How we make cooking fun
It took us a long time to figure out why cooking sucks.
I used to hate cooking, it was such a chore. I would mostly make prepackaged stuff which tasted okay at best and once I hit my mid twenty’s started to not make me feel great the next day. That is when I started to really focus on making my own food but it still was such a pain and I dreaded doing it.
The initial reason I really hated cooking was I was I took it too seriously. I was also anxious about what people thought of my cooking (and still am) but when it came to a weeknight meal it was just me and John. Ultimately if a meal did suck John would never tell me because he is way too nice to me. Eventually, it turned into a way to spend time together. While only one person is the chef in the kitchen the other person will still be around. Sometimes they’re just sipping a glass of wine and chatting, other times they’re peeling garlic and chopping veggies. If John isn’t around to keep me company I get my music going to dance and sing like an idiot, just like I do when I have to clean the apartment. I also stopped taking it so seriously. When it comes to cooking (not baking) I find recipes are suggestions. We are a measure-with-your-heart kind of family and I think everyone should be. We all have different tastes therefore mixing it up in a recipe can lead to some of the best food. Whenever we are done with a meal we always talk about how we could tweak it, and make it better for our tastes. It’s a fun part of the process and tends to lead to some very yummy dishes. Other times it doesn’t work quite as well but that’s okay as well. Ultimately we’ve never made something inedible by tweaking a recipe. Overall it’s always worth the risk.
I think the biggest reason I hated cooking for the longest time was the cleaning up. After I finish eating, I look over at the kitchen and it’s a disaster it’s like the biggest letdown after a good meal and really makes me question whether it was worth it. I started cleaning as I went through the recipes and it may sound like a stupid tip but trust me it makes all the difference. Also if I have John around, he’ll do the cleaning as I go, and vice versa if he’s the one cooking. This way after the meal we generally just have one or two pans to clean and the dishes we ate off of. This way we get to sitting on the couch and reveling in the good food faster which in my opinion makes the whole experience that much better.
By Katie
