What to do when you’ve lost the love of cooking

There were a couple of months there where cooking wasn’t exciting. Life was a grind and I found myself not enjoying cooking as much. With broken sleep from a toddler, I switched from using cooking as a relaxing and creative outlet to a burden and a rush. I stopped tasting food before I served it. I stopped experimenting as much. Meals felt boring and like I’d cooked them all before. I know many mums can relate to this. Cooking feels fun and exciting when you have all the time in the world. Then there are restrictions, you feel like a snack bitch and food is rejected. It’s hard! 

Whether you’re a parent or not. There are times when cooking will feel like this. It’s only natural. But I’m here today to share what to do when you’ve lost the love for cooking and how to find the spark again. 

Watch the video: What to do when you’ve lost the love of cooking

Read the transcript: What to do when you’ve lost the love of cooking

#1A Find food that excites you to eat and cook

You need to be excited by what you’re cooking otherwise it’s always going to feel hard. When you’ve lost the love of cooking this is an epic shortcut to take. Do you love haloumi? Watermelon and feta? Crispy chicken? Slow braised beef cheeks? 

Find what you love and start there. It doesn’t matter if it’s spagetti bolognese or a soft boiled egg sambo. Start with what YOU love and forget about everyone else you’re cooking for (if any), for once please. I promise they will benefit from this.

The Wellness community loves to give rules and regulations. And I get both sides of this coin. But I hated seeing friends not enjoy food – like mangoes – because they have ‘too much sugar’. 

So what excites you? 

Somedays this is a kilo of potatoes cooked in tallow and blasted in the oven on 220C with herbs, smokey paprika, salt and pepper. 

On Saturday nights we make homemade pizza. We don’t live near takeaway so this option is easier to make. BUT when we did live in the city, we still made this. It’s our ritual. We’re so excited by Saturday night pizza. We invite friends over. It’s fun. 

I’m equally excited by a pot of spiced rice. It’s simple and I know how to make 10 different versions of it so it’s always new and exciting.

#1B Remember there are seasons 

Sometimes it might be better that you order a meal kit, takeaway or buy some pre-made meals. This can take the pressure off you when your life and commitments are full on. And that’s okay. 

There are seasons for cooking. While I was pregnant I bulk cooked and froze our meals, so we didn’t have to think about cooking in the early postpartum days. Postpartum freezer meals were a lifesaver for us. I know lots of women outsource this too. Do what you can with what you have.

#2 Connect back into your why.  Your health. Budget. Raising kids and modelling a behaviour to them 

Can you find the love of cooking through an experience you’ve been through?

I was given a heavy serve of real life at 21 with a cancer diagnosis. I’m cancer free now but the experience is not lost on me. It’d be easy to forget and move on and rely on modern medicine to do it’s bit if I was to fall ill again. Cancer changed my life for the better. This is my why. Being sick sucks. Like superannuation, when you’re young it’s easy to delay and avoid and kick the can for later in life. I’ve chosen to treat my body with the respect it deserves NOW because I want to feel great while I’m living. 

You may want to save money on your grocery bill. Or raise kids that understand the importance of good cooking habits and why cooking is so important.

Whatever your why is, find it, get clear on it and use it to fall back in love with cooking.

#3 Get organised. Get the food into the fridge. 

I recently realised I’d lost the love for cooking and it was because I wasn’t organised. I had no meat to cook with and I was finding it difficult to build a meal. No wonder, I had a third of the ingredients missing. 

I find that I have cooking ‘niggles’ when the food isn’t in the fridge and it can feel harder to make a meal work. 

When I’m organised with ingredients cooking feels so much easier. It’s easier to get inspired. It’s easier to meal prep. It’s easier to cook simple meals.

I believe getting the food in your fridge is half the battle. So set up a grocery delivery, find a fruit and veg supplier that will deliver (I love Ooooby), mark your calendar with the day you’ll go to the shops. However you do it, make it fun.

#4 Talk yourself INto it 

Okay so you’re busy, you have many things on your to-do list, you can follow a recipe but you’re still not vibing this whole cooking thing. Can you talk yourself INto loving cooking? Or to start with, tolerating it? 

What are your other options? You’re a human and you have to eat. Can you find a way to be okay with this? If you can’t:

• hire a chef
• order the takeaway meals
• subscribe to a meal kit

There are other options other than cooking but if you’re here I’m guessing you want to love or fall back in love with cooking. You need to find a way to make it work. This could be as simple as growing up and making the choice.

You’re going to cook 1,093 meals this year alone. That’s around 43,000 meals over your lifetime. Do you want them to feel hard? Cooking doesn’t need to be hard. It’s hard when you lack the skills that make cooking work for you. This is covered up with a lack of time, recipe ruts and procrastination. Cooking is easy when you:

• Have foundation recipes you can rely on
• Are armed with the knowledge on how to bring the flavour to meals
• Understand HOW to cook (with simple cooking techniques)

Once you nail these 3 things, cooking is a lot less effort and requires less mental bandwidth.

#5 Find the inspiration online

Find the recipes online that will help guide you.

Take a course that offers accountability and real life support. 

Find a Kitchen Coach that can support the changes you’re making.