In A Cooking Rut

Also, in an everything rut. Sorry for the elongated absence!

If you have followed my writing for any length of time you would know that we’re approaching my favorite time of year: When it gets cool enough that I want to cook everything: Making a little braisey stew situation a bit prematurely the day the temperature drops below 50; baking my pumpkin chocolate chip cookies; baking a galette or just frying an egg to eat over rice with some furikake. I spent so much time last year cooking for so many reasons—it saved money, sort of; it was necessary, definitely; it felt like a way to regain some control in a world that was quickly spinning out of my control. It was comforting at a time of immense discomfort.

But now I don’t want to cook anything. The idea of any sort of recipe prep makes me want to cry. I am more than content eating some combination of food elements that could ostensibly resemble a salad out of a large metal mixing bowl. At the end of the work day now I just have no energy for anything, least of all putting together a meal. Also, preparing food would require having an appetite for anything in particular, something I can only summon half the time. I finally understand the Soylent guys and the people who would rather buy a meal square than eat something. Who has the energy to be creative enough to look at a refrigerator full of food and think of a meal? At a time like this? In this economy???

I felt sort of like this after Thanksgiving last year when I declared cooking…