M & S (or equivalent) or from scratch....

[SamanthaHD]

'What is wrong with spending a little extra time, cooking from scratch?' these were my DH's exact words. Aside from the fact that is very rarely 'a little extra time' I hate cooking, and were DH not around I would feed myself and the kids on bulked out (with veg, pasta, potatoes etc) ready meals, preferably nutritionally sound ones.

DH thinks this is very wrong.

Who, in your estimable opinion, is right?

I'm far from lazy just completely disinterested in food and cooking. I could quite happily live on soup, salad and chocolate. In fact, I did live on tuna baked potatoes for years before I met DH.
DH loves to cook. Therefore he does.

YANBU to hate cooking. I do myself - the special occasion type, when I can set aside serious amounts of time and go to town a bit is OK, but I loathe the everyday kind. I find it boring, relentless and have better things to do. YABU to want to rely on ready meals. There are other and better options if you don't want to cook every day. First, your DH should take turns with you. If he thinks there is nothing wrong with cooking from scratch, fine, let him do his share. My kids have left home now, but when they were younger I got on top of a few 'signature' dishes that I could almost make in my sleep, meaning I never really had to think about the shopping or the preparation, it was done on auto-pilot. I also did what others on this thread have said, made large quantities and froze it. And as soon as they were old enough, both DDs took their share of the cooking and washing-up. If you and your DH were to do that, you'd find that you probably only need to cook once or twice a week each, the other times you are defrosting what's already there - and once your DCs are old enough, less than that.

That said, when my DCs were at home I did occasionally dish up a ready meal and we all survived to tell the tale - it's not something I would have done on a daily basis, but there were always a few meals in the freezer for when none of us could be bothered. I don't think the odd ready meal is a crime against parenthood.

How nice of him to volunteer you for the shitwork.

Prick.

Yeah, feeding your children and yourself healthy food by chopping up a few vegetables is "shit work". Or is it just common sense and easier on the purse?

Anyway, WorraLiberty agrees with me, so I must be right.

Ready meals taste disgusting, thats my problem with them.

I dont mind the odd bit of lazy, prep-prepared veg or whatnot, though. I hate cooking, too. Its boring and I'm not a foodie. I just want a plate of food of a night, not a gourmet experience.

Does your DH not cook?

Oh sorry, he does.

Well listen...you cook what you cook and he can make froms cratch loveliness when he cooks, no?

Samantha I used to hate cooking. It's still not my favorite thing. I figured out one of the things I hated was not just the fussy fucking chopping stirring grating sauteeing ... but having to do it over. and over. and over. every damn day ... [clenches teeth]

But as pixwix said if you just set aside say a day every week or so (well, she does it once a month, but I'm not that good!) and do a whole bunch it is so much easier. Especially b/c you don't have to make like 8 different meals on that day. I make 3 lasagnas one day and throw 2 in the freezer. Then 4 stratas another day and throw 3 in the freezer. Triple batch of one kind of soup, freeze most of it ... after a few times you will have a lot of variety in there. Basically it is not really harder/fussier to cut up e.g., 5 onions instead of one, and then don't have to cut up any onions for a week.

My Slow cooker has saved me from insanity.

I agree with Want2bsupermum, how do you all define cooking from scratch? Tinned tomatoes are processed foods, pasta could be made from scratch but most people used ready-made, yet that is still a 'from scratch' ingredient? The old staple of 'from scratchers' -stock cubes- are laced with salt so not that healthy- so why not spend hours boiling up your own stock and batch freezing that? I think some people are very smug about their cooking, yet in reality are using just as many processed ingredients.

But anyway YANBU at all if your heart sinks at the thought of it! Not everyone likes to do it. I still don't exactly think oh goody will charge in there and make 18 casseroles and then wash everything, cannot wait.

I'm a little confused about whether you or he or both of you have time to do it but think generally the chores should be split. If he likes to cook so much then maybe he could do it and you could do something else.

Threalamandaclarke is there a slow cooker site you like? I don't do very much with mine b/c I sort of can't find that much to do with it. Beef stew sure, but that's about it.

I'm with you OP. I was raised on fisherman's pies and lasagnes and bacon pasta bakes, padded out with those little pasta shell packs you just add water and butter to, and veg and mash... I much prefer the taste of those readymeals to most made-from-scratch food and I am not fond of cooking.

Since moving to AMerica I have had to make most stuff from scratch as they surprisingly do not have a good choice of ready meals. The froxen lasagne is vile so I make my own, which I like almost as much as British ready meal ones. I have to make my own stuffing and biscuits if I want them.

I'd far rather feed my kids the way I was brought up - and I never seemed lacking in nutrition.

No keatsie I'm still looking. "crockpot" and "betty crocker" are ok.
I really need a decent book.
Sausage casserole, beef stew, lentil soup, chicken cacciatore, chilli. That's it so far. I think any casseroley recipe with an added cup of liquid, 8 hours on low would work from my limited research.
I desperately want to discover recipes where no initial browning of onions/ meat is needed. So far only rice pudding

Thanks for letting me know Threal, I was looking at a Real Simple site here www.realsimple.com/food-recipes/cooking-tips-techniques/cooking/slow-cooker-recipes-00100000075675/index.html but haven't gotten far as I lack enthusiasm.

I desperately want to discover recipes where no initial browning of onions/ meat is needed Me too, me too, me too. It is endless.

Oh, thanks for that.

Sure!

Ready meals all taste the same to me, even the m&s ones. I can taste that they just aren't fresh food. I don't love cooking especially but I love the taste of good food so much more that it makes me cook, if you know what I mean?

I love cooking but I don't think it's compulsory to cook as long as you are well off enough to afford good quality bought stuff. There is a shop called Cook near me that does frozen meals that look really healthy. You can also buy nice stuff from Waitrose like marinated salmon, beef roulade, etc and just bung it in the oven and serve with prepacked salad and crusty bread. Nothing wrong with that but it's not something we could ever afford to do - if you can, though, go for it.

I think if he feels so strongly about it, he could make a bit more effort to help out with a chore you hate. Especially a chore that requires constant, never ending effort. I love cooking but even som the relentlessness of three meals a day really starts to get me down after a while.

I would say also that there's a compromise so,union as per this thread, starting with dh doing more and/or batch cooking, using the frozen/prepared vegetables others have suggested and perhaps mastering a few super simple meals. I also think for your ready meal days, there ar ways for these to be better. Eg I sometimes buy those "cook yourself" meals eg herb crusted lamb or stuffed chicken breast and serve with potatoes and frozen veg. I feel zero guilt in those moments as really it's just someone else doing the work for me.

Or, do what my mother has always done: decide you like your food bland and cook accordingly. We grew up on things like grilled sausages and boiled vegetables or the simplest cooked mince. As we got older, we learnt to expriment for ourselves.

Somewhere in between is the way to go, unless you have the time and energy to cook everything from scratch. I have HMS and often have trouble standing, holding a knife etc or I'm experiencing so much fatigue that I shouldn't be allowed near anything hot or sharp. The boys both have ASD and, as well as the food aversions phobias that come in with that package, DS1 has certain foods that he can't eat, at the moment, because we strongly suspect they're triggering abdominal migraines. Then there's the days when I can't take my eyes off them for 3 seconds without something happening.

So, I do cook about half of our meals from scratch, but the rest have at least one element that was either fished out of the freezer and thrown directly into the oven or came in a black plastic tray courtesy of M&S.

I can't really understand why some people hate cooking. As other posters have said, it's just part of life. Like commuting, or exercising, or doing the laundry. Not all of us will love all of these tasks, but they still need done. And cooking is one of the fun ones, surely? Since you have to eat every day, you may as well eat things you like.

The idea of subsisting purely on ready meals depresses me. There are some ready meals that are quite good, which I do like. But the thought of eating them day in day out makes me feel ill. I'd be very surprised if it was a good for your long term health.

I do agree that if your DH has strong feelings about it, then he should step up and put in the effort himself. At the same time, it must be expensive, and unhealthy to over-rely on heavily processed food. There's no need to take 'home cooking' to silly extremes, like making your own noodles or bread rolls all the time. But I can't for the life of me understood why pre-prepared mashed potato exists as a thing in a shop.

Because you can bung it in the microwave for 2 minutes and it tastes just as nice without having to peel a single potato? Let alone chop, boil and mash the bloody things.

Life is too short as it is. If you can take a few shortcuts on things which are necessary but ultimately not enjoyable, then why not?
Like commuting to work, if you could pay to take a faster bus, wouldn't you be tempted? Sure you might say you can read or daydream on the slow bus, but what if you have to stand so your feet hurt and it's smelly too?

Come on the whole thing

I desperately want to discover recipes where no initial browning of onions/ meat is needed Me too, me too, me too. It is endless.
I don't brown anything before chucking it in the slow cooker these days... Simply because I usually pre-load it the night before, chuck the whole bowl into the fridge then in the mornings (when I'm hustling to get out the door) I just lift it out and put in the slow-cooker and set it to come on during the day. Never had an issue with it.

I use chicken thighs, chopped onion, chorizo, potatoes (if lazy, get smallish ones and cut in half and throw 'em in) a tin of tomatoes and good slosh of wine & herbs. If I've got anything else (celery, carrots, parsnips, swedes etc) then in they go. Or nuke some frozen peas and chuck those in at the end.

My slow cooker does everything. Jar of Mussaman curry paste, chunks of beef, onion, potato and a jar of coconut milk & enough water to cover it - job's a good'un. Throw some rice on when we get in and chuck peanuts on top.

Spaghetti bolognese - just like normal, but stir a couple of times towards the end as it cooks.

Soup veggies, stock, couple of handfuls of soup mix or pearl barley - easy peasy soup option, served with crusty bread.

Or another favourite - www.chow.com/recipes/30356-easy-slow-cooker-pulled-pork

I don't mind cooking when I'm in the mood but it's the continual requirement, plus the necessity to clean up afterwards and just manage the whole process.

Are we the only family that has 'quick' rather than ready meals? Kids regularly have boiled eggs and soldiers for tea. Seeds of change pasta sauce with chopped sausage and sweetcorn - is that a 'ready meal'. If it is, why is using a curry paste still classed as 'cooking from scratch'. Does (and I realise this is an MN classic) stuffed pasta count as a ready meal?

I don't think a jar of curry paste is cooking from scratch. I make my own when I make a curry.

I hate the taste / fat content / calories of ready meals. In fact, I couldn't tell you the last time I had one. Years who maybe? Oh no, tell a lie - fresh soups. I buy them for lunch. But never meat based. Pre-prepped meat makes me feel a little queasy.