A week in your kitchen

[hlkm2e]

What do you do over a week in your kitchen? I mean what foods do you cook and bake, how much time do you spend, what kind of meal prep do you do?

I have practically no IRL friends who are interested in food, cooking, baking, etc. As I become more and more into making things from scratch, I find I have less and less people to talk to about it.

I'm wondering how much time you spend in different preps, what kind of planning you do, etc. I thought maybe we could share what we do each day and I could learn how others do things.

Does anyone want to join me?

[FarmerCathy]

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[Leta]

We spend A TON of time in our kitchen. We eat zero convience food. (Okay, we get cereral from WIC, but that's it.)

DH bakes bread about once a month, sometimes twice depending. That takes both of us, but I am merely the dish slave. He bakes about 10 loaves at a time, and we freeze it.

We both can and preserve food, we both do dishes, but I do most of the cleaning.

Our other responsabilities go something like this:

Me: utilitarian things; granola; syrups; beverages; yogurt; feeding the freezer

DH: fancy dinners; making sausage; pies/quiches; grilling and grill prep; beer and wine making.

[FarmerCathy]

Wish my dh did that much cooking. He bbq's and makes hamburgers, but that's it.

[rainyday]

Let's see. Here's a typical day:
7-9 am, in kitchen making coffee, hot cereal, scrambled egg, toast or maybe pancakes. This is in and out time. I'm not in there two hours straight, but it's most of the two hours, most mornings, including eating time and chatting with DH/DS. Also, empty dishwasher while DS eats, sweep floor after breakfast, etc.

sometime between 11 and 12:30, back in kitchen for lunch. This is usually leftovers for me, and a sandwich, soup, or leftovers for DS. Usually there for about 45 minutes for lunch.

2 or 3 pm: back in kitchen for dinner prep. DS sometimes joins me to help. I usually spend about two hours preparing dinner, unless we're having leftovers, in which case it may take only half an hour or so to add a salad and a side dish or two. This is often in and out time from 3 to 6 pm, but it's probably about two hours of cooking time.

6:00 - 6:30: dinner

6:30 -7:00 clean up dishes, sweep, quick mop

Then once a week or so, I'll make bread. DS helps, and we mix it up after breakfast.

Once a week or so, we'll make muffins or a quick bread (like pumpkin bread, zucchini bread, etc.).

Once a week or so, I'll make a dessert as well.


I'm trying to get better about planning. So, for example, I've been trying to do some dinner prep in the morning while DS eats. (He eats A LOT in the morning, so he'll often eat, go away and play for half an hour, then come back and eat some more.) I'll chop an onion or two and maybe saute them while he's eating, then store until afternoon.

Also, I try to make extra hot cereal and then save the extra in a glass container for the next day. That way I can make it every other day rather than every day.

I also try to make half a loaf to a full loaf's worth of extra bread dough each time. I form the extra into buns for hot dogs or hamburgers for those grill nights and into breadsticks for snacks for DS.



Does that answer your question at all? I'd be happy to chat more about it if you want!

[hlkm2e]

Thanks everyone. That's what I was wondering, just the timing and how much actual time you spent. Some days I think I will never leave the kitchen, then some days I'm hardly in it. We usually eat just muffins or pancakes from the freezer or toast for breakfast, then I cook lunch and dinner. Lunch is low maintenance, but dinner is more time consuming.

I also have been making most of our bread stuff lately and that is where I'm much less efficient.

I'm also learning to keep our veggies fresh longer as we bought into a CSA this year. So that takes prep every Sat. morning to keep them fresh for the week.

[rainyday]

Yeah, it often seems like I never leave the kitchen too. For me it's all the time I spend cooking dinner. Making most stuff from scratch is time consuming!

[hlkm2e]

Would anyone want to go day by day for a week and talk about how we spent our kitchen time and maybe get ideas to tweak it and make it more efficient? We could start tomorrow.

[Leta]

Originally Posted by FarmerCathy

Wish my dh did that much cooking. He bbq's and makes hamburgers, but that's it.

I'm very lucky, I know. I am married to a man with a PASSION for food. He is a professional pastry/dessert chef and baker, and he still cooks at home a ton. It amazes me.

[annettemarie]

Originally Posted by hlkm2e

Would anyone want to go day by day for a week and talk about how we spent our kitchen time and maybe get ideas to tweak it and make it more efficient? We could start tomorrow.

I would love it if you all would do this. I want so badly to do more whole-foods/cooking from scratch, but am wondering how people manage it, especially with a new baby and homeschooling.

[Leta]

Efficiency... hmm, that's interesting. We do pretty well keeping everything clean (except for the floor and there usually isn't too big of a crisis surrounding dinner time. We don't meal plan, exactly, because DH was REALLY resistant to the idea, saying that it robbed him of spontenaity.

What we do instead is the pantry principle and feeding the freezer. Since we do not eat convience foods, we buy the same staples every time we shop (restocking the pantry a.k.a. pantry principle).

Then there are the times that DH doesn't feel like cooking dinner, and I, for whatever reason, cannot bring myself to make sandwiches : . Those are nights that we eat from the freezer. Every once in a great while (maybe every other month?), I actually do full-on meal cooking, and in great quantity. These things I put in the food saver and freeze. Typically, I make lots of lasagne, eggplant canneloni, salmon patties, pizza, and macaroni and cheese. All the casseroles get portioned into bread or cake pans ($0.25-$0.50 each at Vinnie's). That way, I can just stick stuff in the oven and bake it, and voila, there's dinner. Much less clean up this way, too.

We also have a stable of from-scratch-under-20-minutes-meals (quesadillas, lentils and falafel, pancakes, etc.) for when we're really in a time crunch, and, to fulfill my duties, I cook out of the crock pot a great deal as well. (Even for breakfast- overnight steel cut oats are so easy and .)

We also go out to eat one night per week, usually Wednesday. I resisted this for a long time, but I am married to man who lives and breathes food, and it is important to him to go out. Sit-down dinners, even with tip, are cheaper than marriage counseling, so I gave in, and I have to admit, I enjoy it. I usually try to thouroughly clean the kitchen the day that we out, so it stays REALLY clean for more than a few hours.

I don't know if this helps anybody, but if you have ideas for us to improve efficiency, I'd love to hear 'em!

[FarmerCathy]

Originally Posted by Leta

(Even for breakfast- overnight steel cut oats are so easy and .)

What's your recipe? My dh has been wanting me to cook steel cut oats for him for breakfast, but he gets up so darn early to go to work, this might be the way to do it. Maybe we should have a whole foods recipe thread too.

[Leta]

I use Alton Brown's recipe.

1 cup steel cut oats
4 cups water
something creamy (I usually put in dry soy milk)
dried fruit or applesauce if you're feeling sassy

Put everything in crockpot, combine, turn on low and leave for 8-9 hours.

[FarmerCathy]

Thank you so much! Can I just substitute regular milk instead of dry milk?

[Leta]

I don't see why not, so long as you reduced the amount of water accordingly. I never measure, honestly, I just eyeball it and it comes out fine.

[swimswamswum]

We spend maybe an hour a day in the kitchen. Usually breakfast is something fast like eggs and toast for me or yogurt and granola for DH. We make our lunches in about 5 minutes if we're working in our offices, if we're home, we usually spend the 5 minutes to make a sandwich or heat left overs. Snacks are usually things like fruit or nuts, so they don't take much time. Dishes are usually done by one of us as the other cooks supper. Sometimes I make crock pot meals in the mornings. Usually it takes 30-45 minutes to cook supper.

We don't do a lot of regular baking, especially in the summer. I tend to bake more when I want the house warm and toasty.

[UUMom]

oooo, fun!

I think we do a mix of prepared and scratch. My 15 yr old dd has a massive love of Barbara's boxed mashed potatoes! So I buy her a box every week, and she makes that as her snacks. She's rail thin, so there must be something in that she needs/craves. :

I'll start with today--

Breakfast--

Dh who wakes at 5-- leftover pasta salad and coffee. For lunch, that he put togheter himself, he brought a cheese sandwich on Matthew's Whole Whaet bread, a container of leftover salad, sliced watermelon, and leftover corn on the cob. Didn't eat it.

18 yr old who left for work at 7-- Matthew's whole wheat toast, an egg from one of chickens, strawberries from our garden and water.

15 yr old who woke at 5-- whole wheat toast leftover corn on the cob, an egg from one of our chickens, strawberries from our garden.

13 yr old who woke at 7:30 - left over veggie burger (dry and cooked), leftover corn, leftover watermelon, water, and one strawberry

8 yr old, who woke at 9-- whole wheat toast, an egg from one of our chickens. strawberries she picked when she woke, water and watermelon.

Me, who ate with 13 yr old- coffee, toast, strawberries

Lunch--

Dh- Says Niscoise salad at a resturant, water, bread.

18, 15, , 8 yr old and me at home-- Grilled cheese, salad, leftover corn on the cob (I bought a heap this weekend) watermelon, water. My son also ate an apple and a banana, and my girls sliced an apple they shared.

13 yr at school- Amy's frozen enchiladas, a piece of watermelon. some salad, and water. I sent an apple, but it came home in his lunchbox.

Dinner-- Bliss potatoes on the grill tossed with olive oil, salt & pepper, red leaf salad, plus tomatoes, a small amount of avocado, shredded carrots, cukes, garbanzo beans (from a can), w/pastured organic steak I grilled with olive oil, salt and pepper-- a small piece each. Water. 13 yr old didn't eat the steak, but was satisfied with the rest of the food.

We have a mix of food, both prepared and 'assisted'. I love to cook, and I love experiemtning with recipes and creating my own. I tend to like foods with clean, fresh tastes. Those sorts of foods don't take very long to prepare, ime. There are many days I do take short cuts (canned beans, fi), too. I spend a lot of time in the kitchen, by choice, but I think that's kind of a personal preferance. Thankfully, there are many healthy short cuts for people who enjoy other creative pursuits, rather than culinary ones.

[cristeen]

I spend the most time in the kitchen usually on Sunday. That's my "get ready for the week" time. I plan out DH's lunches, prep anything I can (chop melon, make juice, make salad, etc.), if I'm planning anything big (casserole, baking, etc.), I take care of it then. Some weeks I spend hours in there, some weeks I spend under an hour.

Mornings, I spend under 30 minutes in the kitchen. I make DH's coffee, pack his lunch, make him breakfast while he's in the shower. I wait until he's gone to think about my own breakfast, but it's usually something quick, under 5 minutes.

Lunch is the same, as quick as possible (if I eat one at all).

For dinner, most nights I'll take an hour to 90 minutes (active time) to make dinner. If I'm planning something elaborate or something that has to bake for an hour, I'll start earlier so we don't eat too late.

[Leylla]

I too am a Sunday preparer...But I gotsta have my menu!

I chop and dice anything needed throught the week.
I deep clean the kitchen, scrubbing the dishwasher, wipe all the shelves down, clean out the fridge, clean the burners, mop the floor, etc. Boil eggs for snacks, make up juices for the week,

Each day DH does breakfast and the breakfast dishes. I do lunch which is usually just a veggie/fruit/cheese tray. And since everything is already cut up, this takes less than 5 minutes.

At lunch I will usually start dinner and we do a lot of crock pot soups or chilis. At least have everything prepared and ready to go. I unload and begin filling the dishwasher again. Sweep. Takes 20 min.

Around 5:00pm I go in and do our sides or finish dinner. We RARELY eat anything that takes longer than 45 minutes to make outside of crock pot meals. I also clean as I go. Dinner takes between 30min-1hour.

After dinner it takes me about 15 minutes to finish loading the dishwasher, scrub the pots, and shine my sink.

I spend less than two hours a day in the kitchen and still serve healthy nutritious meals, AND have a spic n span kitchen.

Steph

[hlkm2e]

So here's how today has gone so far.

We ate some muffins from the freezer for breakfast. The last of my breakfast stash. I definitely need to make some muffins, or pancakes, or banana bread today.

Lunch was leftover goat cheese pasta from last night for me and a homemade pizza for the kids. I guess if I don't get to making any breakfast stuff for tomorrow, they could eat leftover pizza for breakfast

Dinner is stirfry with some veggies from our CSA. I think I will cut them during the kids nap, so I can just throw them in the pot later. I defrosted some salmon last night, so that will go with it. I only have wild rice in the house right now. I should probably go put it on the stove now, since it takes awhile but reheats well.

I should also put out some no-knead bread to bake tomorrow.

There are a lot of should's in this post: