In her new book A Quiet Kitchen, food writer Nici Wickes shares not only lockdown recipes but reflections on the joy of living solo and the health setback that many women experience with menopause.
Photo: supplied
20 years ago, Wickes moved to the small coastal community of Port Waikato because at the time it was an affordable housing option for a single person.
She now believes it is where she was always meant to be.
Wickes can't comprehend people saying they can't be bothered cooking just for themselves.
"I think you are the most important person in the equation. Why would you not have a gorgeous dinner?"
Food is not only Wickes's "great companion", she says it is also her medicine.
After spending decades and a lot of money trying to solve a chronically sore back, Wickes eventually discovered she had a condition called ankylosing spondylitis which was inflaming her spine.
After consulting a homeopath, she now avoids gluten and some other inflammatory foods and says this keeps her back pain at bay.
Unencumbered by pain, Wickes found greater self-acceptance during lockdown after years of feeling "a bit different" as a single and childless person.
"It was just sitting with myself for long enough and going 'boy, I really love just being me in my little hamlet'."
Wickes hopes her story will validate other people who choose to go through life solo, and also women who, like her, experience brain fog with menopause.
Many women still "laugh off" their own experience of menopause, she says, and it's a subject our culture is only starting to learn how to talk about it.
When menopause arrived in her life, Wickes was 43 and being filmed for an unscripted cooking show in Brazil.
"What happened is I suddenly didn't have any thoughts or words in my head.
"Usually, I was not short of anything to say… and instead, I was like 'mm, that's nice...'
"That was quite frightening for me because I've always been someone who loves the written word and loves the spoken word."
Menopause is a medical event worthy of paid leave, Wickes says.
"I swear that during that time I could not have held down a job where I was required to turn up at an office and function every day. I was just lucky that I was self-employed and I could take twice as long to do things without anybody knowing it, hopefully."
Although she wasn't always a fan of social media, during lockdown posting videos of herself making dinner became a great source of connection, Wickes says.
And giving herself permission to turn up on camera with wildly undone hair makes filming videos feel less like work.
"It can be a nice little sociable tool if you use it right."
Browse recipes by Nici Wickes in the RNZ collection here.
