Mwah Hah Hah!!!
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Ahhh! Thinking about what you wrote, while I do not live alone, I think that sounds like me most of the time lately. I enjoy cooking more when I cook for just a few people that like to try a variety of things, and when I can spread the prep, cooking, and clean up over enough time to do it when I feel like it.
I have spent the last 24 hours happily thinking about making tea sandwiches to serve with gazpacho, to a small group of friends at an “afternoon tea” next week.
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I misspoke. I should have said ‘follow that thought’ rather than ‘buy into…’
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I’ll bet you never expected this thread to go this far. The thread that keeps on giving. In a good way.
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It’s been interesting to follow all of the comments. Our guests have been gone for 3 days now and I’m still recovering…
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And that right there is testament to NOT going out for every meal when they stay with you next year. I hope the weekend is peaceful for you.
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Maybe retrospeak should go out to eat to celebrate …
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LOL, we have actually done that before when we’ve hosted relatives who don’t care for, or whose digestion can’t tolerate, food with big flavors. Then I crave chiles and garlic. Sichuan food must happen then.
Wishing @retrospek a satisfying stretch of eating whatever she pleases, when she pleases, in the comfort of home.
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I find most of my relatives stress me out by their power plays for various restaurants or specific dishes.
It always takes me a few days to recover after I visit them or they visit me.
We’re all foodies. We have different ideas of how to dine when family visits. Egos get involved. It’s kind of hilarious.
I tend to go with the flow to avoid conflict, which leads to me biting my tongue, the snark, then resentment, then venting online. When we visit 3 years later, some relatives will whine that they wished they’d chosen another restaurant than the one we ate at the last time- which happened to be a restaurant I had chosen. 
That’s when I decided, on my second last trip to California, to let my relatives choose the restaurants. I’ll bitch about their choices, or what I ordered, to people who will listen later .
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I’m still recovering…8 months out. It took me over a week to sanitize everything they touched or looked at! I’ll never be the same, and we never made it out for a single meal.
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Don’t you go out to restaurants every day when you are on vacation ?
Lemme guess - you didn’t read the thread.
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I did read part of it but it still baffles me to go on any vacation and cook (isn’t eating out part of the fun of a vacation)
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Depends on where on is staying, and for how long. I could neither afford nor would I want to eat out for 2 months straight when I’m in Berlin. But I’m pretty happy with Abendbrot, given the delicacies available to me here.
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It obviously depends how one grew up but I never understood what people like about AbendBROT - for us it had to be always a cooked meal (at home or much less frequently as a kid in a restaurant) in the evening (and I like Broetchen, Fleischsalat etc but that’s only for breakfast)
Dunno. The convenience? The variety? The lightness of the meal before heading to bed a few hours later?
Growing up if we had a warm lunch it was Abendbrot for dinner - if not, my mom would cook something.
I’m not a huge lunch person & prefer a “proper” dinner (back home I cook 5-6 nights/week), but sometimes I just tire of going to a restaurant again when I’ve had 3 meals out in a row.
It obviously depends on one’s personal preferences, moods, and situation. Like everything in life.
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I didn’t understand it until there were little kids in the family, and then also elders who could only take so much exertion.
Even just for myself, though, the flexibility of a kitchen on vacation to have a cup of tea or coffee and something light before heading out for the day, or to come home to after a long day of fun when you planned to go out again but suddenly don’t want to anymore, these are things I appreciate now. And I am a bit eater of outside meals in general.
That said, your question is more from the perspective of retrospek’s guests who were on vacation, vs her own perspective in the OP and after as the host (and one with health and age considerations, aside from food alone).
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*big eater
Cooking means different things to different people, so I don’t think it’s a “buy in” situation.
It took my mom many visits to understand that I enjoy cooking, find it meditative almost, relaxing and enjoyable.
She does not enjoy it, though she is a fantastic cook. For her, it was a duty and a chore. She enjoys feeding family and friends, but cooking is not relaxing to her and never will be.
Everyone comes to tasks from different perspectives. Some people enjoy cleaning. I do not. I’m not going to “buy into” their pov no matter how much they may enjoy it.
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When staying with relatives in small town Bavaria, in Saxony and in Mecklenburg, we usually had a hot lunch at home, and Abendbrot for dinner.
The cousin who was married to a Sicilian made more hot dinners, but she kept the evening meal light. The last time she made me dinner, it was a pasta dish that was basically pasta, zucchini sautéed in olive oil and pecorino.
I like Abendbrot at my relatives’ home. It usually includes some cucumber salads, sliced veg. I haven’t really made it a pattern at home in Canada, although I do it when I’m by myself occasionally.
What I found interesting, was the same relatives, when visiting Canada, wanted the Canadian experience while here, which to them usually meant bacon and eggs in the morning, and hot dinners, with apple pie afterwards. Which I get, when in Rome.
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