I was watching episodes of Rachael Ray's "Week in a Day" yesterday morning and I was completely inspired to cook some meals ahead. Off I went to do some grocery shopping and got myself organised. Then I got to work. Above is a photo at about the mid-point of my cook-fest.
Can I just say, cooking ahead in one day = very hard work.
Despite my sore feet and back and needing a nice long nap afterwards I now have in my freezer:
- 3 meals of chicken burgers + 3 extra patties for a light-on-people night
- 1 roasted vegetable lasagne (I made two, only one made it to the freezer!)
- 1 vegetable pasta sauce (from making the lasagne)
- 3 meals of sloppy joe mince
After getting all that together I was too tired and sore to make the risotto I had planned on, so we ate one of the two lasagnes for dinner. It was so much better than I imagined it would be! You know when you take ideas from a few places and then make it up from there to suit yourself? Yes. That was my lasagne. I'll post a recipe another day because it was just beautiful. The best part is that I managed to hide eggplant and red capsicums by finely dicing all the veggies instead of leaving them as thin strips or rounds. All together you just got a beautiful rich veggie sauce. Any other way there would have been complaints and picking things out. I am the winner!
As much as I love the protective layer that meals in the freezer gives me I think doing so much in one day is probably not my favourite way. I suspect I would rather just double and triple recipes on the day I intend to make them. Which is good to know about myself. Or I could just sit on the other side of the bench for all the chopping, rather than be on my feet for hours.
What I am looking forward to? A term's worth of "Fend for Yourself Friday" meals, courtesy of the burgers and sloppy joe meat. I stopped planning Friday nights because two of the kids would be gone before I could even think about getting home so they had toasted sandwiches or eggs on toast or leftovers. Or nothing. I have no idea! This year I'll be able to get home by 5pm, but they'll still be dashing off not long after I get home. This way they'll have something they can pull out and when they need it and there will be food for others who come along later.
2 comments:
Even though it was exhausting, it must be super satisfying to have all that in the freezer! I sometimes do that too, but then it all gets used up, seemingly without me noticing, and then I am back to empty. I think I need to plan a double up recipe once or twice a week every week and then there will always being something in the freezer.
I tend to cook two-night meals as opposed to freeze-ahead meals, though I've always been intrigued by the notion of filling up the freezer all at once. Sounds like it's tiring! While we don't do Fend for Yourself Fridays (yet--I love this idea and want to implement it soon!), oftentimes Friday dinner is something very simple like pasta and creamed spinach or tomato soup and grilled cheese. It's nice to have an easy night in the kitchen, followed by an even easier night--Saturday night is pizza night, my favorite night of the week!
xofrances
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