When I was young both my parents worked late and we rarely ate dinner together as a family. When they did make meals they would make simple meals like spaghetti, chili, hamburgers, and chicken. These were almost always pre-packaged or frozen and Since we rarely ate dinner together a lot of this meals I ate as leftovers. I appreciated that they put in the effort to cook meals for me, but I never really looked forward to eating dinner. As I got older I started to experiment with cooking and making meals for myself. These also started out really simple like eggs, mac and cheese, ramen, and quesadillas. Cooking my own meals helped me better discover what foods I like and what foods I didn’t. The more I cooked the more comfortable I got in the kitchen, and eventually I started to make food for my parents. I especially loved making them breakfast on the weekends once I got good at making french toast and bacon.
In the last few years of high school my mom switched jobs and was able to get off of work earlier and work less. With the extra time she started to cook dinners every night and we started to eat together as a family more often. She also started making different more complex meals. I remember she started making homemade pastas, enchiladas, salmon, and steak. When I had the time I would help her and learn all of her recipes. She even taught me some of the recipes her mom would make for her, like chicken pot pie and Irish stew. Cooking together with my mom helped me get a lot closer to her and strengthen our relationship since we were able to spend a few hours every week cooking together. It also taught me how to cook a bunch of different types of meals, ones that didn’t come d=frozen or in a can that actually required some cooking.
Since I have left home I’ve had to rely on my cooking skills a lot more as I don’t have anyone to cook for me, and for the past year I haven’t gotten a meal plan on campus which has forced me to cook almost daily. At first it was intimidating, especially going to the grocery store alone and trying to plan out all my meals for the week, but I quickly gained confidence remembering all the meals I cooked for myself and all the times I cooked with my mom. We still text and talk often about food, and she still gives me new recipes to try all the time. I’ve slowly learned to love cooking, trying to perfect old recipes as well as with experimenting with new ones.
Image provided by: https://www.foodnetwork.com/fn-dish/news/2018/9/americans-are-cooking-more-meals-at-home–eating-out-less