Food for Thought

I have been thinking a lot about food. How do you sort out food? Who cooks? What do you like to eat? I find it really interesting. Whether you have a young family or you cook for one or two, we all need food and I find it a fascinating subject.

Butternut Squash muffins, cheese scones and vegetable soup

I would say I am a good cook. I like baking, making and I love recipes not just a collection of items on a plate. My mum has worked in pubs, restaurants and kitchens all of her life and taught me to cook really well. My paternal grandmother was a sustenance cook - feeding farmers hearty meals of basic food but her niche skill was preserving.

She would have made jam and crumble with this lot

My dad traveled extensively with his job: Germany, India, Pakistan and Switzerland. He brought back food ideas. We hosted his engineer clients at our house, sometimes with their families. 

Dahl, flat breads and pakoras

My girls love to cook. Ever since I could sit them on the counter top and hand them bits of food, they have cooked with me. Now they can bake when friends come over and I hardly have to do a thing! They are good eaters trying a huge variety of foods.

Early knife skills have been used well since

Baking with friends

On Sunday, we plan our food. Sometimes I choose the weeks evening meals and put them on the menu planner on the fridge but if dinners are not going down too well, straight away I open it up to everyone. We all pick a dinner from a cookbook and make a list of what we need ready for a Monday food shop. It creates an atmosphere of tolerance. It might not be your favourite meal but you eat it because you know yours will come up another day. I count myself in that - I tolerate macaroni cheese. 

Paperchase food planner

In terms of health, planning like this gives you an overview of the whole week. We try and have something with fish, something vegetarian or a Sunday dinner that provides meat for the following week. There is always cake of the week for lunchboxes - Lamingtons in this instance. It is a magnetic board and stays on the fridge. This one is from paperchase but has nearly run out of pages. My brother bought me a new one for Christmas.

Stuffed pepper and sausage tray bake

We have next to no waste food because we buy what we need for the meals we have chosen. We also make sure that on busy nights, with Brownies or me at work later, we have the easiest thing to cook. Conversely, on the days I am not at work the prep might be a little more time consuming which is fine because I like cooking. Our family have an allotment so planning is key at seasonal times when we need to use food as it arrives in gluts.

Courgette cake with lemon curd

I try to cook more than one meal at once and freeze one. Curries, casseroles, cakes and crumble mix come under this bracket.It means I have one in the bag for say an accidental afternoon of sewing instead of getting dinner ready!

My girls make batches of crumble mix ready to freeze

Finally, because we have a planned menu anyone can crack on and get started. So sometimes my mum might read it on a Tuesday and peel some potatoes for us or if bloke gets in first he can make pizza dough or flat breads which he is very good at. The world does not wait for me to start dinner. 

Every weekend we make a batch of cake for lunchboxes

It all works well for us. Bloke teases me sometimes about the control aspect of it but essentially everyone gets their dinner at five O'clock and nothing is frozen solid or unavailable at the time of need so I roll with it.

My favourite food is anything that fits in a flat bread!

I have been enjoying reading the cookery challenge blog posts this year and this post is inspired by those musings and celebrates wonderful home cooks all over the world. Eat, drink and be merry.

We are on half term this week so there will be lots of baking, foodie shopping and of course eating with family.
Jo xxxx