{"id":1399,"date":"2013-09-15T14:15:00","date_gmt":"2013-09-15T18:15:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/noelfigart.com\/blog\/?p=1399"},"modified":"2016-11-04T13:49:29","modified_gmt":"2016-11-04T17:49:29","slug":"ten-bags-o-dinner-one-hour-and-a-serious-time-savings","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/noelfigart.com\/wordpress\/2013\/09\/15\/ten-bags-o-dinner-one-hour-and-a-serious-time-savings\/","title":{"rendered":"Ten Bags o’ Dinner, One Hour, and Serious Savings"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"Two<\/a>
My husband and son. Teamwork is so awesome.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

My husband, son and I took about an hour to make dinner for ten weeknights.\u00a0 Yep, that’s right.\u00a0 We were able to do that in an hour.\u00a0 How?<\/p>\n

Well, certainly teamwork counts, but it is also because when we’re really busy and we rely on the crock pot most weeknights. None of us really wants to come home after a long day and cook, and all of us have busy days.<\/p>\n

So we take an hour an prep a few Bags o’ Dinner on various weekends. \u00a0To make this go smoothly, what we will usually do is choose five recipes that we like and work well in the crock pot, then double them so we’re doing two bags of each. \u00a0Spend two or three weekend mornings doing that, and you’re all stocked up with an adequate meal variety for a long time.<\/p>\n

\"Bowls<\/a>
The candles are because they help burn off the eye-watering fumes of onions. You can use a food processor to get around this as well.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

When we decide on meals, I will often make a list of what goes in each recipe so that we can streamline prep work. \u00a0Ferinstance, every meal we chose to make had onion in it. \u00a0It just made sense to figure out how many onions those ten bags needed and do ’em all at once. \u00a0While this sort of prep work does use up all your various bowls to hold chopped and prepared ingredients, it makes it a lot easier when it comes to assembling those gallon freezer bags.<\/p>\n

\"Ten<\/a>
Ten bags of food ready to have the air pressed out, flattened, and frozen.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Once everything is chopped, any hamburger is browned and drained (I tried it without the browning step once and found the meals far too greasy), you can start adding ingredients to the bags. \u00a0I go with heavy things first like beans or meat. \u00a0It helps the bags stand up and makes adding other ingredients much easier.<\/p>\n

Ideally, I try to make meals with several ingredients all of them will have, so I would do a hamburger session, then a chicken session. \u00a0I didn’t do that this time, and just made two meals based on hamburger and three based on chicken.<\/p>\n

\"Two<\/a>
Taco stew and white chili. Two family favorites.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Some people use crock pot liner bags and freeze their meals in the shape of their crock. \u00a0If that’s what works for you, I see no reason not to run with it. \u00a0I don’t do that, though. \u00a0I freeze my meals flat. \u00a0Since I don’t use a chest freezer, I need to be able to fit all the meals I make in the freezer on top of the fridge. \u00a0 Flat works better for that. \u00a0I am very careful to label what we do. \u00a0After it’s frozen, you’ll have a devil of a time telling the difference between three or four tomato-sauce based meals. \u00a0 \u00a0Don’t try. Label them.<\/p>\n

I usually take a meal out to thaw the night before, then dump it in the crock pot before work in the morning, turn it on low and forget about it until I get home. \u00a0Lately, if the meal needs to be served with rice or pasta, my son will take care of making that in time for his father and I get to get home from work. \u00a0If you don’t have someone to make these things for you, yes, a little prep work will need to happen before dinner. \u00a0Just not much.<\/p>\n

So, how do these meals taste?<\/p>\n

\"Two<\/a>
Spaghetti and Malaysian curry.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

They’re good. \u00a0Are they like the most amazing gourmet treats you could possibly sink your teeth into? Of course not.* \u00a0Don’t be foolish. \u00a0This is basic, everyday dinner -peasant cooking that’s stewed all day, and that’s what it tastes like. \u00a0Then again, ratatouille is a peasant dish, and so are many meals that taste pretty damn good when they’ve cooked a long time. \u00a0If you insist on gourmet cooking every night, this is not for you. \u00a0 This is your guardian against fast food because you’re too damn tired to cook. \u00a0This is when you don’t want to (or can’t) spend a lot of money on restaurants, but just don’t have the time to make something every night. \u00a0For my family, we really either do this or have a rota for who wears the chef’s hat that night. We’d all rather just take an hour and get it done than have to cook every third night.<\/p>\n

\"Coq<\/a>
Coq au vin. Don’t bother. This is the only time I ever made it and it totally wasn’t worth it.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

People keep asking for recipes<\/a>\u00a0and the link has a couple. \u00a0 But really, anything that works in a crockpot will work with this. \u00a0Some people say that potato-based recipes don’t work well when you freeze them, but my curry has potatoes in it and does great. \u00a0So does the beef stew we made last week.<\/p>\n

However, if you need recipes or shopping lists, you can check these links out. \u00a0The taco stew came from one of them, though I forget which. \u00a0Happy hunting! \ud83d\ude42<\/p>\n