Your cooking - then and now

[karadekoolaid]

My memory was triggered by TastyReuben 's post on memorable meals. My first was when I was only 19 years old. It made me wonder what I used to cook at that age, and during my 20s, and what/how I cook today. I was basically fending for myself from that age (university, own flat, etc) so there was no home cooking to rely on. I probably cooked what my parents had taught me, but obviously started experimenting with new stuff (different cuisines) , thanks to other students and later, the fact I worked in an international language school.
My question is, therefore, how did your cooking skills develop, how did you expand your repertoire? How does what you cooked when you were younger differ from what you cook now?
I can distinctly remember cooking a "risotto" for some fellow students at university. It was cooked rice with a whole packet of frozen Bird's Eye mixed veg in it. Dessert was Angel Delight.

 

[badjak]

I started cooking quite early, and indeed the recipes from mum and dad (both cooked, mum during the week, dad in the weekends and holidays).
It was a wide variety of dishes though, from "plain" Dutch, to Indonesian and Mediterrean. Potatoes, rice, pasta, bread.
So no real major changes.

I did start cooking from different part of the world as well and using different condiments, like fish sauce, rice wine, etc, but also herbs & spices that my parents didn't use (partly because of availability)

And I got pretty decent at cooking over wood or charcoal

 

[SatNavSaysStraightOn]

I had no option but to cook for myself at home. I would often cook for my brother and sister as well because I'd feed them, wash them and put them to bed (reverse in the morning)...

I have very little recollection of what I ate for evening meals my first year at university but that was a a lodger in a home.

My second year was a shared house, so we had much easier access to a kitchen. I think we lived off beans and cheese on toast (together), and omelettes, and of course, cheese oatcakes, or cheese and onion oatcakes (Staffordshire oatcakes). I do know we did casseroles with dumplings as well. We still have those recipes. We found out the hard way that Brussels sprouts absorb mustard.

By my third year we were cooking much more and experimenting much more.

By the time we graduated, we had started to buy the odd vegetarian recipe book here and there and until it was discontinued, we subscribed to the BBC Vegetarian Good Food magazine, but times were very hard financially. We lived off £880 a month. £400 was rent, the rest had to pay everything from council tax, car, fuel, insurance, clothes for starting a new job, food and medication. So we very quickly moved to soups made from scratch for financial reasons. We were lucky if we had £15-£20 for the entire week's household budget. Luckily this was 1995, but for 2 people, it had to go a long way. And that's pretty much how I found spices and herbs and flavour, from the BBC Vegetarian Good Food magazine, and those first few recipes books.