To eat ready meals each night?

[Buckinbronco]

DH has taken over food shopping as I'm too busy. We have 2 DCs who eat at nursery and we get home at gone 7.30. DH answer is to buy 5 scratch meals a week. They taste ok and take 5 mins to Bung in a pan and hardly any washing up.
Their nutritional content looks fine- low fat sugar and salt. They're normal meals like curry and pad Thai.

I am probably over thinking this but I am Just not sure about eating packaged food every week night night.
But, I have a tendency to take the hard way out of everything and worry and this is easy. Peasy. And I can't find anything wrong with the food...aibu?

It's these: m.tesco.com/h5/groceries/r/www.tesco.com/groceries/product/details/?id=286931301

Or just chop some veg and chicken, takes as long as it does to open the pack.
actually the way some of those types of packs are sealed that may not be too far from the truth

I read Joanna blythmans books in my foodie days but I would imagine they are quite outdated now? Unless she's published a new one.

Swallow This, published last year, well worth a read

www.amazon.co.uk/gp/product/B00NEO1M9M/ref=oh_aui_d_detailpage_o06_?ie=UTF8&psc=1

Well OP rather than desperately trying to find problems with these meals, it sounds as if you are actually determined to dismiss any concerns that people have brought to you about declining vitamin content and bacteria, which make these kind of foods bad for your health.

I don't think the bacteria angle is too woo. We already know that people who eat lots of processed food are less healthy. It seems obvious that the more food items are handled and prepped and pierced in factories, the more chance they have of picking up bacteria. Seems pretty plausible to me. The Daily Mail is hardly an obscure science journal and it is a study from a reputable British university.

OP you also seem determined to dismiss any alternatives that people have brought to you. You keep saying that cooking extra food takes time, when I have already said, don't cook special stuff, just double up what you are already cooking at the weekend! It doesn't take any additional time. If you aren't cooking at all at the weekend either then fair enough, but you said that you were.

All in all it is pretty clear that you have already decided that these meals are fine and dandy and there is no alternative so I begin to wonder what your motives for posting are.

The Daily Mail is hardly an obscure science journal

The Daily Mail is famous for printing unscientific bullshit as fact. Do you remember it had articles about drinkable sunscreen that caused air particles on your skin to vibrate in a way that deflected UV rays?

But the OP has better things to do at the weekend than cook. Fair enough. So do I. But then I'm not angsting about what I'm eating.

I think these meals sound great OP, I've been looking for something like this - I wish they did vegetarian versions. I've been trying to think of ways to simplify cooking as it's such a grind. I put too much pressure on myself and DH to provide home-cooked meals every night, and we also try to eat at 5.30pm with DS which is silly really. So last weekend, I went to Waitrose in search of good quality ready meals. Spent about £50 and the freezer is now full. We are planning to do one or two nights a week of ready meals and cut down a bit on the cooking.

The constant suggestions of batch cooking/slow cooker etc on MN bores me. I think most people have heard of it and tried it by now. For me, it is ok to a point (soups, sauces, lasagne etc), but not everything I cook can be frozen, and many things do not freeze well.

I also find it amusing how the consensus on MN seems to be to get a cleaner/gardener/someone to iron etc when both parents work, but spending £30 a week to simplify food prep is outlandish.

I also find it amusing how the consensus on MN seems to be to get a cleaner/gardener/someone to iron etc when both parents work, but spending £30 a week to simplify food prep is outlandish. This, totally. And if you say you cook from scratch some tit comes on and argues that unless you grew the tomatoes yourself it's exactly the same as using Dolmio.

A friend uses Hello Fresh, he likes it because he lives alone and it gives him variety with little effort and no waste. Their perky reps keep turning up to our house, I tell them we've got three kids and they look crestfallen

Also, batch cooking = loads of stuff in the freezer you'll get bored with and eventually bin. Slow cooker = brown stuff that all tastes the same and is actually quite a lot of work. Mine's just gone to the charity shop.

Bravada. I keep saying, over. And over, that I don't want to batch cook. It will Take me time . You and others keep insisting it won't. When I tell you it will you're getting stroppy, despite the fact I have clearly said from the start this isn't about batch cooking.

However. What you say might be true but only if you cook batch cooking type things at the weekend. Last weekend we had steak Saturday and roast dinner Sunday. Neither of these things I could make Double freeze. Why is so hard to understand?

You don't know how other people's lives go. Your best if not telling them they could or should do anything with such blank and white thinking

Oh and thanks peanut butter I've downloaded a sample

OP don't sweat it. The majority of parents here think ready made, prepackaged food is 'fine' - even as 100% of an individual's diet, as long as that individual is under 6 months old.

Why is preprepared, prepackaged food also not 'fine' for adults, for a third of their meals during the week?

Followed by 9 months of Ella's pouches of
Course...

I don't think it's v different from going to the supermarket and buying the same ingredients, just cuts out the middleman. What's wrong with it if you can afford it and why would it be more healthy to go and buy the separate ingredients?

Lot of competitive batch vcooking angst inn hon here. Really agree with the poster who said that a man has come up with solution 'job done' and women have to guilt trip about it....

"And a lot of the people here (maybe not you op) seem like to get these meals just because they can't be arsed to chuck some ingredients in a pan. I mean, seriously?"

Other than predjudices, what is actually WRONG with not wanting to cook? Is it better or worse than not wanting to clean the toilet?