Food Thoughts & Quotes – Virginia Woolf

Another week has passed, a week of cooking and eating and thinking. This weeks quote is from Virginia Woolf:

“One cannot think well, love well, sleep well, if one has not dined well” – Virginia Woolf

This quote is taken from an essay she wrote in 1929 and is related to the low standard of food served at women’s colleges at the time.

I agree with it fully.

How often have you found your work suffers or your emotions erratic, your mood irritable to say the least purely due to lack of food or ..the wrong food?

There is even a name for it now: Hangry. The anger caused by hunger. I know I have been hangry a few times.

We all know that if we eat well, we feel better. We eat poorly then our mind and body suffer the consequences. That is not to say I have a problem with ..shall we say junk food? You know what I mean.. fast food served out of a window, swapping a chocolate bar for a meal. I do it, the majority of us do. I normally however end up feeling fairly rubbish because of it.

I also have poor sleep if I don’t eat enough, sometimes I get so caught in work that I just forget to eat. This isn’t often but by the time I stop and think oh I skipped lunch or dinner I have normally gone past the hunger. So I go to bed but my body doesn’t know what to do because it hasn’t got the fuel it needs in it, so my night is unsettled and I wake like a grizzly bear on the hunt for honey. Typically this results in eating the entirely wrong thing for breakfast and the cycle can continue.

On the other hand if I eat a good, filling and balanced meal, I feel energised and happy. I made such a good roast chicken dinner today, it is my daughters favourite meal by far and it always leaves that warm, comforted feeling that I had myself as a child when my mum made it for me.

I went on to work hard and have a happy, motivated but relaxed evening. Now that is not purely because of the food. But I am sure it helped.

Do you think food and the way you eat has an effect on your moods and the way your day goes?

These Sweet Potato pancakes are a really good way to kick your day off the right way: