I’ve been ‘in charge’ of food for our household ever since Faye and I met, when I DJed at weekends, Faye worked in the week, and so it fell to me to make the weekday evening meals. We’ve made every mistake, tried all diets, and honestly you couldn’t make up some of what we’ve done/been through (how about being diagnosed coeliac and living gluten-free for 8 years, only to figure out that the diagnosis was wrong?). Over the decades, we’ve boiled out ‘food philosophy’ down to these few rules to live by:
- We cook what we eat - Just following this simple rule removes so many of the pitfalls of modern diets, because we actually know what we’re putting in our bodies. When we know something, we naturally take more notice.
- We try to buy real ingredients - The odd jar, packet or tin is fine, but it’s best to cook from scratch with food that’s come from the ground, not a factory.
- We mainly eat whole carbs - Brown rice, whole potatoes, oats, wheat, home-made brown bread (bread machine), brown pasta.
- We also eat lots of other plant-based foods - Nuts, seeds, fruit, all colours of veg, salad etc.
- We sometimes eat meat fish, dairy, eggs - However, not at every meal, and not as the basis of our meals.
- We don’t fret about any of this - 80/20, what’s life without white rice, chips and the odd chocolate cake?
The recipes we cook tend to use short-cuts - I love our pressure cooker, food processor/liquidiser, air fryer, rice & bread machines etc - but many are easy to cook in the campervan too, especially as we have a small portable pressure cooker with us. Finally, we eat a LOT - I guess that comes from running a lot.
Oh, and coffee. Lots of coffee. Coffee is a non-negotiable.