....Instead of Filling a Compostable Food Container with Random Salad Ingredients
The last thing you want to do at the end of the day is drag yourself to the grocery store, figure out what ingredients go together to make a meal, recall what you need and what you already have at home, buy them and then go home and cook them but it can be fun!
“Well I live alone, it’s too much work,” you say. “And I don’t even care, I’d rather just eat cereal,” you might add.
Below are ten reasons why cooking for yourself can not only be fun, but better for you, for the environment and for your brain.
1. Your Food Tastes Better — You know that stuff in the salad bars sits out for hours, right?
The warm stuff getting warmer and the cold stuff getting colder…even if you rushed right home after shopping. Even if you live one block away. Even if you eat that salad mash-up straight from the container as you walk out the store, there is no way it will taste as fresh, as if you made it at home.
2. You Learn Stuff — Cooking is learning and the kind of learning with retroactive effects. When you learn to cook, you never un-learn; all those potlucks, dinner parties, late nights with a new lover when you just whip up a coq au vin are all in your future.
3. Instant Leftovers! — There are few things more pleasing than having a delicious meal packed into a Tupperware to take to work so you don’t have to hit up the cafeteria/deli/Whole Foods salad aisle. Again.
4. A Sense of Accomplishment — Even if you’re cooking for yourself, there is a true sense of accomplishment when you make something you enjoy. Most of us spend our days working on projects that take a long time to be realized—cooking is a form of instant gratification.
5.You Might Have to Buy Things — “Sure," you might say.“I get all of this, but I don’t have a lot of pots and pans and kitchen appliances.” To which I reply, "an excuse to shop!"
6.Drinking While Cooking — This is truly one of the funnest (not a word) things to do—swish around your kitchen with a glass of wine while cooking. Have you ever seen My Drunk Kitchen? I strongly advise you to, either for inspiration or caution.
7.Moving Meditation —Cooking, like exercising, is a great time to meditate on your day, go over talking points for that big meeting tomorrow or to figure out how to kindly break up with that person you’ve been dating who, sadly, is just not the one.
8.Cooking is Sexy — Getting your hands dirty, making a mess, the smells and the heat…if you’re not a landscape artist or, say, a Jackson Pollock-style painter, this is a perfect way to indulge your tactile senses.
9.The Real Deal — Even though those containers at the salad bar or the wax paper your to-go items are wrapped in are “compostable,” isn’t the most “compostable” thing using a non-throw-away-able (also not a word)plate?
10. The only downside is the dishes. To this, I have nothing positive to add aside from…uh…nope. Doing the dishes is a straight-up boring task.
Happy shopping/cooking/eating!