The lunch idea is wonderful … must go get my own solitary lunch now .

I liked Belongums story too as a former nurse. Though I just missed out on living in nursing quarters.

Belongum – great story. It is possible. And just lovely to get a surprise lunchbox on your desk 4/5 days. Even lovelier (I hope) to make food for friends. Fingers crossed. And Karratha? You do get around.

River – I like that idea for two reasons – one, it means that everyone has to meet in the one place and two, I don’t have any tiny containers to put the dressing in.

Pity I work with about 70 other people…

I once lived in a Nurses Quarters with – shock horror – nurses when I was an apprentice… and the same problem presented itself. Everyone was trying to share a kitchen as individuals, that meant allocating shelves and cupboard space, a section of the firdges present, even down to spoons knives – tea towels – it was bloody madness, and you always had someone helping themselves to something that wasn’t theirs – denying it till they were blue in the face.

I couldn’t understand why people wanted to live a separate life, in a shared space such as a ktichen. So i started to offer to cook meals (i actually like to cook)… if people contributed, to the meals, and to the cleaning etc, I shared the meal out to those involved. As I’d hoped – this encouraged others to take part, and once a fortnight we had dinner parties to spoil ourselves! It actually made the quarters a nice place to live, because the shared kitchen area became a fun environment to LIVE in again… it was great while it lasted!

Simple things often produce the best results eh… I might try it at work – you’ve made me believe it possilbe again – cheers from Karratha mate

I have a great recipe for roasted capsicum and tomato soup – all you do is get a baking dish and chop up two red capsicums, one kilo of tomatoes, and one red onion, sprinkle with some pepper, add two to three teaspoons of minced garlic and shred some fresh basil over it all.

Place it in the oven on about 180 to 200C for an hour. When it’s done, place it in a blender, add one to two cups of vegie stock and one normal spoon of balsamic vinegar, and blend to your preference (I like it a bit chunkier instead of a pureed soup).

Very healthy, very easy – I make it every weekend and take it into work for my lunch during the week.

I had a delicious salad the other day made by my sister in law – it was really simple – blanched green beans, snow peas and fresh peas, chopped hazlenuts and a dressing made of lemon zest, parsley and butter, which melts on the warm vegies. Not sure if the butter disqualifies it from the “lo-fat and healthy” criteria but there’s lots of vegies in there – that’s got to count for something!

There are so many salads for summertime and soups for colder months that you could prepare in bulk. I suppose you’ll just need to get yourself a big salad bowl with a lid, and a thermos for the soup. A subscription to delicious. is all you’ll need for recipe inspiration