I enjoy cooking.

Interestingly enough, this is not something that I would have said ten years ago. And if I’m being honest, I much more enjoy cooking alongside someone else. I’ve never taken a formal cooking class (although I wouldn’t rule it out), I tend to cook the same things a lot of the time, and if I get home at the end of the day and there’s nothing already made, I always dive for hummus and veggies. Easy.

I’m writing this on a Thursday afternoon. I had a few crackers and the last of a tub of hummus for a snack. I have everything in the fridge to cook my quinoa salad and have a nice, filling, actual meal. Why am I sitting here writing this instead of cooking and eating food? I’m waiting for my husband to get home so that we can cook together. He usually does the tofu.

One of my mom’s slow cooker recipes. She used to freeze batches for me. Now I make my own. (And sometimes freeze a few batches.)

There’s something about cooking a meal with someone that’s almost as enjoyable as having the meal. Sometimes more so.

When I was a younger adult, I didn’t cook. I would make a pathetic (lunch meat, mayo, bread) sandwich or what I called a salad (spring mix, cherry tomatoes, ranch) to take for work. Sometimes I would heat up Campbell’s soup (until I made the discovery that it gave me gas). I made frozen, fried chicken patties. I ate leftovers from eating out. I’ve always been an active person and this didn’t have a huge effect on my fitness at first. My mom would come to visit when I lived in Chicago and she would cook healthy crock pot meals for me and pack them up and freeze them. (Yay!) But I didn’t cook. Sometimes I would boil water, throw spaghetti noodles in and then dump Prego on top. (If you dump the sauce on right after the noodles come out, you don’t even have to heat up the sauce.) But that’s as close as I got.

This began changing when I started fighting competitively. Suddenly I needed access to healthy food most of the time. I needed low calories to make weight and I had to make sure that I had enough energy to get through my workouts. I polled friends for easy recipes and that’s where it started. I still use some of them and I actually still remember who I got them from, even if I am no longer in touch with that person. As I began transitioning into a full time fitness career, my knowledge about nutrition increased and I began cutting out more junk calories and sugar and trying to incorporate more nutritious food.

My favorite lunch staple! The original quinoa salad recipe came from our cleanse.

Then one year Dean and I decided to do a sugar cleanse together. It was HARD, but we committed to two weeks. We looked at all of the recipes, picked out a few we liked and then started a meal plan. Each weekend we would cook lunches for the week and decide on dinners and breakfasts. Although the cleanse itself was tough, we learned a lot about recipes we liked. And I learned that I really enjoyed cooking with Dean. I still prepare my lunches over the weekend and we still cook together several times a week.

During the holidays, I cooked a lot! I learned to make Dean’s family’s cinnamon rolls with his mom during Thanksgiving so that I could make them at my family’s house at Christmas. I cooked with his Dad and learned that his first job was working at a bakery. At Friendsgiving I made my favorite cinnamon crumble muffins to bring along. At Christmas my mom and I spent a long time in the kitchen making the now-famous Four Hour Cake! We also recreated some avocado toast that we had enjoyed while we were out Christmas shopping and we made the cinnamon rolls.

The best part about these cinnamon rolls is that they’re bite sized! (This photo was taken less than five minutes after they had come out of the oven. We don’t even take them out of the pan.)

In the midst of all of our cooking, a package arrived from Dean’s family. They sent us a special scraper to help us cut the cinnamon rolls. My mom also made the cinnamon rolls and our avocado toast at her New Years Eve party with her friends. Dean and I made a new recipe for our private new years party (we cleaned up the house and dressed up just for the two of us). It was a recipe from a book he got for Christmas. Not everything I’ve made was 100% healthy, but sometimes that’s not the point.

Now, the cake that my mom and I spent four hours making? It weighed eight pounds. It was beautiful and tasty! I had about two pieces of it over the course of two weeks. Some we served at Christmas Eve dinner, some I brought home and shared with Dean’s parents when they came to visit after Christmas, some I gave to my neighbors for their anniversary. I think that I’ve had maybe five cinnamon crumble muffins total, although I’ve made them at least ten times. My mom cooks seafood for my dad and I. She does not eat fish. I don’t eat meat, but I enjoy helping Dean grill his. Sometimes I’ll throw a mushroom cap on the grill when friends are grilling just to be part of it.

I have cooked alone before and enjoyed it. When I think back on those times, it’s generally when I’m trying a recipe that someone has given me, or when I’m cooking for a specific event or person.

For me, I believe that I enjoy the connection that cooking creates. Whether you’re just in the kitchen stirring because someone handed you a bowl and a spoon, or you’ve got a complicated recipe that requires some planning. It’s obviously fun to create something that you can thing bring for people that you love to benefit from and enjoy. It’s also satisfying to create something. Personally, I think the best part is the interaction between loved ones. Near or far away. Cooking together or just sharing recipes and pictures of the process.

There is a special joy to cooking! I’m glad I’ve found it.

The connection between food and family