Cooking from home can be fun, it is something the whole family can enjoy and participate in, it is not just something only Mum's can do.
One of the best skills I taught both my boys was to cook, and they both helped from very early on, it can see them through anything, and it is very relaxing.
I relied on my youngest son to help with meals while I was working full time for a short period of time, and he was a huge help to me and it was very beneficial to him as well, as he is now married and the first one home in his household, so he can take what he learnt here at home and introduce it to his own house.
I am a lover of collecting, my husband will say I'm a hoarder, but really if it comes to cookbooks, I've got to have them, I just do.
I had to make way for a renovation in our kitchen a few years back and that meant packing away my cherished cooking books, you would think having hundreds I would never use each and every one but you're wrong.
I would know which book to go to for a certain recipe, each time I would go into a church shop, second hand shop or charity shop I would scour the shelves for recipe books and buy buy buy, I would go home read from cover to cover and then try out recipes, the book would then get a cross or a star depending on what the family thought of the meal, this way it helped me to know as I flipped through each book which recipes I had tried and which ones we liked and didn't like.
It is easy to just reach for the pre processed ready made meals, or the tins or jars of just add mince, sausages or chicken, but really all those meals are is rubbish and they are so basic to make, and you could make them for quarter the price you would spend on a ready made one, and by researching through recipe books you can get easy to follow recipes that will have you turn up the same meal you would of paid 4 times the price for in the supermarket.
My Cookbook of love
One of the things I did for my children when they left home, was to construct for both of them a cookbook made up of all the recipes they had enjoyed over the years, with tips and tricks that only their Mum would know, to help them prepare, cook and dish up a magnificent meal for very little cost.
