A few years back we had a lovely Austrian backpacker spend a few nights with us. It happened to be over New Years and we happened to be making up some delicious food to take to a beach bonfire. I was preparing potato salad, I popped some water on to boil and grabbed my peeler. The lovely Austrian looked at me confused. “If you are going to boil the potatoes you can easily hand peel the skins off after they are done, you will waste less” she said in her direct european manner. I paused not too sure what to do, my head says NO that is not how you do it and I reply “oh it is okay I will just peel them”. She looks confused again.

She had clearly just given me good advice, I clearly had ignored it.

Five years on I look into a pot of boiling potatoes, see their skins beginning to shift and I shake my head. Why is it so hard to take good advice? We get stuck in what we know and decide that it is easier to keep going then to change. This is just a short post to remind us all, next time you get good advice take it and run like the winds of change…and stop peeling potatoes!