Agreed. There’s a wide gulf between feeding myself and planning meals for a household. When left to my own devices, I will do as you do, or if I’m feeling ambitious, I will go grocery shopping and let myself be inspired by what’s fresh and looks good. But when I’ve got teenagers to feed, there needs to be planning and forethought about variation and nutrition. If it was just me, there would be a lot more seafood, but I can only get the picky one to eat 2-3 meals a week with fish/shellfish.
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The husband & I have a deal, from early dating days: I cook, he cleans.
It started when I made him grilled cheese after a gig, and cavalierly stated that I would cook for him whenever he wanted if he cleaned up. (I may have been under the influence at the time.) He said, “DEAL!” and did the dishes, then cleaned the kitchen.
Fast-forward a quarter-century, and today I can make and freeze his favorite meals and meal components and he can microwave them, which makes my job easier. I don’t always have spoons to cook when he’s hungry, but I have a tendency to cook huge amounts anyway when I get started on a good day, and FoodSaver is my friend.
Deciding what to cook is easy. What do I have a taste for? That’s what I cook. But my pantry and fridge are generally stocked with all the ingredients to make stuff we like, which is 75% of the problem with cooking on a whim.
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And that there is a huge difference, too. Mostly in this topic we’ve been talking about 2 cohabiting adults, as far as I can tell.
If I’m in a position of being responsible for children’s nutrition, it’s a whole different thing. Planning, cooking, no complaints.
I might not love doing it, but I’ll do it.
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I’m talking about that situation too.
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I’m the same. Sometimes when it’s just me, I’ll go out and get things that my wife can’t eat, like seafood or pork. But even that’s something I haven’t done in ages (mostly because I’m never completely alone anymore).
It’s been both for me. I started doing it all when it was just the two of us. The collaborative process came after our daughter was born. I try not to complain, but some days it’s hard not to.
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For me it’s two or three, depending on if it’s the one week of the month when the mutual partner of my nesting partner and I is staying with us. Although putting three people into the mix and the increasingly varying degrees of pickiness / allergies / diabetes, really makes it interesting sometimes. At least we all agree on bacon!
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Similar for me and mine, except that we switch off duties - the person who did not cook cleans.
I think as long as the division of labor works for the couple, and someone isn’t feeling like the other isn’t pulling their fair share of household chores, it’s fair! My problem is always with the misogynistic attitude that women do all the household chores, even with a full time career. That’s just bullshit.
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It’s manbaby bullshit. Clean up after yourself baby! Can’t cook? Call yourself a man? Here’s the laundry. Figure it the fuck out.
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It really is bullshit. My first job was on the housekeeping staff at a local resort. The amount of guff I took from men was pretty eyeopening. One guy (a guest at the resort, no less) told me, I would “make a good wife someday” when I was introduced as part of the housekeeping staff. I was 14 at the time and that shitty remark stuck with me all these years.
It remains one of the best job experiences to this day because I can still clean a small house from top to bottom in about an hour (it’s probably a little longer these days).
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Crikey, what an asshole that resort guest was! I know it’s unreasonable, but I wish your 14-year-old self had replied, “Actually, I’ll make one hell of a husband! Ask your wife.” and then winked.
But I also agree that working housekeeping was a great life experience. My first job (at age 14) was working housekeeping in a nursing home. And I worked at a B&B in the same capacity about a decade later. You learn all the tricks and efficient methods. How to thoroughly clean a bathroom in about 15 minutes. Even how to fold fitted sheets 
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I usually feign ignorance and ask Ms. Shiv to “show me one more time how to do this”. I think she’s on to me, though.
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I recently realized that knowing how to fold them too well can be a burden. I couldn’t differentiate between the fitted and the flat sheets in the drawer, so ended up unfolding a bunch of flats in search of a fitted. Woe was me. Though it did spur the “bedding and curtains purge and reorganization of 2021.” Marie Kondo would’ve been proud.
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I’ve watched this a half dozen times and still can’t do it. The first alignment of the corners goes okay, the second is less good, then something disastrous occurs and I wind up with a wadded mess that I stuff into the linen drawer. For Martha, the sheet folds itself like magic. The answer may be to only have one set of sheets that goes from the bed to the wash and back to the bed so you never have to fold the darn thing.
Jinx @tcg550
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We solved the fitted sheet problem by washing the sheets and putting them right back on the bed.
King size sheets are expensive so we only buy a set whe we need them.
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My experience aligns with yours. I do think the large flat surface makes it a bit easier, but I’m pretty much like the woman on the right here.
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That was my first marriage. That’s why I’m so happy this one is so different!
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Wow. I was listening without sound, but they’re making it look way harder than it is 
The trick is just to reevaluate your concept of “corners.” Since some of the corners in this will be folded over puffy parts, until you smooth them. I do it all in the air, no large flat surface needed.
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Have you considered a second career as a fitted sheet whisperer? It could be lucrative.
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I hadn’t cottoned onto that idea, but I have sateen some others achieve success in the home organization field.
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