When beginning our devotional cooking journey to heal our bodies and reconnect to the hearth, we may feel confused or lost as to what we’re doing.
These rules will help create boundaries around your devotional cooking practice to help you get clear about where to focus, what to expect and how to move forward with learning to love the kitchen again.
- Have a well stocked kitchen: When you have ample base ingredients like herbs, spices, fats/oils, and dry goods, whipping up an easy healthy meal becomes a no brainer. Think of these ingredients like different paint colors when painting a canvas. The more options, the better!
- Plan ahead: Trying to think of what to cook when you’re already hungry is the worst! Spend 10 minutes the night before, or even 30-45 minutes on a Sunday planning out your meals for the week so you can let the mental work go. That way you can make sure your meat is defrosted and you have everything you need when you’re at that hunger crux-time.
- Be willing to pivot and get creative: Don’t have sour cream? Use plain yogurt. Don’t have unsalted butter? Just use salted butter. Using substitutions is a common experience in the kitchen. Don’t let not having one or two ingredients get you down. Find a way to make due with what you have.
- Have fun in the process: Devotional cooking is a creative process. It’s a way of self-expression, and even if you mess up, that’s ok! You get to try again. And sometimes you get it *just right* and you get the pleasure of eating something SO DELICIOUS!
- Waste as little food as possible: Eat your leftovers, or just make enough to eat in that one meal. Use veggie scraps and bones from cuts of meat/chickens to make a soup stock, save bacon grease or fat trimmings to use in cooking. Repurpose leftover in new dishes (ie. leftover rice into a casserole, salad into a lunch wrap).
- Recipes are not fixed (unless baking, where chemistry matters): Recipes are for ideas. Swap out ingredients for what you already have. Don’t have the perfect cut of beef? Use any red meat. Use the vegetables that you do have. Put in your favorite herbs/spices. Salt the meal to your liking. Make them your own!
- Sharing is caring: Homemade food is medicine for everyone’s soul. Share some cookies with your neighbor. Bring some soup over to a new Mother. Volunteer to cook for friends instead of going out to a restaurant (or have a potluck). The beauty of cooking is that we get to share the food we made with love with those we love.
- Put your kitchen to bed in the evening: Spending the 10-15 minutes before you go to bed to tidy your kitchen. Clear the sink of dishes. Wipe the counters. Put away ingredients left out. You’ll be more inclined to cook the next day when you’re kitchen is clean and tidy. And no, it does NOT have to be spotless.
Enjoy these tips?
Join me in my upcoming course, Kitchen Hearth Heart Heal, where we’ll explore and practice the Way of the Devotional Cook.
Head here and read up on all the goodies this 6 week journey has in store.