Before I get back to normal...

As my recent updates have shown, life has been a bit of a turmoil lately, and that's not about to change with centrelink's decision today (despite their decisions as recently as last month) that my fiancee and I are partners (in the centrelink definition, not just the obvious one). The starting point of those changes are we'll be operating from a position $200 short of where we've been. This is not entirely helpful on the stress levels.

But what I'm actually wanting to write about is food, and specifically what I've been eating over the last little while, and there's really 3 periods at play here; after the baby, in Adelaide, and after Adelaide.

After the baby

Food stayed sort of the same as before, but was adjusted by having 1-3 dinners a week at Catherine's place. Those meals tend to be salads and meat, or serve yourself pasta and sauce, or rice and stir fry. Nice and simple, without anything special or stand out. meals at home were make a batch of something and eat 1-2 serves and freeze the rest for later. Toasted sandwiches and ramen for lunches.

^{I think this was in a Mexican week that I had where I made a bunch of Mexican-ish things}

There was also a bit of 'normality' with 1 week of actually getting to attend gaming before I was off again to Adelaide.

^{I have to look up where I went for dinner on the way to gaming, but it was burger and fries}

In Adelaide

Too much junk food. Just way too much of it. But at the same time, not enough meals. I lost 5kg during the ~6 weeks even though we had multiple meals from Maccas/HJs/KFC/Sushi chain/Hudson's Coffee. There was quite a bit of lack of motivation to eat, and lack of caring about what I ate.

Another part of what I ate was in response to the idea of 'empty the fridge and freezers'. So there was leftover curries (that I'd made in March/April) with quick packet rice. BBQ Chicken pieces as snacks. Savoury muffins, a couple of single serve frozen meals (surprisingly good too), and many serves of frozen meals cooked by friends and family. The standout was the lasagna, which had the surprising ingredient of chickpeas which I'll have to attempt in a future lasagna I make. And there was frozen fish and chips that I baked.

^{yeah, this wasn't actually in Adelaide, but from King of Kebabs before I left. I think it does represent the healthyness of my diet while I was in Adelaide though}

I cooked a few times also, especially when there were 4 of us in the house, but I really didn't make anything interesting, or more difficult than roast vegetables to go with frozen stuffed chicken or spaghetti bolognaise from a jar of sauce. I wasn't in the mood for detailing the process, so while it was a nice 'packet meal' post idea, there wasn't a process done to do it (at least I don't remember taking any pics)

Lunches were almost always either skipped, the junk food, or toasted sandwiches or rolls. I like them, and they're an easy go to when you can't think of something to make.

Back in Sydney

Since I've been home there's been much unpacking and going over to Catherine's. I haven't cooked myself anything much, but have made ramen a few times for lunch, but mostly it's been toasted sandwiches. There's been no take away since getting home, but on the drive back of course there was.

I've added a soup to my upcoming packet meals post list, which is the closest to cooking that I've gotten. I've also been stalled by having one of the housemates mum's staying here and she cooks a lot, which leads to me getting to taste the yummy Indian food she makes. Still weirds me out a bit that she's asking me advice on the Indian food she makes, since she actually is from (and lives in) India.

^{sneaky preview of what I did to a tin of soup}

I have a markdown pizza in the freezer to spruce up at some point, as well as a few serves of frozen things before I actually have to cook, but the motivation is really not coming back to me. Hopefully I'll get some inspiration from the multiple packets of things that I rescued from the pantry before my siblings threw most of it out. I'd probably have kept the entire pantry if I lived in the state, but when you have a small car worth of space to transport things home over a multiple day period, 2kg tubs of flour (and similar) aren't really a priority.

So that turned out to be quite rambly, and I'm not sure where it went really, but it was good to tap out some words and I feel better for it at least.

^{12 weeks old and cuddling daddy. A better photo of me than her though as she turned away and went to sleep}

^{Upgoats made by the talented @ryivhnn}