Balance

I'm just trying to strike a healthy balance here. I love to cook, but there are only so many hours in a day and even fewer minutes at dinner prep time when you are the mother of a 16 year old and a 12 year old. I want to feed my family healthy foods, but if there were too much whole grain in the menu and no butter or sugar, meals would feel a lot less comforting and fun. I want to sustain the earth, to buy locally and support organic farming, but sometimes that means spending a lot more money and time. And while cooking is probably my biggest hobby, there are a lot of other things I like to spend time on and think about, like politics, education, the environment, parenting, exercise, gardening, travel, and of course, work!


Some days I feel quite successful at finding that middle ground. Other days, I feel defeated. In typical female multi-tasking fashion, for a good portion of my waking minutes, I am thinking about what's for dinner, what's the next recipe to try, what ingredients I need to shop for. But like the rest of you, most days I need to be more satisfied with a compromise, to focus on the whole point of cooking: sharing food with loved ones. Gathering for a meal is what really sustains us. That's a healthy balance.