[Link] Cooking for people who don't

I found it was easiest to just stop eating complex foods at home. If I want a prepared meal I go out. If I stay in I eat minimally prepared things.

My health has improved dramatically.

Of course this isn't a viable option for most non-single people.

It would be very nice if someone would read the posts, filter good advice from bad advice, and make one summary post. I am interested in eating well (and cooking well is probably necessary for this goal), but most advice I get is very complicated and contradictory, and I don't want to spend time researching this topic. A simple rule that is easy to remember and follow is much better for me than a complex rule I forget. Here are some very simple rules that seem good to me:

• Every food must contain vegetables. (Vegetable = fiber + water + vitamins. Vitamins are good, fiber and water fill stomach without giving much calories. Soups are good too.)

• Always eat breakfast; don't eat after 6 PM. (These two parts reinforce each other. If you are not hungry at morning, you probably ate too much at evening.)

• Don't eat less, eat different. (If your diet makes you hungry, you are doing it wrong, because your willpower will break. You can eat as much vegetables as you want. In this comment, word "vegetables" does not include potatoes.)

This is IMHO a "level 0" of healthy eating. Extremely simple, but probably even this would improve the diet of many people. I would be interested in some "level 1" advice -- simple healthy recipes, or general guidelines on healthy food making.

EDIT: There already is a similarly simple advice on LW.

Thank you for posting this link.

First of all, I highly recomend Good Eats. As a tv show, it's probably not the most efficient way to learn how to cook, but Alton Brown presents simple, useful recipes while managing to convey the high-level methodology of the process. More importantly, it's damn entertaining.

I agree with RomeoStevens; keep it simple at home. I enjoy cooking, but I found that trying to prepare homecooked meals every night for myself led to motivational breakdown. So when I'm home, I graze on things that are healthy and delicious. A little bit of some (good) cheeses, raw vegetables, baguette, fresh fruit. Stir-fried-whatever when I'm in the mood.

Also, while this probably applies to anything you want to do better, it seems especially true of cooking: learn to enjoy it. It's really very easy and quite relaxing when you get the hang of it.

/me shrugs

I have no patience for food preparation whatsoever. Even making scrambled eggs is too much trouble for me to want to do it voluntarily. (And then I have to clean up afterwards!) If it's not edible straight out of the package, don't bother me with it.