To wonder who these wonder women are who 'cook from scratch' every day

[MGFM]

Following on from all the threads about supermarket shopping and how to make it cheaper etc, I just can't get me head around all of the families 'cooking from scratch' everyday.

Is it just me that thinks that cooking from scratch everyday is an absolute nightmare? Are people confused about what cooking from scratch actually means? Are all these people who do this SAHM/SAHDs? Are they getting up at 5 am to put the meal together to heat up in the evening. I just dont get it.

I am currently on Mat Leave but when I was working full time and getting home around 1645/1700 every night, the last thing I wanted to start doing was cooking from scratch.

And what does cooking from scratch even mean? I enjoy sausage, mash, peas and gravy. The mash is from scratch...does that count?

I tend to cook from scratch at the weekend....a big pan of chilli which can cook for a few hours, or spag bol and then will freeze the left overs but I dont start cooking this on a thursday night for example.

Anyway, If I am being unreasonable and it is actually pretty easy to be super mum/dad and cook from scratch, can I please have your recipes?

Thanks! -

tryhard Can I come round yours for tea?

Haven't RTWT but I enjoy cooking, I find it relaxing and I like to eat nice food. Tonight's dinner was a sort of Spanish omelette. Chorizo, potato, chopped onion, garlic, thyme, paprika on the low hob for about forty mins. Add nine eggs and dress some salad and that was dinner, plus two portions of lunch in the fridge.

'From scratch', not much effort. Nice food.

aubergine and mushroom stew. takes about half an hour. even so that uses tinned tomatoes rather than homegrown scalded, skinned tomatoes

veg in white sauce takes about half an hour as well.

lentil bolognaise/chilli takes longer as red lentils need longer to cook. 45 mins?

bean soup takes days. about one day to dig the bloody things out the bottom of the far corner of the cupboard for a start (if you soak beans and cook, but then these are frozen in batches to get chucked in at the end or alternatively buy presoaked/cooked tinned beans.

then there are the blue peter meals... here is one I made earlier from the freezer.

swings and roundabouts. sahp probably need to eat cheaper and have time.

wohp probably need to eat quicker and need to use stuff that is half done.

you can eat crap or healthy stuff either way. really it is not a big deal in the scheme of things. you do the best you can with the resources you have.

Susan
You can cook beans from dry to ready in about 30mins in the pressure cooker! It's brilliant!

FT WOHM here, with a DC of 16. I genuinely regret some of the time I spent in the kitchen when DS was younger. It's alright saying they can join in, sit with you etc etc but even then you're not fully present and there's a limit to how much hanging around in the kitchen is reasonable once they're over about 5.

I think we invest too much sentiment into it tbh, and too much moral nonsense too. If I had my time again, there would have been far more fishfingers and oven chips and bought pizza.

Husband and I get in around 6pm. He cooks from scratch every night and we eat around 7.30-8pm.

Kids (8, 11, 11, 12) & DH leave and return at 7, so they're out longer than me. I cook and have everything ready when they get home, ready for 8.30 bedtime. Thinking back over the last few days.

Everything from scratch pretty much. Tonight was tortillas - didn't make the actual tortillas though. Chicken, onion, peppers, grated carrot, grated cheese, lettuce.

Tomorrow pumpkin and cauliflower chili made today, probably enough to freeze.

Sunday Quiche - don't always make the pasty. Make double so does for an extra lunch for the weekend.

Saturday - Sausages and baked potatoes with brocoli. Didn't make the sausages.

Breakfast pancakes made by kids Sunday morning. Lunch was left over risotto. Sunday evening quiche and salad.

Friday morning woke up v early tried a new pancake recipe (1 banana 2 eggs, flour optional). Evening leek and bacon risotto.

If I'm doing a big weekend meal everyone cooks with me. I have a good crew of junior sous chefs.

Chilli recipe

1 tbsp oil
1 large onion
1 red pepper
2 garlic cloves, peeled
1 heaped tsp hot chilli powder (or 1 level tbsp if you only have mild)
1 tsp paprika
1 tsp ground cumin
500g lean minced beef
1 beef stock cube
400g can chopped tomatoes
½ tsp dried marjoram
1 tsp sugar
2 tbsp tomato purée
410g can red kidney beans
plain boiled long grain rice, to serve

In tomato season we freeze toms whole and make roast veg sauce in vats to freeze.

My chilli is pretty easy:

• extra lean mince (500g ish)
• onion (1)
• garlic (3 cloves)
• mushrooms (handful)

Cook off Add

• cumin (2tsps)
• smoked paprika (1tsp)
• wee bit of coriander (1/2 TSP)
• thyme (2tsp)
• teaspoon or two of instant coffee or dark chocolate...Or both
• cinnamon stick
• a little dried chilli

Then woucestershire sauce, beef stock and passata or tinned tomatoes. Bring to boil then simmer for a bit. Ideally then leave to go cold for a while and reheat later, really brews the flavour. Fish Cinnamon stick out.

It takes about 10 mins, plus whatever brewing/simmering time you have. I tend to whack a load of brown rice on to cook first and prepare chilli while it cooks. Then serve with salsa, nachoes and the rice. Cheese etc. Probably 30 mins from entering kitchen/faffing to eating.

Similar timings for something like fajitas if serving with chips which take 20 mins to cook.

SAHP, with outside responsibilities, no fixed commitments. Cook from raw most days, but it's either done early and left to slow cook in a batch (so casseroles, using cheap cuts of meat or legumes in large quantity for eating and freezing), or it's fast and furious, and costs a little more. BUT, I have an extensive store cupboard/pantry with loads of herbs/spices so the finishing tasty bits are to hand. Not to brag, but I come from a family of good cooks and greedy people. Tonight was a Thai red curry duck laksa which would have been quicker if the duck legs had been less tough.

Coeliac means I don't have much option to use ready made or packets but I don't find it too much of a hardship and most things I cook aren't particularly time consuming.

I drive 150 miles home on a Friday evening and can do fish in breadcrumbs and chips/wedges with some veg in 30 minutes and at least 10 minutes of that is waiting for the timer to go off.

A lot of other stuff I cook takes a reasonable amount of cooking time but requires no babysitting, e.g chicken and veg en papillote. Chop, sprinkle some herbs and seasoning, stick in oven for 40 mins.

I think many people have a repertoire of meals that they put together,in my house we have food similar to what's already been mentioned, tonight,marinated chicken breasts with salad,not difficult to prepare; other nights chilli, meatballs, salmon, something in the slow cooker: pulled pork, lamb curry, chicken casserole, all things easy to do,frequentlymaking use of supermarkets 3 for £10 offers.

I do a weekly 'cook from scratch' morning. I get a delivery the day before, so I have time to nip and get anything missing or figure out how to make do without.

I then spend a morning (usually 3 hours plus some time to chill while the oven is on) cooking.

An example morning would include:

Roasting two chickens
Making granola (usually make enough for two weeks of breakfasts with things like toast/pancakes/bacon and eggs mixed in)
Baking bread (I sometimes do this twice a week)
Making muffins
Making soup
Making quiche
Once the chickens are roasted, taking off the meat and making coronation chicken with some of it (sometimes I will make the mayo, but often not)

Then portioning it up and freezing some (for Thu/Fri) and refrigerating some

Lunches through the week will be:
Soup and bread (twice)
Quiche and salad
Chicken salad
Coronation chicken salad

Dinners through the week will be:
Roast chicken
Coronation chicken jacket potato and salad
Chicken risotto or chicken supreme and rice
Chicken pie
Some form of leftovers (could be quiche and chips or coronation chicken baked potato or chicken pie)

Yes, it means we will have a very chicken-y week and then a very mince-y week (shepherd's pie, spag bol etc) and a very tomato-y week (pasta, veg chilli) but by this point I can mix and match a bit with what is in the freezer (and occasionally have a 'freezer week')

But all cooked from scratch, and it means weekday meals are very quick. Even risotto is easy as I make it in the instant pot.

Cooking from scratch definitely means different things to different people

Take lasagne

Obviously you can buy it ready made & frozen

Or buy ready made bechamel sauce & bolognese sauce & pasta sheets and assemble it all yourself but still using ready made ingredients

Or make the sauces from scratch but use ready chopped onion and garlic and tinned tomatoes

Or make the whole lot from scratch including using fresh tomatoes insead of tinned, and make your own pasta from scratch too.

Liviva we do a fair few on toast nights here every week, all welcome 😍

So I actually just did my planning and Tesco shop.

Tomorrow will be fish and chips from the van - a treat for DS2 and DS1 not around so very easy. I'll nick some of his chips, do some veg for him and have some toast later.
Wed - DS1 not around again so DS2 and I will have quick kid tea of fish fingers, happy faces and veg.
Thur - DS1 at his Dad's. DS2 and I will have grilled salmon, rice and veg.
Fri - DS2 at his Dad's so DS1 and I will cook together which we really enjoy. We'll do paella
Sat - Just me and DS1 and I think I'll make a quiche. Might make the pastry or might not. Plus a lovely salad.
Sun - all three of us (at last!) and beef stew has been requested.

I work full time and often have conference calls in the evenings from home so it can be a juggle.

I too cook from scratch for almost all our meals. I don't make pasta, sausages and all of that from scratch but all sauces, soups, curries are made from scratch. The key is to plan meals and also have the ingredients stocked.

For example I make a big pot of bolognaise sauce and then portioned it up for the freezer which then can be used in pasta, a pizza topping, lasagne so that's already a few meals done.
Also make a curry and use the leftover as pie fillings for pie and salad so that's two meals.
I have a breadmaker, so stew and bread is all from scratch.

I have a 5 month old so I need to plan ahead , but we have healthy, 'cooked from scratch' almost all the time.

May I suggest a cookery writer that's just below the radar? Diana Henry's books are great. Not extravagant, or restaurant-y. Everything is accessible and most of it is easy. Start with Cook Simple.

Like everyone else has said I do a mix of fairly quick, prepared night before and slow cooker meals. Also eat the same meal 2 days running 2 weekdays.

This week for example-

1. Chicken and prawn curry (made last night as knew I'd be working late)
2. Pulled pork (slow cooker) with baps and salad (this would generally do 2 days but have guests tomorrow)
3. Cod with breadcrumb/garlic crust, sweet potato wedges, skin on and pea+mint purée (takes 30mins total)
4. Chickpea spinach pie- I'll make the filling Wednesday to eat Thursday+Friday

We often have convenience meals from the freezer- but I make them. I spend the occasional happy morning cooking, fill the freezer and we eat out way through it.

We do almost all from scratch and because it's habit it doesn't take long. Eg often:

Mac cheese
Spag Bol
Fish pie
Chicken pie
Cottage pie
Homemade pizza
Road in the hole
Roast and Yorkshire/lasagne at the weekend
At least one very easy meal a weeek eg jackets, omelette

Plus fishfungers once a fortnight!

I have a food processor which speeds everything up and cook things in stages.

The irony is that I love watching cooking programmes

It's makes ng sauces that's the key. I make several different ones, curry, tomato, whatever, and all youbhave to do is defrost in their microwave, chuck in some prawns or leftover chicken or something, cook rice or pasta and there you are.one thing I do buy are those microwave bags for steaming vegetables. They are brilliant!

I also cook big helpings - so yesterday I made a big batch of easy pizza dough 675g sf flour plus 9 tbsps olive oil and 300 ml warm water all mixed up and then we had pizza last night and then refrigerated some of he dough for tonight.