I don't cook any more.

About four and a half years ago I stopped cooking. I was well on my way to cooking like my Mum and Nana. You know the type, the guest asks "How did you make the pastry for the tart? It was so sweet and moist." The cook responds "Well...The recipe says... But I just did..." The guest asks "Can I have the recipe for your rissotto?" The cooks answer is "Well...I make it a bit different everytime. I don't really have a recipe."

Four years later the only thing I cook from scratch without using a recipe is pancakes. Put some self raising flour in a bowl with some sugar. Add one or two eggs, depending on how much flour you put in. You can put some vanilla essence in if you want. Then pour in milk until it is just right. Pour the batter into the hot pan. Sometimes I add a couple of grated, peeled granny smith apples and cinnamon. Sometimes I add drinking chocolate or milo to the flour. Sometimes we just have plain with lemon and sugar on top. And sometimes I make these for dinner. To cook them it is best to heat vegetable oil in a pan so you can shallow fry the pancakes and this gives then a lovely crisp edge. But it is also okay to cook them in a non stick pan for the fat conscious family members.

But I digress. For the first four years of our marriage I made many awesome home cooked meals that were enough to feed many more people than ate at our table each night. I would come home from work excited about what I had planned for dinner that night. I shoulder part of the responsibility for Mick's weight gain in the early years of our marriage as I indulged him with my enjoyment in the ktchen.

When I was dating him his idea of a balanced meal was two minute noodles with frozen vegetable. Then we came together and I cooked stuffed capsicum and chilli chicken with marinade I had made from scratch. I made muffins with apples I had stewed and decorated cakes with chocolate swirls I had made the day before. I enjoyed cooking. I think I still do. I just don't make time anymore nor do I have enough brain power to plan a meal more than an hour in advance. So now I make beef strog from a jar, just add beef, mushrooms and sour cream. I make cakes with Betty Croker. And when I say, "Boys lets cook today," we make jelly.