on the way home, and one thing I did differently tonight from most nights is that I went right to the kitchen.  I did not first flop down on the couch with the ipad to check up on facebook.  Instead, the dog went out back, I changed my clothes, and then grabbed all the ingredients out of the fridge and got right to work.  I had also walked through the steps in my mind while driving, so I didn't in the moment have to decide if (for example) the sausages were going under the broiler or on the stovetop. Decision-making is not my forte after a long work day, and that kind of indecision can drive me to the couch with the ipad while all my energy and good intentions leak away.  I also had a clean kitchen to work in.  Definitely a messy kitchen is often a barrier.

I know that for most women of my age cooking dinner is not that remarkable.  I did go through a stint where I made dinner for the family every night, but it wasn't for twenty plus years like most of us, only about five years.  Now I'm back on my own, and pistachios in lieu of dinner is actually just fine some nights.  No-one to please but myself.  But I'd like to get the inspiration and energy to cook more often than just on weekends.

So I guess the main points of my cooking success are:  clean kitchen, all ingredients already on hand, a clear plan of how it's going to go, and don't flop down on the couch first. Another key point is home before seven.  I'll see if this is repeatable more often.