5 Reasons Why You Should Cook More (Home Cooking Benefits)

What are the 5 benefits to cooking at home?  And is cooking at home really healthier? The latter question does not have a straightforward answer.

However, cooking at home can certainly be healthier than other alternatives! Like eating out, having a caterer, or ordering food deliveries straight to your door.

With such convenient options, it can be tough to find motivation to start home cooking. But home cooking has other benefits besides being healthier! Read on to find out!

Here’s why you should cook at home:

1. Feel-Good Activity

The whole process of seeing meals come together from raw ingredients not only gives you a better appreciation for food overall:

But is also relaxing for your mind. As it’s good to have a more hands-on activity in between switching from screen to screen!

Cooking is a creative outlet that engages all of your senses too! Sight, taste, touch, smell, and even hearing! Which can boost your endorphin levels!

Not to mention the sense of pride (and independence) when you successfully recreate a dish. Or invent your own secret recipe! That is a good boost for self-confidence!

At the same time, you’re picking up or honing a skill! Which at the very least, feeds your family and you. And who knows? You may open your own restaurant or food business one day!

2. It Helps You Build Relationships

However, if you’ve never enjoyed cooking before, you may want to try new recipes or roping in a household member to join you.

Because cooking together with a loved one makes such a difference! And cooking then becomes a social recreational activity that brings the family together!

And when you sit down to eat the meal you prepared together, you are also sharing an experience!

Cooking for others is one of the best ways to show people you care too:

If you ever have a loved one in need (e.g. sick, depressed, busy, facing tragedy), and you want to help them, this skill will always be appreciated! As you know, delicious food can lift the mood quickly!

And people will indirectly associate you with the good feelings they get from your cooking!

3. You Have Full Control

This is how home cooking is healthier than outside food!

Because you can determine everything! That includes the portions (important if you want to lose weight), and what ingredients go in! Can’t eat eggs? Or seafood? No problem!

Especially if you have very particular diet restrictions, cooking at home saves you the hassle of explain to servers exactly what you need. And getting disappointed when they can’t meet your requests!

With home cooking, you can leave out preservatives, artificial coloring and seasoning too! Restaurants will hardly ever pick top quality ingredients! But you can!

Home cooked meals can be well balanced in nutrition too! And because you don’t have waiters and cashiers or rental to pay, the budget goes solely into getting good ingredients!

On top of that, you can ensure that food is prepared in a clean environment! It’s likely that the person serving your food also collects money bills without washing their hands in between!

4. It Saves The Environment

Back to the notion of being able to control how much food you cook, that also means that you can reduce the chances of food wastage!

True, you can always take back food that you don’t finish from a restaurant.

But you can take it one step further with a food composting system in your own home! Or by boiling your own natural soup stock from vegetable scraps!

Other than this, just think of all the plastic involved in food deliveries! While plastic takeaway containers can be recycled in Singapore:

Plastic cannot be infinitely recycled. It will eventually become too brittle to be useful.

So you can imagine how much ends up in the landfill or incineration plant every day! Not a great example to show your kids either.

5. Cooking At Home Saves Time

Among other home cooking benefits, the one that most people are not aware of is the time-saving factor!

Think about it:

By the time you find parking, scroll through menus, deciding on what to order or where to order from, you could be whipping out something quick in your kitchen!

Don’t forget about delivery times too!

And if you have a pressure cooker, air fryer, toaster oven, or slow cooker:

You won’t even have much to clean afterwards! And while the cooking is in progress, you can chill at home with your family! Rather than spending more time outside at rush hour madness!

Verdict

We think the benefits of home cooking are clear and far outweigh the convenience from daily reliance on outside food sources. You can save those for emergencies!

But what you eat every day will affect your body in the future. Eating healthier will boost your mood! And cooking at home saves time, money, and the environment!