Day 29: a midday escape

I am sure I am not alone in feeling that working from home (over going into the office) can take a much greater toll on our emotional wellbeing. I find, with working in an office, that you can better define concise boundaries between your home- and work-life; something perhaps not so easily done in the current circumstances where your desk is but meters away from where you usually sit down to relax in the evenings. I have to admit though that we are lucky enough to have a spare room that has been assigned as the designated office, but I do still struggle, and, we won’t have this arrangement forever (perhaps not in this house anyway).

Although I consider myself fairly well-practised in working from home, I’ve been doing it for about four years now, there still comes a time when everything bleeds into one and it all gets a little bit too much for me. It’s so easy to fix your stare at your computer screen first thing in the morning (when the sun is in its rising cycle) and then wake from your hypnotic stare several hours later (when the sun is in its setting cycle). Without the distraction of colleagues, friends and team meetings - this can become a tough cycle to break.

So, to break the monotonous routine, I sometimes like to step away from my desk and cook my main meal at lunchtime instead of in the evening, as this gives me the downtime that I need to re-align my thoughts and return to my desk more coherent, and in a better frame of mind, later in the afternoon. Granted, though, I am in a fortunate position to be able to do this; I set my own hours (within reason) and I don’t have kids (yet) that I need to pick up from school and cook for in the evenings. So for now, at least, I will take full advantage of this and call upon cooking as my midday aide in times of need. Although, I could very easily (and often do) turn this time into preparing the evening meal if I am in dire need to get away from my desk at any point throughout the day.

Today’s particular aide took the form of Nigella’s Salmon, Avocado, Watercress and Pumpkin Seed Salad, and considering it involved several (minimal effort) steps, it was quite nice pottering back and forward between the kitchen and my office.

Nigella’s Salmon, Avocado, Watercress and Pumpkin Seed Salad

I like fish, but I love smoked fish, particularly when it’s cooked, so I opted for fresh cold-smoked salmon fillets here and kept the cooking method the same as instructed, which, by the way, is a method of salmon-cooking that I will certainly be adopting; it's stress-free and flawless. Of course, it depends on the size of the salmon fillets, the ones I used were a little on the small side - but I should have used my common sense here to take it out of the hot brine a minute or two earlier. Still, the salmon was soft and definitely lacked the chewiness that is so common in overcooked salmon.

The only other change I made, which was more a product of negligence from not reading the recipe (or even the title) properly, as opposed to one of choice, was to use cucumber instead of avocado. I quick-sweet-dill-pickled the cucumber in honey, vinegar and dill to make it a little more interesting.

Flavour musings

Taking the time out to make this gave me the composure I needed to return to a busy afternoon back in the (home) office; a refreshingly light and delicious lunch perfect for a midday indulgence without the side-effect of the carb or dairy fatigues, which are not ideal when you have an afternoon of strategy meetings planned. So, for me, this was just the right kind of indulgent brain-feed required on a day like today.

For supper, I assembled onto a slice of sourdough: creamed horseradish, rocket and gleaming coral flakes of the remaining salmon, before adorning with a grinding of cracked black pepper and a squeeze of lemon to finish.

I appreciate we all have different roles at work, and sometimes the cost of submitting late to a deadline could be your job, but just remember: no cost is greater than the cost of neglect to your mental health. Breaks, long or short, can in fact improve efficiency, and you may even make that deadline earlier than you thought. I also know this struggle, to break or not to break, can be unbearable and each day I have retrain my mind to ensure I take them.