1. Firstly, it is cheaper to cook at home than to buy take-out or eat at restaurants night after night. Once you’ve gathered most of basic ingredients, you can find a few recipes that appeal to you and make your mouth water. Make a list, and buy only what you need, you can make a week’s worth of dinners for about the same amount of money you’d spend in a mid-range restaurant for two or three prepared meals. The biggest bonus is, there are always leftovers when you cook at home. You can use these meals for lunch the next day. That will eventually same you tremendous amount money.

2. Secondly, cooking for yourself is healthier. You can control the amounts of fat, sodium, carbohydrates, or any other substance that goes into your food.. You can buy fruits and vegetables that are in season and at their peak of flavor and nutritional value rather than settling for browned lettuce or fruit that tastes like cardboard. Portion control is as easy as deciding how much food to put on your plate, eliminating all that temptation to eat the fries that came with your restaurant burger. Many Restaurant food uses a lot of butter and heavy cream that can be high in calories to make food taste richer. That makes it easier to stick to a diet plan.

3. Cooking for yourself allows you more flexibility than using prepared foods or ordering at a restaurant. At home, if you don’t likean ingredient in your pasta, don’t use it. If you like extra basil, add it. You can use olive oil instead of butter, or switch soy milk for dairy. Your choices are limitless.

4. Your meals are suited to your taste, every time. Some of us like spicy food while others prefer less spice. same lies with salt and sugar. At home you prepare the food suited to your taste every time.

5. You can adjust the servings: If you are on a diet, you can make less. If you know you like seconds of a certain dish you can make more. If you are having dinner guest you can make alot.

6. Cooking at home can be faster than going out. When you take in to account the time spent driving to a restaurant, waiting to be seated, waiting to be served, eating, paying, then driving home again. You could have fixed something simple and tasty much faster and been more comfortable in the process – shoes off, favorite music on the stereo, relaxing in your own home with or without your friends.

7. Avoid intake of unwanted chemicals & additives: All the techniques used to process food whether it be canning, dehydrating or freezing, virtually destroy the flavor of food. These chemicals are listed under the guise of “natural flavors” and are added to enhance the flavor. Color additives are added to make the foods look fresh. Monosodium glutamate is in almost all processed food and in almost all fast food. Medical studies have revealed that MSG causes obesity. We should never put MSG in our bodies, and yet it’s something that is in almost every processed food we buy. Free yourself from MSG by cooking from scratch at home.

8. You would probably eat less at home since you can save it for later. Dont you feel compelled eat everything at a restaurant because you paid for it.

9. Better Health: With fewer chemicals you have in your body, the better your health will be. Studies have shown that chemicals can cause obesity and cancer, and neurological complaints. The better you feed your body,the better quality of life. We are supposed to have a healthy relationship with our food.

10. Lastly, the more you get to cook, the more you practice and master the dishes that you like. You will learn to tweak your own recipes from the existing recipe that you have been practicing and maybe you can come up with your own recipe. As the saying goes, "practice makes perfect".

Please enjoy my collection of recipes by me and some of my affiliates and friends.

Christie Lavalley

Favorite Recipes

Fermentation