5 ms·

This is generally why I don't cook much and don't really plan to. It shortens my evenings and the tradeoff just doesn't seem worth it.

jakehilborn 8y ago
I've found meal prepping to be a fantastic solution. I can make 5 meals in about an hour with my 4 burner stove. These meals are cheap, help me eat a lot of vegetables, and allow me to easily hit my macronutrient goals for strength training.
- projektir 8y ago
  Yeah, meal prepping is something I've kind of wanted to look into but from what I've seen it only works for half a week and I still need good recipes for it. Not to mention that it kills my Sunday, which I take issues with.
- Rjevski 8y ago
  It's definitely better to batch stuff, but even then, an hour of your time is probably worth a lot more than the equivalent of buying those 5 meals already made. Not to mention, I assume the one hour doesn't include time to clean up, which for me is one of the biggest drawbacks of cooking.
  - stinkytaco 8y ago
    They say that money can't buy happiness. That may be true, but it can buy a dishwasher, which is much the same thing. Easily one of the best material purchases I've ever made. I only mention this because I only realized this after I purchased the dishwasher. And so I spend time researching and "optimizing" in hopes of finding the next dishwasher in my life, which is how one falls into the trap this article describes.
stinkytaco 8y ago
I can understand the money tradeoff (your time is worth more than your money, ergo you do not cook), but I'm curious how you handle the health tradeoff? Do you eat lots of prepared foods or restaurant foods, or just lots of raw stuff?
- projektir 8y ago
  I don't think I share the general view on "healthy" food. If I am getting correct macros and vitamins and not gaining weight I consider myself fine. I found evidence on other claims scarce. I think obsession with healthy eating is a fad and tbh I grew up in another country and the food was often much worse there despite much of it being prepared by hand, because there just wasn't enough of it or enough of nutritious food (i.e., something like /oranges/ cause for a celebration). > Do you eat lots of prepared foods or restaurant foods, or just lots of raw stuff? A mix of the three. I'm more likely to eat raw kale than cook it in something. I like things like canned chickpeas. I sometimes boil things or cook simple items like scrambled eggs.
toomanybeersies 8y ago
I've never understood this attitude. Cooking takes as much time as you want it to. Cooking up a bowl of pasta is like 10 minutes of actual engaged cooking time. Boil some water, add pasta, meanwhile fry a some sausage and onion (maybe add some broccoli or other vegetable), once pasta and sausage are cooked, drain the pasta water, add pasta sauce from a bottle and the sausage, then put it in a bowl. Boom, there's a good dinner.
- projektir 8y ago
  > I've never understood this attitude Then consider a lesson in putting yourself in the shoes of others. When I make the decision to not cook, I am not you. Capture that, and it will make sense. Unfortunately, more often than not, I found people are just looking for someone to consider below them, rather than understanding that some people just make different choices. I think cooking takes as much time as it does modulo your skill level. Obviously someone who cooks a lot will have lots of tricks up their sleeve. Their confidence level will be high. They won't make dumb mistakes. It doesn't take them forever to chop an onion. My cooking skill level has never been high. For example: I'm really bad at coordination. If I am doing two things at once (boiling + frying), I tend to mess up timing. Something ends up overdone underdone. Another: logistics. When did I buy that broccoli? What if I can't find good broccoli? What if it spoils? Now my plan is in ruins. This is probably the hardest part of cooking for me, is deciding on ingredients, buying them at the right time, and not letting them spoil. Whenever I do make food, say, for potlucks, it's a sufficiently advanced process that I don't really want to repeat it every single day. Also, I'm used to tasty food. I'm not used to bland food. Boiled pasta with store sauce is just not going to cut it, I tried. I'd need to, at minimum, add cheese to it. And boiling pasta is hardly cooking anyway.
  - jesterjester 8y ago
    Wow this was the most ignorant and man-child comment I've read in this entire thread lol. The generalisations and overestimations are beyond me. No one cooks every night in this world, unless it's their job. Real food lasts a lot longer than you think it does, and that shows your inexperience or lack of trying to even inch near the real thing. You remind me of a kid that gets a water pistol expecting a bb gun and cries because water doesn't hurt. Your gripes with cooking: - I don't understand how long food lasts. Takes one time to learn. - I don't know how to cut things. Takes one time to learn. - I am used to tasty food. The cheap food from your restaurant is not from scratch. Restaurants are often less fresh and less diverse than what you make at home. - I don't want to cook every day. What are you cooking, 2 sausages and an egg? How about cooking 4 sausages and 2 eggs. Use a pot that doesn't feed 1 person like a normal person. Do you cut parts of a tree off as you need them or do you cut the base? Honestly I don't know how you live by yourself when you can generate these kinds of "blockades". How about before you pin something you can't do down to it's "negatives" you actually start to pin some effort into it. Do you catch Ubers everywhere because last time you got in a car your feet got tired from grabbing the steering wheel and your back hurt from sitting upside down? No one taught you to drive that way, no one taught you to cook pasta, toss in sauce and a piece of cheese on top...

jakehilborn 8y ago

I've found meal prepping to be a fantastic solution. I can make 5 meals in about an hour with my 4 burner stove. These meals are cheap, help me eat a lot of vegetables, and allow me to easily hit my macronutrient goals for strength training.

projektir 8y ago
Yeah, meal prepping is something I've kind of wanted to look into but from what I've seen it only works for half a week and I still need good recipes for it. Not to mention that it kills my Sunday, which I take issues with.
Rjevski 8y ago
It's definitely better to batch stuff, but even then, an hour of your time is probably worth a lot more than the equivalent of buying those 5 meals already made. Not to mention, I assume the one hour doesn't include time to clean up, which for me is one of the biggest drawbacks of cooking.
- stinkytaco 8y ago
  They say that money can't buy happiness. That may be true, but it can buy a dishwasher, which is much the same thing. Easily one of the best material purchases I've ever made. I only mention this because I only realized this after I purchased the dishwasher. And so I spend time researching and "optimizing" in hopes of finding the next dishwasher in my life, which is how one falls into the trap this article describes.

stinkytaco 8y ago

I can understand the money tradeoff (your time is worth more than your money, ergo you do not cook), but I'm curious how you handle the health tradeoff? Do you eat lots of prepared foods or restaurant foods, or just lots of raw stuff?

projektir 8y ago
I don't think I share the general view on "healthy" food. If I am getting correct macros and vitamins and not gaining weight I consider myself fine. I found evidence on other claims scarce. I think obsession with healthy eating is a fad and tbh I grew up in another country and the food was often much worse there despite much of it being prepared by hand, because there just wasn't enough of it or enough of nutritious food (i.e., something like /oranges/ cause for a celebration). > Do you eat lots of prepared foods or restaurant foods, or just lots of raw stuff? A mix of the three. I'm more likely to eat raw kale than cook it in something. I like things like canned chickpeas. I sometimes boil things or cook simple items like scrambled eggs.

toomanybeersies 8y ago

I've never understood this attitude. Cooking takes as much time as you want it to. Cooking up a bowl of pasta is like 10 minutes of actual engaged cooking time. Boil some water, add pasta, meanwhile fry a some sausage and onion (maybe add some broccoli or other vegetable), once pasta and sausage are cooked, drain the pasta water, add pasta sauce from a bottle and the sausage, then put it in a bowl. Boom, there's a good dinner.

projektir 8y ago
> I've never understood this attitude Then consider a lesson in putting yourself in the shoes of others. When I make the decision to not cook, I am not you. Capture that, and it will make sense. Unfortunately, more often than not, I found people are just looking for someone to consider below them, rather than understanding that some people just make different choices. I think cooking takes as much time as it does modulo your skill level. Obviously someone who cooks a lot will have lots of tricks up their sleeve. Their confidence level will be high. They won't make dumb mistakes. It doesn't take them forever to chop an onion. My cooking skill level has never been high. For example: I'm really bad at coordination. If I am doing two things at once (boiling + frying), I tend to mess up timing. Something ends up overdone underdone. Another: logistics. When did I buy that broccoli? What if I can't find good broccoli? What if it spoils? Now my plan is in ruins. This is probably the hardest part of cooking for me, is deciding on ingredients, buying them at the right time, and not letting them spoil. Whenever I do make food, say, for potlucks, it's a sufficiently advanced process that I don't really want to repeat it every single day. Also, I'm used to tasty food. I'm not used to bland food. Boiled pasta with store sauce is just not going to cut it, I tried. I'd need to, at minimum, add cheese to it. And boiling pasta is hardly cooking anyway.
- jesterjester 8y ago
  Wow this was the most ignorant and man-child comment I've read in this entire thread lol. The generalisations and overestimations are beyond me. No one cooks every night in this world, unless it's their job. Real food lasts a lot longer than you think it does, and that shows your inexperience or lack of trying to even inch near the real thing. You remind me of a kid that gets a water pistol expecting a bb gun and cries because water doesn't hurt. Your gripes with cooking: - I don't understand how long food lasts. Takes one time to learn. - I don't know how to cut things. Takes one time to learn. - I am used to tasty food. The cheap food from your restaurant is not from scratch. Restaurants are often less fresh and less diverse than what you make at home. - I don't want to cook every day. What are you cooking, 2 sausages and an egg? How about cooking 4 sausages and 2 eggs. Use a pot that doesn't feed 1 person like a normal person. Do you cut parts of a tree off as you need them or do you cut the base? Honestly I don't know how you live by yourself when you can generate these kinds of "blockades". How about before you pin something you can't do down to it's "negatives" you actually start to pin some effort into it. Do you catch Ubers everywhere because last time you got in a car your feet got tired from grabbing the steering wheel and your back hurt from sitting upside down? No one taught you to drive that way, no one taught you to cook pasta, toss in sauce and a piece of cheese on top...