Day 20: Make Your Cooking Cure a Cooking Habit

Day 20: Friday, March 28
Today’s Assignment: Plan next week’s meals, and then keep it going!
The Cooking Cure: See all assignments so far here

Grab the confetti and start the parade — Congratulations! You’ve made it through 4 weeks, 20 meal-“curing” assignments, and all the way to the finish line of our first-ever Cooking Cure. It feels pretty good, doesn’t it?!

We’ve talked a lot these last few weeks about setting goals, kicking old habits and finding new ones, and ways to get ourselves out of cooking ruts. The challenge going forward is making sure these new habits really stick.

1. Review Your Cure Goals: Remember those goals we made for breakfast, lunch, and dinner? Well, pull those out and read them again with fresh eyes. How did you do with meeting your goals? Do you have any new goals now that you’ve cooked with these ones for a while? Taking a minute to check in with your goals every so often is one way to keep yourself out of a meal rut and on track with the kind of cooking (and eating!) you’d like to be doing. In the weeks ahead, keep these goals handy — they’re good ones! — and don’t hesitate to set yourself new goals as needed.
2. Which Assignments Worked Best For You? Think back over the past few weeks. Which daily assignments really worked for you? Was it the days we had you set aside time to research recipes? Or the Friday assignments walking you through the steps for weekend meal planning? There were likely one or two of the weekly assignments that really aligned with the goals you set for yourself — these are good assignments to revisit every few weeks. You could set a reminder on your phone to reserve 10 minutes on Saturday morning for recipe hunting. Or schedule a date six months out on your calendar to revaluate your habits and set new goals. Take the assignments that we did here and make them your own. All 20 goals are in the link below.
3. Plan Your Meals for Next Week: Last but not least…yes, your final Cure assignment is to keep up the momentum and make a plan for your meals next week! Definitely include at least one of the meals from your “Stuff I Like to Eat” list. If you like, include plans to eat out for a meal or two — it’s ok to give yourself a break from homecooking now and then! Don’t forget to schedule time for shopping and prepping, and think through using up leftovers.
4. Keep in Touch! We’d love to hear from you as you wrap up your Cure and head off on your own. Keep in touch with us on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram.

→ The Cooking Cure: A gallery of all 20 assignments

Follow the progress of The Cooking Cure in a real live kitchen:

• Cambria Liveblogs the Cooking Cure

SIGN UP

• Sign up here for The Cooking Cure

SHARE YOUR PROGRESS

• Questions? Comments? Pictures? Email us at cookingcure@thekitchn.com
• Follow and show your progress on Instagram, Pinterest, Facebook and Twitter! Make sure to use the #cookingcure hashtag.