So, let’s talk about making time to cook for this part of our Healthy Eating Series – why, how, and what our current culture thinks about it. Of course, since a basic glance around AOC’s home page reveals my passion for real, simple, homemade food that is nourishing and healthy (most of the time – I’m also about balance!), it’s no surprise that I think taking the time to cook is important. But I’m going to go out on a limb and say:
Taking – and valuing – the time to cook homemade foods is one of THE most important things you can do for you and your family.
Why is making time to cook important?
- We will eat healthier, no doubt about it.
- When we’re healthy, life is just easier to live, right?
- The act of preparing food builds togetherness – and a connection with our past.
- Food can create complicated emotions, especially when bad habits are started young – we want to encourage and build a good relationship with food.
- Preparing food is an essential life skill and passing this on to our children is just as important as math, reading, and science (and actually helps in all these areas, putting that knowledge to work in a real, hands-on way!).
A few months ago I read an article complaining about “quick & easy cooking” not actually being easy that had me so exasperated I had to take some time before talking about it, because I knew I wouldn’t be able to let it go without adding my two cents. It was published in the Atlantic Monthly and written by a freelance writer who states that she “writes about food for a living.”
I put that in quotes, because I wonder if she makes a living writing about food, how can she not be able to look at a recipe and know if it will take her longer than the time listed (I usually can…)? Why doesn’t she have a go-to arsenal of recipes for quick weeknight meals like so many others do? And she doesn’t plan for weeknights or have a stocked pantry? Sheesh.
Okay, I get it: we are tired at the end of the day. When we have kids needing to be fed it adds stress. But leaving 5 minutes to prepare a meal and eat before putting your kid to bed? Seriously? I don’t think the issue is easy meals here. It’s more an issue of priorities, it seems to me. And there’s the heart of it for me:
Our culture as a whole has devalued the time it takes – and has always taken – to make quality food for our families and ourselves.
It’s “not important.” “I don’t have time.” “I’m too tired.” “I don’t cook” said with pride (i.e., “don’t” not “can’t”). It breaks my heart, especially since I see so much trouble caused by food that could be avoided with better choices and relationship to food.
The food education that comes from a household where meals are cooked from scratch and the family all helps in the preparation, from actually helping to cook to dealing with dishes and clean-up, is invaluable and shouldn’t be underestimated. Knowing we can feed ourselves in a good way fulfills a basic human need and is empowering- we can provide for ourselves and be proactive about our health.
Yes it takes time to plan, shop, and prepare and some nights it feels like a chore. But there are plenty of go-to dishes I can put together in about a half hour – and they’re delicious and wholesome, even if they’re simple like curries, lettuce wraps, or simple tacos. Obviously this involves more of my time and effort than ordering out, but that should not be what we compare ‘easy’ cooking to, anyway.
So, let’s agree to value cooking and the time it takes to make good food, okay? As long as there’s time to binge-watch the latest Netflix or Hulu offering, there’s time to nourish our bodies. Note: there’s no judging here – we love nights watching a good show – just as a comparison to evaluate the time we do have, if we’re honest.
Let’s also agree that sometimes it’s got to be quick and easy and may not look as good, or be quite as healthy as other nights. It’s about balance and having goals (learning to cook, trying new foods, eating more vegetables, or whatever it may be).
And here’s the key to making it happen:
You’ve Got To Have A Plan
If, like the writer of the Atlantic Monthly article, you come home after a day’s work and then start thinking about what’s for dinner, it’s too late. Because then you’re willing to do whatever is fast, which almost always comes at a cost of your health and your budget.
When we plan in advance based on what our family likes, it is easy to make a variety of simple weeknight meals, whether stir fries, pasta, or sausages with peppers & onions. But even simple meals require planning and preparation, like any job you want to do well.
So, how are we going to make this work for our real-life, busy lives?
Here are some tips for making time to cook and keep weeknight meals do-able:
- Plan a dinner menu. Assign themes to each night to make it easy (Taco Tuesday, Pasta Wednesday, Seafood Thursday, etc.).
- Keep a list of your family’s favorite easy go-to recipes and rotate them through the month. There’s nothing wrong with repeating recipes we love. Some of our easy favs are soft tacos, haystacks, vegetable-egg scrambles or a fried egg breakfast-for-dinner, pasta with meat sauce or pesto-chicken sauce, chef’s salads, and toasted cheese-type sandwiches (or paninni’s if you’re into that) with cut vegetables.
- Shop on the weekend or day off (Shopping on the way home? Always a really bad idea: hangry).
- Keep your refrigerator, freezer, and pantry stocked with foods you like (ie, if you make a lot of Thai dishes, fish sauce may be a staple, but for others, maybe not).
- Save new or longer-cooking recipes for weekends.
- Be flexible with recipes – if you don’t have shallots, use onions (one of my favorite substitutions, as I rarely have shallots), and so on.
- Use weekends to make batches soups, stews, and casseroles and re-heat the for a quick meal.
What tips would you add to this list?
Read all of the Healthy Eating Series:
Healthy Eating Tips: Making Time to Cook (you are here!)
Healthy Grocery Shopping Tips: Shop Smart & Stay On Budget
17 Essential Cooking Tools for Healthy Eating: Cookware & Small Appliances
18 Essential Tools, Knives & Gadgets for Healthy Kitchens {+ 7 Nice-to-Haves}
25 Healthy Family Favorite Main Dishes
19 Healthy Soups, Stews & Slow Cooker Dishes
22 Healthy Bread and Breakfast Recipes
19 Healthy Snacks and Desserts
Subscribe to Organize, Plan, Cook & Beautify Your Home with Free Printables
Subscribe to AOC's popular weekly Newsletter full of useful information, behind-the-scenes updates, and occasional offers AND get access to this printable in the VIP Subscriber Library that also includes eBooks, checklists, organizing helps, and recipes - with more added regularly. We'll never send spam - read our Privacy Policy here.
Mel says
November 9 at 3:46 amGetting takeout or restaurant food actually does take time and doesn’t satisfy like homemade food. There are a lot of meals I make that would take less time for me to cook than the time it takes to load all the kids into the car and drive anywhere. I guess my main issue with cooking is the cleanup that never ends and chronic pain. So some days, although I know it’s faster for me to cook at home, I get takeout because it’s much less painful than working the kitchen.
My eldest has developed a love for cooking and experimenting in the kitchen, but he doesn’t clean up after himself unless i’m hovering over him telling him and reminding him what exactly needs to be done. I admit, I don’t always set the best example. I don’t clean while I cook. I try to get the cooking done as quickly as possible so I can sit down and then when I feel the pain has reduced, I clean little by little until bed time. And still end up with dishes in the sink in the morning.
Cooking might be quick and simple and I love it, but I just can’t seem to do it as often as I want to. I plan meals most of the time but depending on how I feel, I don’t always have the energy to follow through and I just can’t think of a way to get any simpler but still have foods the whole family will enjoy. Feels like I’m stuck in a rut but definitely need to change for the sake of our health. Any tips on getting stubborn/ distracted kids to help more?
Jami says
November 10 at 7:02 pmOh, I’m so sorry to hear about your pain, Mel. That is a HUGE issue and I know it makes you not want to do anything (I had a few years of back pain issues, so I understand, though not to your degree). I would definitely make things with the thought of how many dishes/pots were needed and not just ‘easy.’ A lot of one pot meals (even the one-pot pasta meals where you cook the pasta right in the pot. You’d have a knife, a cutting board, and a pot to clean up, mostly. Or sheet-pan meals where everything is roasted in one pan. Start Googling and collect a handful of truly one pot, low clean-up meals.
As for the kids, if there wasn’t an option (no food unless you help), that may get them on board. 😉 Also, get all the kids to help each meal – some set table, some butter bread, some cut lettuce for salad (if able), two to clean up, etc. Bribing/rewards worked for us, too, but at some point we had to move to, “you’re here taking up space and eating, so you’ve got to do your part.”
The struggle is real, I totally get that, and yours is complicated with your health – do what you can and I’ll be rooting for you, Mel!
Mila says
February 28 at 5:44 pmJami,
I found your blog through Ann’s On Sutton Place blog. So glad I stopped by.
I saw the same article as you did and had the same reaction. I also felt so sad that the people who saw the article will be convinced by the author and will be happy to justify their laziness. I think with the wealth of resources on the internet– menu planning tips galore and wonderful quick and easy recipes, there is no excuse not to learn to cook efficiently. The only reason I can think of why someone won’t do it is that it simply is not a priority, and that’s a personal choice. I just really did not like the blanket statement the author if the article made.
I have four kids and I work, and I cook from scratch for the reasons you mentioned in your post. I try to spread the word on my blog and share what works for me, and learn from others’ experiences (like yours!).
Jami says
February 29 at 2:24 pmGlad you stopped by, Mila! I’m impressed with all you do (and blog!!) – and you’re so right about personal choices. There are many from scratch meals that are super easy, especially in our age of canned tomatoes and frozen foods. Think about moms just 100 years ago and the amount of time needed then! We have it easy. 🙂
Sue says
February 21 at 5:53 pmMy grandmother and my mom were, sorry to say, not very good cooks. I ate so many frozen dinners it make my head spin. So I had to learn how to cook, and this was before the internet. I learned slowly and had made many lousy meals. But I kept at it, found good cookbooks and then finally the internet. We call fast food, “food of last resort”. It does take planning and having staples at hand. It is not hard, it really does not take that much time. It does take cooperation, as I have MS but it is still the only way for us. No one in my family likes store cookies, baked goods etc. all can taste the chemicals and the way to much sugar.
Jami says
February 22 at 3:10 pmI love reading this, Sue – I too, ate many frozen dinners, hamburger helper, and fast food growing up. I did have a great example in my stepmom, though, so I knew it could be different and I set out to learn what I needed. And it’s so rewarding when your family starts noticing – and preferring – how good real food tastes, isn’t it? 🙂
Mindy says
February 21 at 12:02 pmAmen x 1000.
Jami says
February 22 at 3:12 pmHigh praise, my friend. 🙂
Karla Schlaefli says
February 19 at 1:59 pmI so agree with these comments! We have lost our way as a nation, embracing fast and convenient foods for healthy homemade. We have so many time-saving appliances–crockpots, pressure cookers (automatic and other), food processors, etc. It has to be a priority to cook healthy and it starts in the mind. If you go back and look at old photos from the first half of the 1900’s you will see how hardly anyone was overweight, and if they were it was not the obesity you see today. There is so much info out there on nutrition, food, shopping, saving at the store, there really is no excuse not to cook. I love the slogan that says, “Love your family, cook them tasty food.” My mom always cooked for us, as did her mother before her, and it was always from scratch. We sat down to eat together almost every night as a family, and even now that we are empty nesters we do the same. It can be very simple, that’s often the best, but it is not impossible…
Beth A says
February 19 at 12:25 pmMy favorite way to make sure I am eating home cooked meals is to batch cook ground meat and chicken (diced or sliced). I freeze the pre-cooked (by me) meat into meal size portions, then I can pull it out to throw together a quick stir-fry, tacos, spaghetti, whatever! I also like to do that with rice.
The other thing I love is my pressure cooker. Think chicken breasts, from frozen, 20 minutes, without turning on the oven. 🙂
Jami says
February 22 at 3:25 pmI love that, Beth – I should do more ground meat freezer packets, but I love having the chicken precooked and ready to go, too. It’s saved our meals many times. I’ve not thought to do that with rice!
I’ve never used a pressure cooker, but I’ve heard people (like you) rave about how quick they are – great tip. 🙂
Liz Marley says
February 19 at 12:57 amHi Jami, my eyes were opened to this issue when I visited Morocco and stayed with family (my brother in law is Moroccan). His sister thought nothing of spending the best part of the day, on and off, preparing food for the family for the evening. Various family members helped her at various points during the day. Every evening, we had a beautiful spread of food and each meal was a joy to experience. The love and care she put into it was a revelation. Whilst few of us have time to spend a day cooking, the lesson I learnt was that whilst we may eat food quickly, that is not a reason to prepare it quickly (or buy it ready prepared). If made with care, the process of cooking and eating is so much more enjoyable. She did not see it as a poor use of her time to prepare a lavish feast for loved ones and no-one else did either.
Jami says
February 19 at 9:29 amOh, that sounds like such a wonderful experience, Liz! I, too, learned from our travels that we can learn a lot from other culture’s relationship to food. 🙂
Julie Pullum says
February 18 at 11:00 pmI agree with all you have said above, we too have the same problems here in the uk, it’s easier to have something processed or take out. It’s damaging the nations health and the government are really trying to get people to cook, there is a lot of advertising going on with programmes and adverts on the tv, and Jamie Oliver and other famous chefs have been campaigning for several years now in schools and on the tv. There are booklets coming through people’s doors and the manufacturers are having to put full nutrition values on packaging. The big supermarkets are on board too encouraging people to cook from scratch with tips and hints for easy dinners involving the whole family. All that said, my tip if your days are very stretched is to get and use a slow cooker, very useful summer and winter and coming in from work on a cold day to a delicious stew or curry or bolognaise or chilli or even a whole chicken/roast just needing some vegetables or rice or bread is wonderful!
Jami says
February 19 at 9:33 amAt least they’re trying, Julie. 🙂 We have Jamie Oliver here a bit, too (I loved his food revolution reality tv shows he did a few years ago), but we don’t quite have that push to encourage people to cook – that would be nice.
And yes to slow cookers – I love mine! I have heard people say it’s hard to find recipes that need all day (10 hour) cooking, but definitely soups, chilis, and things that can’t really be overcooked are so wonderful to come home to. 🙂
Judy Elvey says
February 18 at 6:18 pmI have people look a little shocked when they see we have such a well stocked freezer and pantry for just my husband and me. Well, I cook nearly meal, or reheat our leftovers. If we can’t go out, or don’t want to, we have everything necessary for many meals. For years my husband had diverticulitis, making his diet very bland and limited, so it was easy to fix what he liked, and could eat, at home. Now I estimate we eat out about 5 meals a month, lunches specifically, all other meals we make at home. We’re older, retired, on limited incomes, however, to be honest, this is how we have always done it, in our 33 year marriage. It amazes me that young people seem to do the opposite of us, eat out often and cook occasionally. No wonder so many of them cannot save money.
Jami says
February 19 at 9:36 amSo true, Judy! I’m curious, you said that your husband ‘had’ diverticulitis – did eating good food help it go away or was it something else?
Judy Elvey says
February 19 at 12:02 pmI suppose you could say Dennis still has it, at least diverticuli pockets, but the main ones that kept catching everything were removed in surgery to remove a large mass found in 2008. His bland diet changed then, but his preferences were set, he never went back to eating foods that were spicy, although finally he was able to eat thing with seeds, and nuts. I think we eat very healthy meals, normally. I enjoy cooking, and preparing our meals, so we kept eating at home. I was thinking the other day that I cannot remember the last time I went into a drive-three at a fast food place! I will say Dennis was in the hospital recently due to a blockage in his small intestine. Something got stuck and it wrapped around some scar tissue from the first surgery. Right now, he is on a low residue diet, no fiber, and that will be added in over time. If there are any more blockages, he will need surgery to remove the scar tissue. It’s really interesting how one thing affects another.