Even in harmful situations, we can learn something good. Cooking at home in Covid-19 Quarantine.

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We live in a miserable world where the unexpected finds us unprepared. Future thinkers try hard to estimate and predict how the future would look like but most of the time, data and past experiences do not reflect, at all, the tomorrow of the world. But the only hope is that humans are wiser than any other animals as they are versatile and can adopt new changes. They can get ways to live and become better despite the challenges around them. Many people claim that our own activities are the main causes of troubles and problems coming into the world. But again, on the other hand, they are so necessary for the development of the world and our wellbeing. Technology has raised in many sectors including the agriculture and food industry. If we only bring our ancestors, the latter can show how the world has changed better though wild animals where forests have been cut for agriculture and home constructions can experience differences. We can still learn to do good things with these initiatives around the globe.  People often argue on industrialized food as the only available food nowadays, especially those living in towns but forget to make vegetable gardens at home, which are very healthy and source of proteins and immune systems to our bodies.

According to WHO definition nutrition is a process of obtaining food by the body for growth, repair, reproduction, energy to mention a few. And as stated, frequent home-cooked meals with a healthy eating habit can increase the chance of a healthy body. And this can reflect on how whenever we get a chance to be home, we need to prioritize some skills including cooking as it is very essential for cooking healthy meals. Our lives depend greatly on our intake: food, drinks and oxygen, and many other factors and each depends on one another. With this rapid economic development of this world, everyone is working hard to earn a living(Money) and this creates limited time/space for people to do some activities that are so necessary for them. One of them is cooking. It is believed a home-cooked food has health benefits than consuming processed food that tends to have high sugar and sodium levels. Susanna Heather B, et Jean Adams in their articles stated: More frequent consumptions of home-cooked meals were associated with a greater likelihood of having normal range BMI and normal percentage of fat which has implications or reducing Non-communicable diseases(NCDs). Also for the food to last for a long period of time, different chemicals additives for the long shelf-lives have been identified as among the main causes of poor nutrition among people which leads to poor immunities system, digestion system difficulties as nutrients responsible for that, dies/ get lost and ends up eating empty calories food. Twenty thousand (20,000) people die each day due to poor nutrition-related diseases, and home-cooked meals can be a great solution for this problem as people consider balanced diets and hygiene during their preparations.

What is Coronavirus?

My assumption is that almost 98 % of the world’s population have heard very often the word coronavirus or COVID-19 because the situations affected everyone in one way or another. Coronavirus is an infectious disease caused by a newly discovered virus and there is no cure until now, thus killing so many people around the world. Almost four (4) million people around the world are affected and many thousands have already gone. As it has no vaccine yet, it is advised for oneself to prevent the spread of this pandemic through washing hands regularly with soap or alcohol sanitizers, avoid close contacts, and also self-isolation as the virus cannot be tested by eyes. Most of the symptoms of the coronavirus are coughing, Headache, fever, tiredness and difficulties in breathing. This pandemic spread from one person to another easily and quickly as affected people can affect millions unwillingly. With the strict policies for each nation to protect people, governments recommend people to stay home and try to work remotely. Life is very expensive and once gone, it’s lost forever, people should therefore corporate with their nations to end this pandemic soon. While staying home, it is a good time to consider their health diets as they can cook and eat from home.

Five (5) importance of eating home-cooked meals advantages:

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Cooking sometimes requires enough time and attention but it is one among good ways for all people who need to eat healthier. Despite that, cooking at home has so many advantages of which people need to understand deeply. Here below are some highlights on the importance of cooking and eating from home:

1.It brings joy

I have had a privilege to live in a village with parents and siblings, where we would sit down, pray and eat together always. After eating, we would listen to a radio while having conversation on how the day was spent. Whenever someone would be behaving inappropriately, it was high time for counseling and rebuke. Conflicts are managed and problems get solved on the table. Now I realize that growing up with such a health-conscious, cooking-oriented family is a privilege itself and brings joy. You feel loved. Also the act of preparing food for ourselves is self-care which is a fundamental part of being human. It also brings joy when a parent cooks while having games with their children as they get allowed to be part of the cook when they are five years old or more. And with this, it can be as good as eating food on a date with a lover.

2.It saves money

Everywhere, finished products are expensive compared to raw materials. This is applied to food as well. Raw food is found in local markets or supermarkets and is relatively inexpensive compared to industrialized food from restaurants as they also need a profit. According to a cost comparison of home cooking versus restaurants delivered meals, Wellio found that on average, you can save around $16 per meal by cooking at home.  means a day in every week, you can save $832 per year. There are also many other expensive costs like transport, calls when going out which can also help families in other economic plans. Different cultures react to things differently but the truth to be told everywhere is that cooking at home is the best way to save money for the next few days.

3.Improve cooking skills.

We learn by starting with tiny things or small. Cooking is like any other skill people need to learn. They are so many experts in cooking and have made billions of dollars in their career. For instance, in COVID-19, food staff and healthcare-related are the only services allowed. It is actually hard to stop food services and businesses dealing with them because food is our primary need. Different experiment on how many days a person can spend without food, gives different results  but Peter in his articles stated that a person can spend 21days without food but with proper hydrated.This means without anything only 7 days is enough to find a dead body because of starvation for someone.There are individuals who can not eat at home even when they are raw food because they do not know how to cook them. starvation leads to low BMD and causes various diseases which becomes a burden in familiesPeterJaniszewski,2020. Cooking home is a key to increasing your skills as you get to practice little by little on different types of meals. As with other professional work, people can even discover so many things by themselves and have fun cooking. With skills then, it can be a great experience which can increase the chances of getting good jobs as some job descriptions require these skills.

4. Help someone to inhibit the healthy eating habits

Every habit is built from a tiny start. We can start small with the end in mind. This motivates people to learn to do hard things with confidence in every practice. Healthy eating practices are also habits we build with time. There are so many people who never mind the food they eat and others do. Cooking the same kind of food isn’t fun. People always try to cook different meals and with these they get different nutrients. This is always because once we have fun in cooking, we want to try new cooking methods with different ingredients. With cooking at home, the assurance of eating balanced meals goes high because eating the same food at home is not fun at all. This builds eating healthy habits and a person starts minding a lot on the types of food to consume.

5.Makes a person Healthier

This should be the end goal for every home-cooked meal. If not, there won’t be any single difference with other types of food. Having time to choose food to prepare, we also get time to think of the healthy benefits of them while making meals and juices. And eating raw food makes a consumer get all the nutrients than consuming ones from the supermarket with additives. Home-cooked food is good for weight regulation and a good range of BMI (Body mass index)

Why in quarantine.

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Covid-19 has changed ways we normally do our daily work with restrictions of staying home. We are recommended to work remotely using the internet. With this stay, we can learn a lot including cooking. We are in a busy world, and everyone is stressed thinking oh her/his tomorrow. We therefore put all effort and work as hard as we can to make sure that our goals are achieved and attained. It gets hard to have time to cook for ourselves during the day. Also in weekends, some do not get free time at all. Cooking like other work is so hard at first but as we keep on trying and having a desire to learn new techniques, it gets funny and preferable. This pandemic keeps changing things and we cannot predict others pandemic like this one that might come later in future. It is therefore good to learn basic and necessary things that lead to primary needs. So many people argue that now, technology has made life easier that we get to order food and medicine at home, but we never know even those might get stopped. It is good then to start trying our best in this stay home time to learn different basic needs including cooking. Online courses have made it simple that we can learn everywhere and anytime. We cannot get tired of learning, it’s a part of our lives. Even in harmful situations, we can learn something good. Cooking at home in Covid-19 Quarantine.

References:

Time. (2019). Poor Diets Are Linked to 20% of All Deaths Worldwide, Study Says. But These Foods Could Help. [online] Available at: https://time.com/5562994/diet-disease-mortality/ [Accessed 14 Dec. 2019].

Who.int. 2020. Nutrition. [online] Available at: <https://www.who.int/health-topics/nutrition> [Accessed 8 May 2020].

Peter Janiszewski. 2020. How Long Can Humans Survive Without Food Or Water?. [online] Available at: <https://medicalxpress.com/news/2015-12-humans-survive-food.html> [Accessed 8 May 2020].