What does home cooking mean to you?

[HomeCookingWannabe]

Hello, this is my first post having lurked for a while.
I've always had a terrible relationship with food and think nothing of just eating chocolate or toast for dinner. I've made various attempts to "fix it" and none have worked long term but i'm trying again. I dream of being a "home cook", eating healthily and making proper meals like lasagna or shepherds pie for dinner, but with a busy job I'm completely fine taking some short cuts (like shop bought pastry).

So just figuring out what the rules are, and wanted some advice on what everyone else does? Incase relevant, I live alone and am veggie

For me home cooking means it's OK to use passata or tins of tomato when making a sauce but not to open a jar of pasta sauce. I make pastry but i do sometimes buy it. I buy packets of penguins but I also make homemade cookies for lunch boxes every week.

Not sure what you mean by 'rules'. If you don't currently cook at all either I'd gentle suggest it may be easier to start with small changes bit by bit and then move on gradually, this is likely to be more sustainable for you and less overwhelming.

Yes. Exactly this!

I'm not sure i'd ever be someone who makes cookies tho, that is pedestal level for me! Must be so cool

I think making wholesome vegetarian food is actually harder. And if you live alone I think you either want to batch cook and freeze or do things that are fairly quick and simple.

You can't just stick a chop under the grill or put fish in the microwave.

In terms of quick stuff, there'd be omelettes, baked spuds with cheese/baked beans. Perhaps veggie stir fries with tofu. Veggie soup with red lentils also pretty easy.

Traybakes of roasted veg with halloumi are pretty good too.

Thankyou @WeightoftheWorld yes that's a good point, and I will, i'd just like to know what a good place to aim for might be. And i havent really got that sorted in my head. I think avoiding overly processed food is a big factor in it

I’d start with bulk making a tomato sauce for pasta.
You can freeze it and blend some for tomato soup.
use some for shakshuka
If you cook some dried haricot beans, add them to the tomato sauce and Slow cook a bit more, and you have healthy baked beans.

Learn to make a risotto- pea, peanut and Parmesan is spectacular.

The Maybe a five bean chilli or a lentil bolognese or a dhal?

If you did a new one every weekend, that would build up to four home cooked meals a week by the end of the month.

When I was 19 I read Delia's cooking basics. That may be the exact name of the book.

It taught me how to cook things but by bit, so how to cook a stew with the emphasis being on how to get the meat well cooked.

This gave me the fundamental science for cooking which helped me to do the basics well, which in turn helps with more complex recipes as well as quick and easy recipes.

Don’t beat yourself up if you take the odd shortcut or two. Life is for living.

Jamie Oliver’s give ingredient cook book is an easy way of cooking meals. The recipes aren’t too bad.

Also try some of the cookery boxes - Hello Fresh, Mindful Chef, etc even if you just take advantage of the initial offers which make it quite cheap. Also, simply Cook which supply you with just the herbs and spices , do alot cheaper.

I think in the real world many people do a mix of cooking actually from scratch (Jamie Oliver curry pastes, bolognese etc), pizza from the freezer aisle, stir-fries with a few chopped vegetables, veggie bean stew, pasta with shop-bought pesto, shop-bought puff pastry tarts (honestly this is DEAD easy, just unroll the sheet, put some toppings on and put in the oven, I like a leek and goats cheese one), home-made cakes, low-effort stuff like eggs and potato wedges, freezer Yorkshires etc, lots of fresh herbs etc, full-on roast dinner (which is not actually that difficult), sausages and jacket potatoes.

BBC goodfood website is good for browsing recipes. Pretty much anything will be a step up from toast for dinner but it'd be good to get an idea of what stuff you make that you like to eat?

If I were where you currently are I’d make the smallest of steps to go from 1-7 in the following order perhaps -

Day 1: Beans on toast
Day 2: Eggs (instead of beans) on toast
Day 3: Omelette With veggies (instead of eggs) on toast
Day 4: Frittata (instead of omelette) with toast
Day 5: Frittata with roasted veg (instead of toast)
Day 6: Rattatouille (instead of roasted veg) with some microwave rice
Day 7: Veggie curry (instead of the ratatouille) with microwave rice.

That way you can change one component a day and see what happens

Things like lasagne and shepherd's pie, I might make on a Sunday afternoon. Portion again for dinner on Monday, and some in the freezer for another day. Definitely not making that on a week day.

I make breakfast bars every couple of weeks, they happily keep in a tin.
I'll often cook more than I need and will use leftovers a different way the following day. Big tray of roast veg works for lots of things.
Last night I had omelette and salad, it doesn't have to be complicated.

Try the Roasting tin cookbooks, very good and straightforward. There are no rules though, some nights I'll do loads - others it'll be beans on toast!

Thankyou all.

I should have said (oh no, im dripfeeding 🙈) that when I get into it, I enjoy cooking and am reasonably ok at it, just can't get the habit to stick and resort back to junk food.

But my ex cooks "a proper meal" every night for his children and I think that is so cool. I suppose it's defining what a proper meal is. If I oven cook a shop bought pizza, that wouldnt count, but what is it that makes that not count. Maybe something about needing to combine ingredients?

To me, home cooking is about using fresh ingredients that give you a good balance of nutrients. So I'd want at least three different veg, cooked from raw, in a main meal. And as pp said, some tinned beans or tomatoes or fish are fine, but generally, I'd avoid ready made sauces full of unneeded salt, sugar and fillers.

A shop bought pizza has almost nothing on it. If you jazzed it up with some freshly sliced peppers and onions tossed in a bit of oil, added extra mozzarella and olives and a handful of fresh chopped herbs or spinach or rocket on top, it's almost home made.

Came here to recommend the Green Roasting Tin book! Great for trying new things and almost as easy as bunging a ready meal in the oven, once you’ve done a bit of chopping.

I lived on my own for years and I always made meals that lasted so I'd cook a pasta dish that dud two night or a quorn bolognause that I'd have with pasta one night a jacket the bight and a portion to freeze.
I always have frozen chopped onion, frozen chopped peppers and spinach as they are all great time savers without being too processed.

I quite like this as a working definition, so you almost start with "from scratch" as the default then work back as time allows, but ultimately with the aim of a nutritious meal. Embarrassingly, I hadnt considered whether it was nutritional i was focusing on the effort to cook (in my working definition) but I think you have hit the nail on the head.

PS. My first post is overwhelming, I can't keep up with the replies, this is harder than it looks, lol

HOME COOKING....To me means....
Cooking from scratch like a shepherds pie, roast dinner, curry, steak pie but also ok to use tinned tomatoes, stock cubes, frozen garlic, readmade pastry etc.

Just anything that's not processed

I’m a single veggie too. I bought this book a few weeks ago & decided to make one recipe from it every weekend when I’m home.

It’s fun, it’s definitely broadening my range & since I do the full amount whether I’m hosting friends or not, I usually have enough to freeze a few portions - which also means I’m less likely to get weekend takeaways. Also the more I do, the better stocked my store cupboard gets so there’s less I need to buy.

My other mainstay is tofu, I marinate a block & have it air-fried with sweet potato chips or as part of a stir fry.
https://uk.bookshop.org/p/books/one-pot-pan-planet-a-greener-way-to-cook-for-you-your-family-and-the-planet-anna-jones/2613001?ean=9780008172480

After years of ready meals & freezer foods I've learned to make 'home cooked' meals the last few years. More recently I've also gotten into baking. As someone who was a total novice I can honestly say, using the right recipes, it's so much easier cooking from scratch than I expected it to be. Avoid recipes with ridiculous long lists of ingredients or complicated techniques. I find the best ones come from people on instagram etc rather than 'proper' chefs.

As for rules, there isn't any. I started of using jar sauces but fresh meat/chicken etc because that was still an improvement for me and it made it more manageable. Do what's going to make it easy for you. Good luck, enjoy

I should also have mentioned, I own about 20 cookbooks because I buy them thinking it will make me "that person". Turns out, you actually have to use them :)

Thankyou for all your advice, I am going to take a day at a time and just follow the guidance provided here.

@EmpressaurusDeiGatti I've heard good things about this book - I'll add it to my list of ones I want to buy.

Thank you @Tooearlytothink , it's really helpful to see someone else who has been there and made it through to the other side :)

I mostly cook from scratch but draw the line at filo and puff pastry, everyday bread and wraps (I might bake bread if it forms an important part of a special meal but buy it for a piece of toast of a quick wrap at lunchtime), pasta, some condiments (I'm not making ketchup but will make chutneys and salad dressing).

I still consider myself cooking from scratch if I use ingredients in their prepared form i.e chopped tomatoes, tinned kidney beans or frozen peas. What I don't do is use prepared sauces or ready meals.

We do a mix of home cooked and full convenience and partial

Eg
Home made lasagne/ fish pie
Bbq meats and salads
Roast dinner from Scratch

From a jar:
Pasta sauce and curry

From a packet of
Rice kit
Fajitas
Couscous

From a freezer
Chicken and chips

We eat from scratch 3 or 4 nights and have one night from the freezer.