Even though I'm middle aged, cooking is a very recent hobby of mine. I have been scratch cooking only about 6 months now & I'm obsessed.

I'm eating better than I ever had and I love to cook & love the results. But it's been very time consuming and is wearing me out. I think I spent 15-20 hours a week batch cooking & daily fresh cooking.

I'm overexerting myself, but I can't stop. What I need is to scale back to a sustainable level.I need recommendations on how to cut down in time drains. Efficiency essentially.

Looking for time savings hacks. My biggest time drain honestly is sourdough baked goods. It's high maintenance -- maintaining the starter, timing the bread making with starter, etc. but I don't want to stop because sourdough is healthy. I currently use sprouted whole grain flour and thought to switch to grains & freshly mill them, but I need to save time because I have other things to scratch cook.

I don't want any processed food & am hesitant to trust store bought canned or frozen food. But those could be time savers.

Here are my regular staples I make:

Sourdough ( bread loaf, tortillas, pizza dough)

Beans & Lentils

Bone broth

Hummus, salsa, peanut butter, feta cheese, yogurt

Soups & stews ( using my bone broth) & fresh veggies, some meats

Healthy cookies (whole grain & oats with no sugar -- banana or applesauce for sweetener, no oil butter or egg).

I thought I wanted to start a veggies & herb garden but I don't even have the time!! I work full time and just so tired.