From calendar-keeping to cooking, for years, my hyper-organised personality crept into every corner of my life. I would save Instagram recipe videos and cuttings from weekend newspapers and use them to plan shopping lists with grand ideas about midweek dinners: a white bean stew pencilled in for one night, tacos another, homemade burgers another. I was always overambitious.
You would think this level of planning would translate into less food waste. But a busy routine working in London, often with last-minute events and long commutes, meant I was too tired to make anything when I came home. By Wednesday, I would fill up with shop-bought sushi or soup. More often than not, I would get to the end of the week with a fridge full of wilted ingredients, which I would quietly chuck into the food waste. I felt guilt and shame, but I was stuck in a loop.
Wilkinson: ‘It took the idea of growing my own food to truly understand its value.’ Photograph: Sarah Lee/The Guardian
It took an audit of my spending last summer to get myself in check. During that time, I also decided to grow tomatoes in the garden of my shared flat. I was a novice gardener, but soon I became obsessed with caring for these plants. It was as if a switch had been flicked in my mind – as if it had taken the idea of growing my own food to truly understand the value and timescale of food production. I made a commitment to myself then and there to change my habits.
Now, I save every last scrap of uneaten food and integrate it into my next meal: using cubes of stale bread to bulk up soups, or cracking an egg or two into a three-day-old chilli for a breakfast shakshuka. I have a container of vegetable skins in the freezer, which I’m planning to boil for stock. Quick-pickled carrots or cucumbers, with a splash of soy, are a go-to for brightening boring carbs.
When I can, I’ll pick up Too Good to Go boxes, which contain surplus food from local cafes, restaurants and bakeries for reduced prices, and challenge myself to make something quick and tasty from the random assortment. It’s usually a soup, or “stovies” – a Scottish dish made with boiled potatoes and whatever meat is available.
I also broke the closed-minded rules I had cemented in my head about food. Fruit can go with savoury dishes, for instance – apples work well in curries, while berries add colour to a salad. I used to shy away from beige on beige, but leftover roast potatoes with garlic and spaghetti is a new favourite. A lot of this is probably obvious to most people – but for me, it has been something of a breakthrough, although not without a few flavour disasters. I’ve learned that Sichuan pepper and mint should be used sparingly, and that it is possible to add too much chocolate to a chilli. My way to make anything edible is to cover it in sriracha.
I’m less ambitious with midweek meals now, but I’m much more creative. I have saved money and time, and will no longer wince when I open the fridge at the end of the week. It’s been freeing, in a way – and has helped me embrace spontaneity in other parts of my life, such as social plans. Best of all, I’ve rediscovered what I loved about cooking in the first place: the joy of making something delicious out of almost nothing.
