I love food and love cooking but I see how it can be pointless for somebody who doesn't. It's like how I view Christmas - the expense and hassle just for one day that is never as exciting as it promised to be. I don't "force myself" to cook and prepare food, to me it is a creative pursuit like my music and painting and I get a lot of pleasure out of it.
Interesting that you mention Xmas - from year to year, it's always the same, yes. They begin with those kitschy decorations and songs already in October, Christmas sale in November, and the like... and people get exhausted and bored, ending up being tired of the whole thing. As you're pointing at it, so much fuss for just one day.
I see how cooking can be a very creative activity - my bad, I prefer channeling the same amount of creativity to learning or teaching guitar. Yes, I experienced that peeling and slicing vegetables might give a good training to one's fingers, but it doesn't train you in keys, modes and chord patterns.
I'm not sure if I'm a foodie or not
but...
I think vegans are sort of ... herded... towards cooking.
Vegan restaurants are rare and although many restaurants have vegan choices I can't afford to eat out all the time.
And prepared vegan food or frozen
So... I had to learn to cook.
My mom started me off with her own cooking lessons like 50 years ago and since I consider myself a lifetime learner I haven't stopped learning how to cook.
So it was very natural for me as I transitioned to vegan eating I would learn about vegan cooking.
I'm not sure I spend much more time cooking that any other bachelor. I'm a big fan of bulk preparation. I even did that before I learned to be vegan. but I have continued to evolve in that direction.
Purchasing an Instant Pot only added to my efficiency. I don't even make pasta or oatmeal one at a time anymore. I even bulk prepare my burritos and salads.
That's true, if you are a vegan you'll have no other choice than learning to cook your own food, this is the only way to make sure it's indeed vegan - you know what you've put into it.
You know what? I wouldn't eat out even if I could afford it. I don't know if this counts as frugality, but eating out feels so snobbish. Even if I'm not eating at a very exclusive or expensive restaurant, I get this spoilt and snobbish vibe that feels not quite natural for me.
Bulk preparation sounds like a good idea - if you have to cook stuff, then it's worth making much of it so that it can go to the freezer, yes.
I guess it's a function of interest. I can certainly understand not enjoying or being interested cooking. I have one friend who loathes cooking, and she doesn't really enjoy meal-type food all that much. She'd rather eat snacks/candy/junk food than meals.
I love being in the kitchen -- creating, working with my hands (like making bread) and challenging myself to come up with delicious meals. I find being in the kitchen therapeutic and a lot of fun. Yes, it can be messy with all the dishes and whatnot, but when you hit on something just right (like the vegan stew recipe I tried last week), it's so gratifying. I guess I'm a foodie? I do enjoy eating delicious food, and I want the food I make to be delicious
I can certainly relate to this friend of yours, though I understand eating sensible meals should be the norm.
I enjoy eating delicious food too, it's just about the kitchen not being my favourite place.
My way of dealing with most of your concerns is to have similar meals that I love on a regular basis and therefore only dinner time is up in the air.
We both work from home so that makes it easier too. We normally do not eat until 12-1 pm and Mon-Fri I have either noodley soup, oatmeal or a wrap of some kind with banana pb&j. Saturdays is steel cut oat day and Sunday brunch is always beans on toast with a side of either Just Egg patty, hash brown or vegan sausage with orange/banana slices.
We have a rotation of dinners that we love and although it is mostly me that does the prep/cooking my honey does occassionally help or make the meal, usually our pasta meal on Saturday nights.
I do love a lot of the process also because of the smells and the sense of accomplishment from cutting the onions and garlic (they are in pretty much every meal) the potatoes, the carrots or making an amazing pizza.
So I would suggest keep it simple, eat what you love and if that involves the same thing regularly, that is okay, and eating only twice a day makes it even simpler.
Emma JC
Find your vegan soulmate or just a friend. www.spiritualmatchmaking.com
Oh yes, noodle soup, oatmeal and eventual wraps are familiar at our place too. Beans on toast are nearly an everyday thing here, because this is the easiest.
Awww, funny that you're mentioning this, we've just had pasta this evening - though it's not Saturday - we both were quite exhausted but needed something warm. Gemelli pasta and vegan red pesto saved our lives for the day.
Good for you if you enjoy the smells! The sense of accomplishment is familiar to me - like, I made it, yeah! -, but not always to the level I find rewarding.
Yeah, these are good ideas! I'm trying to keep it simple - though I try my best to avoid monotony.
Oh yes! Did you know that people in the medieval times used to eat only twice - or max. thrice - a day? Two or three hearty meals, they didn't snack through the whole day.
