My Cooking Mantra Meets Motherhood

Many of you may have seen my last food blog, Bee Sweet, in which I touted always cooking from-scratch meals with the freshest ingredients possible. As stated in My Cooking Mantra, I believe that, 

"Nothing, I mean nothing, tastes more delicious, more addictive than homemade, from-scratch food."

And it's still true! However, as a new mother (one year, now, and counting), I've found that the game has been switched up a bit. I used to have no problem spending an hour or two standing in the kitchen learning to prep food properly and cook until we had an amazingly delectable meal on the table. Coq au vin, Steak Diane, cheese souffle; I made large breakfasts every weekend and baked desserts weekly: muffins, scones, omelettes, cakes, trifles, pies. And this was after a full 9 hours at the office. Today, I'm lucky if I have the energy to make pasta with olive oil and garlic powder.

So, what's the answer? Pre-preparation! And this isn't just for you working moms and dads out there; it's a wonderful technique for anyone with a busy schedule or who simply doesn't want to spend nightly time making an effort to put a real dinner on the table. And yes, here is where I will not mind lifting up my nose a bit, especially to parents.

In the first place, as you see above and as you may have seen in Bee Sweet (do me a favor and read my more eloquent mantra at the old blog), I don't believe in fast food or carryout or lazy home "cooking." I'm not going to snub my nose at you for not enjoying to cook, not knowing how to do it well, or for taking shortcuts because you simply don't have time for anything else. Before my wedding this past weekend, I spent nearly two weeks eating shelf goods and fast foods every night because I literally had zero time for efforts in the kitchen. I'd have starved if I didn't give into jarred pasta sauce, Taco Bell, or Chinese carryout (but let me add that my 1-year-old had a nutritious meal almost every night). Sometimes, it's just something you need to do. Sometimes, it's just something you want to do! But if you're a parent...sometimes is all that it should be and this includes foods you find on the shelf because they're full of unnecessary, unhealthy chemicals, sugars, and sodium that won't appear in from-scratch cooking. Of course, there are healthier, preservative-free packaged foods, but it'll cost you and if you can afford to, that's great, but many of us can't. So, we need a better solution.

To parents, my opinion is that your job as a mother or as a father is to ensure this little person you brought into the world grows up with the ability to take care of him or herself. That doesn't simply mean you've taught her to work and make money or be financially (and otherwise) responsible. On the long list of values I believe you should instill in your child, is the job of ensuring she's healthy inside and out and that this child understands what it means to be healthy and how to maintain it. Your son or daughter shouldn't grow up believing that dinner comes from minimum-wage paid teens working the counter at Wendy's or from a girl named Little Debbie. She should know that it comes from fresh produce that she's seen you hand-pick at the market that is later washed, chopped, cooked, plated and served to her straight from your kitchen. 

Instead of keeping out bowls of candy, leave fresh fruit for your kids to nibble.

Red bell pepper--grated to prevent choking, raw for a major pack of nutrients!

Who doesn't love a little linguine with tomato and basil? Healthy AND refreshing!

Something sweet for my sweet.

As a parent, you shouldn't only be concerned about pedophiles in your neighborhood or if your child's milestones come earlier than his peers', but whether his organs are clean and vibrant or his hamburger-laden arteries are clogged with the cholesterol of a 50-year-old, his Cola-filled liver damaged with the cirrhosis of an alcoholic, or his sugar-coated blood pressure as high as a diabetic. And you can make as many excuses as you like about how you can only afford fast food or you only have time for carryout or you don't know how to cook or, best of all, your child won't eat anything else, but none of it is valid or worth your child's physical well-being.

Now, let's turn away from the righteousness of my above statements and look toward how to correct these food misconceptions and learn better habits to improve not only your child's life but your own.

First...no food is cheaper than fresh, in-season produce or raw, unprepared meats. At McDonald's, you can get a quarter pounder with cheese, french fries, and a pop for around $5. Now, let's make that meal at home. At my local market, I can get a pound of ground, U.S.D.A. Choice Angus Sirloin Steak for $3.63 a pound, which translates to about 90 cents for a quarter pound, the amount of meat on the above burger. Add 30 cents for a couple slices of un-processed cheese fresh from the deli, a few cents for several slivers of raw onion, a few slices of pickle, a couple squirts of ketchup and mustard, 40 cents for one hamburger bun and the same (maybe) for the amount of potato it would take to make a medium fry (which probably isn't 100 percent potato, anyway), and let's just call that glass of water free (which you're drinking instead of sugary, acidic Cola)...You're paying just over $2 to make the same meal at home--less than half the cost! So, let's say you buy this meal four times a week...that's $20 compared to the under $10 you'd pay at home. Do this for a year and you've spent over $1000 on McDonald's when you would have spent less than $500 making the same in your own kitchen.

Of course, a hamburger with french fries isn't really a nutritious meal even if it comes from home--something to have once a week, maybe, but when home cooking, you're obviously going to be looking for a different variety of foods and ones that are even less expensive (ground Sirloin obviously isn't the cheapest thing you can get). With that said, imagine how exceedingly less you'll spend by cooking at home rather than eating out. And, if you actually experience fast food or carryout as cheaper than groceries, you're either buying the wrong foods (pre-packaged or processed items rather than raw, in-season produce) or shopping at the wrong store (a "grocery store" such as Kroger or Meijer rather than a produce "market"), in which case you simply need to remodel what you're eating and where you're buying it.

Randazzo's Fresh Market. Do some research and hope to find a decent market in your area!

Second...you have more time to prepare dinner than you're giving yourself. Cooking food doesn't take time; preparation does. To stand there chopping multiple vegetables, cleaning up multiple cuts of meat, softening onions, browning chicken, etc, does take time. Once that's all over with, though, you need only sit and wait (and once you've had practice, prepping takes no time!). Of course, you always have the option to skip these steps. Will your meal be less flavorful? Technically. Will you mind? Probably not. If you're not used to eating food that has so many steps for creating layers of flavor in the first place, then you're likely not going to mind a meal that consists simply of seasoned chicken thrown in the oven on a bed of uncut vegetables, which is still delicious, especially moreso than something off the shelf. And it seriously takes little time to wash off some veggies and set them inside a dish with a few chicken breasts, in which case you really do only need to sit and wait! 

Jamie Oliver's Italian sausage with grape tomatoes and herbs. There is nothing else in here (except salt and pepper) and I literally just dumped it all in a roasting pan and shoved it in the oven. Instant, flavorful tomato sauce-covered sausage to feed a dozen. Zero time, zero effort, one pan to clean. 

Of course, if you want the layers of cooking, you can get away with eating such "complicated" meals every night without having to deal with the prep work every night, though you do have to deal with it at some point. My recommendation is to set aside a couple hours on a free day (which almost everyone has) in which you can prep all your meals for the week. So, rather than wasting any of your precious work-night freetime, you take an insignificant amount of time on a day off to peel and chop veggies, clean cuts of meat, portion ingredients, even start some of the cooking! And if you've planned out all your meals for the week, you can get similar items prepped at the same exact time and have several meals ready. If you plan ahead in this manner, you enable bulk prep work, saving yourself loads of time even on your designated prep day! So, does cooking at home take more time than waiting at a drive-thru? Yes, but if you strategize, it doesn't have to make you feel as if you've lost any free time that wasn't worth it. And, of course, there are more ways to do this than what I've outlined here. I'll give tips and tricks in each recipe you find on this blog to help you on your way to quick, simple, from-scratch cooking seven nights a week!

Third...never, ever, ever claim that you can't cook. Nobody is asking you to hand-whip a perfect souffle from memory. Are you able to open a package of chicken breasts and set one in a baking dish? Are you able to open a package of carrots, peel them, and cut them into chunks and set those inside the dish? Are you able to fill a pot with water, turn the dial on the stove, wait for it to bubble like crazy, dump in a bag of pasta or rice, set a timer and wait? Are you able to read and follow directions, scooping salt into a measuring spoon labelled '1 tsp' and dropping it evenly over a chicken breast if that's what the recipe says to do? Then you can cook. It doesn't have to be fancy, complicated, or "impressive," nor does it have to come out of a box of pre-seasoned rice or a can of squeezable pancake batter. And, like anything else, you will get better with practice.

Hates to cook. Says he "doesn't know how" to cook. All alone, made amazing mustard-glazed chicken with the most perfectly crisp potatoes I've ever had the pleasure of eating. Ha!

Last...you are in charge of what your child eats. Better, you are in charge of what you eat. A dislike for any food is no excuse not to eat it. Taste is not unchanging; it forever develops and its development is wholly based on what you eat. Growing up a picky eater, I found myself a bit embarrassed as an adult when my friends would want to eat somewhere and I refused because there was nothing I'd like. I didn't want to be the person who everyone else had to please just because I didn't like so many things, so I decided to do something about it and try to learn to like more food. I cannot express what a success that was! 

I used to refuse to touch tomatoes in any form outside of ketchup or spaghetti sauce--if there was a chunk, cooked or raw, I wasn't going to touch it; the same goes for my husband. So, I started out slowly...I'd chop tomatoes very finely and cook them for plain pasta to make a bit of a chunky sauce. After getting used to that, I'd chop them more and more roughly until I could eat huge chunks of cooked tomato. Then, I did the same for raw until I could put a whole slice on a sandwich and love it. There are some foods that aren't worth the effort, but when it comes to nutrition, there is no better reason to keep trying until you've trained your tongue to crave something. The same goes for your child. So your son got used to eating grilled cheese and chicken nuggets on a regular basis and will turn away from anything "healthy" or "different" you put in front of him. Just keep trying. You're the boss, not your child. It's hard to tell your kid that he can either eat his vegetables or eat nothing, but he's not going to allow himself to starve--eventually, that kid is going to eat what you tell him to and after he starts eating it regularly, he'll probably start asking for it. You should never give up on your health or your family's. 

The only member of this family who liked salmon in the first place is the baby...until now! ;)

So, the point is...you should care about your health and, certainly, your child's health. There is no good excuse for choosing quick, junk-laden foods in favor of fresh, nutritious produce. You are in charge of what you eat and what your children eat. If something isn't liked at first, keep trying because taste buds do change. If something is difficult to make at first, keep trying because it will become second-nature. If something takes too long, break up the prep time or share it with someone who can help. Having a healthy body and waking up with a burst of energy every morning is worth the effort and your loved ones will thank you for it later.

The best advice I can give a parent is to start your child on healthy foods immediately and keep them away from "junk" for as long as possible. It's easier to change their minds than an older child! Here, we have broccoli, water (not juice), bananas, eggs, a smoothie (of only frozen fruit, plain yogurt, and whole milk or water), avocado, pasta with marinara sauce (onions, tomatoes, herbs, salt, pepper!) and, of course, a whole load of fresh fruit for snacking :)