To think that while cooking from scratch is better for you, it can be a massive PITA

[TwentyOneGuns]

I've just spent the afternoon making lunches and batch cooking for the week ahead. I'm sure the results will be lovely but it's all so bloody fiddly, messy and time-consuming.

While I was wrestling with a butternut squash (to make soup which incidentally will be nice but neither buttery or nutty so it's badly named as well as a bastard to cut up and de-seed) I couldn't help thinking how much quicker it would be to open a bloody tin. I know homemade is better but honestly I lost the will to live with that thing.

Anyone got any tips or gadget suggestions for making it all a bit quicker?

I also use a pressure cooker for BNS soup. 7 mins. Bam, done!

It's not the cooking, it's the washing up I find a PITA. I love cooking but I hate the kitchen looking like a tip and I hate that I make the effort to cook and then have to clean up too. When I was little, the rule was the cook didn't wash up. Sadly I don't have the requisite number of older children to make that work.

What the hell is a soup maker?

One of these. It makes really good soup in 21 minutes without having to do much apart from chuck in ingredients. Honestly.

m.morphyrichards.co.uk/products/cooking-and-baking/soup-makers/501014-Saute-and-Soup-Maker.html

Butternut squash can be an absolute winner in certain, select dishes, but it is a bastard to peel and chop. An utter bastard.

I defrost mine on the bottom shelf of the fridge Nodney. To be honest I am not a massive batch cooker, I just freeze certain things I know work well.

Remember, Shelaghturner:

"You don't have to like it; you have to eat it!"

squoosh I agree it helps that we both take a turn. Depends on who is doing the bedtime stories that night. The other person does the cooking. Beginning of the year dh had to do both as I broke my back, and it was a chore for him.

I do my menu planning one evening in the week and then do an online shop which makes the whole process much less painful. I think about the planning once in the week and then forget it. Helps that I love reading recipes and working out if they will work for our family and finding new things for us to try.

I leave a frozen thing out overnight then pop it in the fridge in the morning. Never had a problem.

I double batch most times I cook and put half in the freezer or fridge if eating the next day. Defrosting usually in the fridge, but in the microwave if I forgot to get it out the night before

What I have found is that most recipe books are full of shit like "brown the meat in batches then remove from the pan...then brown the onions....in a separate pan cook the vegetables.......then transfer it all to a casserole pot" etc. and that would take hours of prep time and half the contents of the pan cupboard. No one seems to notice any difference when it's all just cooked in the one pot together, and it saves on the washing up.

I love one pot cooking, maybe two pots if I'm feeling clever. Bung it in, set timer, watch telly for a bit, timer goes beep beep, dish up, eat

Butternut squash makes lovely soup.

I never peel raw butternut squash. For soup, halve it, place in preheated oven and roast, seeds and all. When cooked, scoop out seeds and throw away and scoop out flesh for soup. For roasted, I just slice, cook and eat the skin.

Love butternut squash and toss it in pimenton, drizzle with olive oil or sprinkle with sumac and zataar. Roast with red onion. Serve with cooked chick peas and a yoghurt tahini dressing.

I no longer brown meat or soften veg ahead of casseroling - no noticeable difference.

YANBU. I've just spent the evening making soup and spicy chicken for the week ahead. Also got brioche going in the breadmaker for breakfast. I do it because 1. it's better for me 2. it's massively cheaper - I am broke and calculated I was spending £150 a month on breakfast and lunch at work and 3. I'm so sick of sandwiches etc. But yeah, it's a bind. I've got a few recipes that I can cook nearly blindfold, these days.

Freezing and defrosting tips from St Delia

Getting organised is the key to cooking from scratch. I chop and freeze things like onions, peppers, mushrooms etc in big batches so they can just be grabbed from the freezer to chuck in a pan. Left over cooked fresh veg also get frozen and are great to put in curries/casseroles.

When the dc's were younger - and much fussier, I would spend a couple of hours cooking and pureering vegetables together to freeze (including chopped tomatoes) which then got thrown in to my 'no bits spag bol' etc. they had no idea....

I'm also not adverse to using pastes to speed things along if time is short.

I swear by the Oxo Good Grips Y Peeler It's a fabulous bit of kit and will even make short work of a butternut squashes skin.

I second this, it's so great I got carried away and took off most of my fingernail. Ouch!

Another vote for the oxo good grips Y peeler on butternut squash skin.

Can't add anything else to the thread. I'm struggling to find the energy too

Great ideas here, thanks a lot. I'm glad to know I'm not the only one who has a love hate relationship with butternut squash . I'll definitely try the tips for preparing it. Some good suggestions for gadgets too, like the sound of that peeler.

DH is very good at doing his fair share of the cooking, he gets home before me most nights so often ends up doing the tea. But the meal planning, shopping and most of all thinking of what to have - what's good value, healthy, reasonably quick and everyone will eat - does fall to me. That's why I try to get ahead at the weekend but I'd much rather spend the time doing something more exciting.

The bit I hate the most is preparing salads or whatever for lunch the next day. Can never quite summon up the energy before I go to bed to make them, and don't have time in the morning. Have just been a good wife and done us both a salad and a fruit salad for tomorrow. But it's so dull!

Celery soup is the best in our family. Just cut up the whole celery - doddle because of its shape, with one chopped onion, big lump of butter. Ten minutes add 700ml of marigold bouillon, cover and simmer for about 40 mins, then whizz and it's done. I used to faff with cream, blue cheese etc but now my teens really love it like this.

I'm not a fan of cooking. My idea of cooking is to brown some meat and chuck on a jar of sauce. Now the children are a little older I'm making the effort and trying a new recipe once a week. I've bought an exercise book, copy out a BBC Good Food recipe and make sure the ingredients are added to the online shopping list.

I love cooking but have to be in the right mood. A rainy sunday is perfect for cooking soups for lunches, bread, pizza dough and cookies. BUT if it is sunny I want to be out in the garden digging and planting or going for a walk or bike ride.

I cook from scratch most of the time but don't give myself a hard time if my lunch is a tin of soup or the kids have a frozen pizza or four!

I love cooking, but have to have entertainment when I'm doing it. Laptop/tablet in kitchen with something good to watch on iPlayer / Netflix.

BNS you need to chop it into rough chunks, drizzle in olive oil & throw a few whole garlic cloves at the oven tray. Abandon in oven at roughly 160c while you wash kids hair etc.

Leave for 1 to 2 hours, or as long as it takes a female preteen to wash their hair..... stir when not answering the calls of "Mummmmmm wheres my conditioner/towel?" delete as appropriate....

When veg is fully roasted add lots of veg or chicken stock & blitz with a hand blender. The soup tastes so good it restores my sanity after a long & busy weekend :) For extra taste add precooked red lentils

Sainsos do a bag of chopped fresh BNS with some red onion and red chilli mixed in. Pan fry couple mins, add stock, simmer and blend. Ready in 20 mins.

MN does tend to bring out the extremists! 'I always cook vegan, organic, gluten free from scratch' or 'sod that we live on carry out and ready meals done us no harm'

I suspect I'm like most people - having a mix of virtuous and lazy days. Mostly virtuous (I hope) but with some cheats thrown in (passata and frozen peas are more nutritious than fresh anyway!), eg pre-prepped veg (frozen or fresh).

I agree with the pps saying more practise equals better speed anyway and starting with a bowl of hot soapy water to reduce time washing up.

One pot wonders good too, pasta and sauce, stir fried, stews, filling 'homemade' soups/broths using ready prepped veg and stock...

As its only me and dd I often end up making double if trying a new recipe as I'm not confident to reduce proportions till I know the recipe well.

Re BNS I also chop in half roast and deseed after roasting. But only when it's in season and can get good sized ones, rest of the time I get pre chopped frozen.

I'm also very sensitive on the onion chopping tears nonsense (blinded for hours after) so have been using frozen chopped onion for years.