Cooking for divorced men and women

Divorced cooks and cooking for one
Since getting divorced cooking can seem pretty pointless and eating alone can be depressing if you have been used to a companion facing you over the dinner table.  It is tempting and easy to follow the takeaway or ready meals route but that path leads only to boredom, over eating and unnecessary expense. 

It is also too easy to be lazy because, yes, there is a certain amount of effort involved in making even the simplest of meals, divorced or not, and a certain amount of preparation and clearing up is inevitable but making yourself something delicious to eat does not need to involve using every pot, pan or dish that you possess.

Shopping for divorcees
The key to eating well for anyone, not just the newly divorced, is careful shopping. If you have a choice then don’t do just one big shop a week at your nearest branch of Tesco or Sainsbury unless you absolutely have to. The best way to buy food is as and when you need it. It is all too easy to be seduced by BOGOF offers and bargain packs so that you end up with piles of rotting and out of date produce that you have to consign to the bin at the end of the week.

It may seem old fashioned and contradictory but you can eat really well if you practise thrift in the kitchen. By that I don’t mean going out and buying ‘value’ products or cheap as chips intensively reared chicken or pork but by buying the best quality food you can afford and using it wisely and well to utilise every scrap possible.

Storing food 
A freezer, even a small one, is a useful way of storing leftover bits and pieces as long as you don’t treat it like a dustbin. Make sure you label everything before you put it into the freezer as nothing is likely to create greater confusion than an unlabelled tub or package that you have found lurking in the deepest recesses and which is just as likely to contain chicken breast or cod fillet. A good crusting of ice will render identification almost impossible.

Use markets and local green grocers to buy what you need for the next two or three days. Visit farmers markets and farm shops. They have wonderful, local produce that is usually very competitively priced and is often cheaper than if bought at supermarkets. It may take a little more effort but you will spend less in the long run and you will be supporting your local economy rather than seeing your hard earned shekels disappearing into some vast corporate coffer.

Lay the table
Try not to eat all your post divorce meals in front of the TV. Lay the table properly and use a napkin, pour that beer into a glass instead of drinking it out of the bottle. You will enjoy your meal more than wolfing it down as quickly as possible while watching Corrie or the footie. Clear away the dishes when you have finished. There are few things more depressing (well apart from getting divorced that is!) than a kitchen littered with dirty dishes and pans.