Rituals of the kitchen can help heal the wounds of divorce

By Adele Horin
March 7, 2005

Men are more likely than women to eat out a lot after separation and divorce because they have the money, cannot cook or dread eating alone at home. They are also less likely to have children living with them.

"All of a sudden they have to do things for themselves, like cooking for one, or cooking for their children, which they may never have done before," said Bruce Smyth of the Australian Institute of Family Studies, who has co-authored a paper on cooking after a divorce.

Yet learning to cook for children and to share a meal at home with them could be more satisfying than taking them to McDonald's, he said. "It can be a key that opens doors, a way of forging closer bonds between fathers and their children."

Despite the importance of mealtimes to family life, little is known about divorce's effects on cooking and eating habits. Studies suggest that divorce lengthens the day: women get up earlier, men go to bed later, fatigue sets in, and the urge to cook may diminish. Men report skipping meals more often and eating out more.

There may be little incentive to shop or cook for one, or the energy to cook for others, Mr Smyth and Ilene Wolcott say in their paper, "Food and Family Transitions", published in the Journal of the Home Economics Institute of Australia. "There may be the temptation to just give older children money to buy something to eat."

As well, food can become a focus of parental disagreement after separation, with cooking skills being equated to parenting skills. Yet, according to Mr Smyth, who has held discussion groups with divorced fathers, separation can be an opportunity for men to create new rituals around food and meals.

"There can be dad's way and mum's way," he said.

Michael Green, author of Fathers After Divorce, said children felt reassured when they saw that their fathers could cook and run a home competently.

At Boys Can Cook, in Bondi Junction, men gather on Wednesday nights and Saturday afternoons to learn to cook. Rocky Ranallo, 50, who has been divorced for five years, said he had never cooked. "It's costing too much to eat out all the time and I'm sick of eating at McDonald's with the kids." Last week he cooked his first ever meal for his two sons aged 11, and 15. To his delight they ate the lot.
