Cooking again

I stopped cooking for a while. I made food, but didn't cook.

This year had taken it out of me and I struggled to find the energy and creativity to produce something that we could savour over a meal. Glad to say, things are returning slowly.

It came about by first making a deliberate choice to move away from prepackaged meat. It's unhealthy, environmentally damaging and expensive. So, if I want to make fillet, I go to the butcher and want to see how he cuts it from the carcass. The same goes for other types of meat. When I want to cook fish, I go to our local supermarket, choose the fish and watch how the head, tail and fins disappear and how filleting is done. I have been amazed at the difference in taste as well as the difference in price. This week alone I have been able to get Yellowtail at R22.00 per kilo and Hake at R51.00 per kilo. A kilo of fish is A LOT of food.

Secondly, I planted my own veggie and herb garden from which I get fresh greens. Once again, cost effective and really tasty! It is amazing how easy it actually is to plant and produce your own food.

So, tonight I made fried hake. Two hours of preparing batter, cutting the fish, making Basmati rice, cutting and cleaning broccoli... Two hours of not thinking about work, counseling, meetings. Just me, my German knives, fresh food, AMC classic pots and Classic FM in the background. Now, this is chilling. Pity I'm not allowed to drink wine anymore.