Routine and habits......

No I’m talking about a chocolate habit or a secret biscuit habit – they are vices not habits!
I’m talking about food shopping habits as we all have to multitask due to lack of hours and time constraints we now have a wonderful place we visit either in person or online the supermarket – I would never in a million years have thought I would say in the same sentence wonderful & supermarket.

In the UK we have:
1. Tesco.
2. Asda (Wal-Mart).
3. Sainsbury’s.
4. Morrison’s.
5. Waitrose.

I can say that all supermarkets are laid out almost identical as you walk in you hit the fresh vegetables and fruit and then you move to diary and then meat, dried/ tinned and beverages and then cleaning products with bread somewhere in the middle and the far end the booze ....
So you walk round with your trolley and either a mental list because you buy the same stuff week in week out or you have the back of an old Christmas card with bits on you need because your either entertaining or on a diet and you need items off your normal route.

So I hit fruit and vegetables and I think okay need to diet (why am I having this thought in a supermarket surrounded by food) and reach for the lettuce, tomatoes, spring onions..... or I might see a vegetable bag and think okay let’s make a hearty , filling but low calorie soup ......... but the vegetable bags always have a swede or turnips in – I hate those boiled –I like them mashed with butter or boiled and then roasted in the case of turnips but not diced in a soup . But I buy the bag anyway because I’m dieting and its winter.

So why do I only plan what I’m eating when I’m entertaining or I have to buy 36 grapefruits and 48 eggs because I’m on some strange diet ? I now know I buy food out of habit we all more or less have a retinue of dishes we serve weekly like spaghetti Bolognese, sausage & mash, meat pie, carrots and mash....nothing wrong with that unless you look at the key accessory to the dish CARB’s....

I still buy to suit a family and a growing child ....... but I’m not feeding a family and my child is 22 and can cook herself.
Plus I now realised my cooking is not very adventurous I either boil stuff to death and / or mash it with butter and seasoning because I have potatoes in 90% of my diet?

So I found The Cook's Encyclopaedia of Vegetables on the shelf unused and I’m taking seasonal vegetables and doing something different with them so today I have done celeriac gratin which wasn’t difficult as I had all the key ingredients in it was easy to make and very filling and no carb’s I could have added potatoes and in a previous life the potatoes slices would have outnumbered the celeriac slices ......tomorrow I’m having kale.

I’m taking what is seasonal and making it work and Alice hasn’t wasted away in a corner though lack of nourishment she too is learning new dishes and maybe she will not just have the carbohydrate cooking gene – it could bypass her and her waistline!