Family/Life, Health, Recipes

Save Time and Money, Cook Ahead

With both my husband and I working full time, the need for quick and nutritious meals presents a big challenge.

I get home a good 1-1/2 to 2 hours before my husband does, so it’s logical that I’m the one who prepares and cooks dinner for the family. At first, we fell into the horrible rut of buying prepared foods at Costco in order to save time in meal preparations.

This was a bad idea for obvious reasons:

  • more expensive than home cooked meals
  • very unhealthy

Then one day, I noticed I was feeling really run down, like I had instantly aged 20 years.  I was always tired, grumpy and just flat out felt like crap!  My husband and daughter never really commented if they were having issues as well, but I’m sure they were if I was.

It didn’t take long to determine the processed foods were the culprit.

I decided I had to turn around our eating habits, and FAST!!!

I started cooking once a month on the weekends, making a few things like…

meatloaf

meatballs,

meatloaf

meatloaf,

split pea soup

split pea soup

rice

and rice.

I even incorporated dessert into the meal planning by whipping up a double batch of super yummy…

peanut butter chocolate chip cookie dough balls

peanut butter chocolate chip cookie dough balls.  Yum-O!

In addition to the home cooked foods above, I also use the crock pot for cooking ribs, whole chickens, pot roasts and other meats. Between the meals I cook ahead and the crock pot, I almost spend more time cleaning the kitchen than cooking the meals. Awesome!

What do you do to get dinner on the table quickly and cheaply?  I’m open to more suggestions for meal ideas!  Seriously!

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by Laura Rucker on December 7, 2009
4 Comments / Leave a Comment »
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4 Responses to “Save Time and Money, Cook Ahead”

  1. Colleen Easley — December 7, 2009 @ 11:01 AM (#
    1
    )

    If you are doing all the cooking, why on earth are you also cleaning up the kitchen after dinner. That should be the job of the rest of the family. Ha! At least that’s how it works at my house.

    [Reply]

    • MsWonka replied: — December 7th, 2009 @ 6:58 PM

      Good point! Actually everyone loads their dishes and puts the food away. There really is very little to clean since the meals are either nuked or coming out of a crock pot. And since he works longer hours and makes almost twice what I make, I’m OK with cleaning up what little mess the precooked meals make. :)

  2. Heather — December 8, 2009 @ 9:45 PM (#
    2
    )

    Wow! That looks fantastic, I wish I could be that organized!!

    [Reply]

    • MsWonka replied: — December 9th, 2009 @ 5:51 AM

      Thanks. I need to figure out some other foods to make next time. Enchiladas perhaps?

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