To wonder how people find the time and money to cook from scratch

[Mummyof287]

We sometimes have a roast, cooked from scratch or Jacket potatoes with toppings and salad.Everything else tends to involve something from a box/packet/jar.
That's not to say every meal is total 'junk food' and the meals are always balanced (protein, carb, fibre) but usually include something processed.
Here are some examples of what we eat;

-Salmon/smoked basa, rice (microwave packet rice) veg
-Quiche (good quality boxed) new potatoes, veg
-Sausages (butchers or supermarket good quality butchers style)
-Old el Paso Fajita kit using quorn chicken

• Burgers (from butchers) in buns with salad

-Pizza with corn on cob/salad

• Breaded/battered fish portions, homemade chips/wedges and beans
• Lasagne (using jar sauces) & veg
• Tortellini (packet) and sauce (ready made in pot/packet)
• Stit fry using quorn chicken

I find cooking really stressful and am not very good at it 🙈 My DH likes cooking and used to do more recipies from scratch, but since having our two daughters time is stretched especially on the days we both work, and when he has done recipes they don't eat it as they are really picky eaters, so feels like a waste of effort, half of it goes in the bin.

I want to stop using so many processed foods as know its not ideal health wise, but time and especially money are fairly short, and most recipies seem to have so many ingredients, it all gets so expensive!

Any ideas of recipies that are very quick, cheap and easy please??

Oooh, yes, I do often add some herbs and a bit of flavouring depending on how I'm feeling- rosemary can be nice, sometimes a little mustard, maybe a bit of tomato puree. Never garlic though.

I use frozen onions, chopped garlic, herbs, ginger and chilli this saves time the cost of buying all this together would be too expensive for many but one or two items at a time and Tesco’s are the best for these. There is also a few good Thai frozen mixes about

frozen spinach, mash, carrot and swede mash, peas, green beans and recently tried roasted root vegetables are all very good

i never use jar sauces and curries I buy the kits from Aldi or if on special offer in Sainsburys

i no longer faff about making chicken goujons or pizza (that I made once from scratch)

recently discovered that by adding bought grated cheese (which I do not usually buy) to cream makes an instant cheese sauce another time saver

And getting into the habit of cooking makes a difference after a whole cooking a chilli will no longer seem a chore and easy to do

for rice a rice cooker or microwave rice cooker (I have the microwave rice cooker) both make excellent rice and trial and error will make you into the perfect rice chef (but much easier using the above)

I love garlic😶 Like... LOVE. I am picky about which I buy if I don't grow my own that year and am know to ask for taste in markets😂

I love garlic too! Just not in my cottage pie . I like to buy the extra large type garlic with big juicy cloves- my DF sometimes grows it and it's great roasted in olive oil before using in your pasta sauces.

I cook most things from scratch, I find a lot if things really don't take longer than buying ready made.

The trick is to make extra, and find simple, one pot foods. Last night we had sausage, lentil and sweet potato casserole. About 10 mins chopping and frying veg (leeks, sweet potato, carrots, garlic, pepper), sausages chopped and fried off 1st, a bitbof paprika. Add lentil, water, tinned tomatoes, season and let it cook away. Serve with bread. I made enough for 4, plus a couple of lunch portions are in the freezer.

If you're making a roast, always make extra. The veg van be used for salads, or whizzed for soup. Potatoes can be fried up for brunch, alongside an egg. Meat can be used for sandwiches, noodles, curry etc.

Also, it's OK to 'cheat' and use some sauces. Sometimes I make my own curry/asian inspired dishes. Others, I just buy a packet. Spice blends can be useful too.

We always have an 'emergency' freezer meal in, for days I really can't be arsed. And I freeze left overs, wven small amounts can be used for pittas/wraps. Add salad, greek yogurt (More.flexible than sour cream in my opinion), cheese.etc and ta daaaa, a tasty meal in moments.

Once you start, you will find it easy.and much tastier.

If they don't yet recommend to grow hardnecks not soft necks. There are few varieties which are just wowza + you have the stalks for pesto or cooking. They don't last as long hanged as soft necks do but totally worth it.

What is cooking from scratch? Like if I make a bolognese should I blach tomatoes myself inorder for it to be from scratch?

What about if making a stir fry and I use ready chopped veggies and a spice mix? Or even making a tortilla I don't make the tortilla dough myself?

I think there are levels to coking from scratch. Doing everything properly from scratch like actually making the pasta dough and getting ingredients to make your own ricotta is gonna be tons of work and take forever. But buying pasta and boiling it and throwing some chicken on a pan with some cream and spices won't take much longer than a ready made meal.

imho, cooking from scratch is extremely easy if you cook simple plain meals and don't need sauces. Spuds, veg, grilled meat, salt & butter? Quick & simple. choose what to cook based on what needs eating in your fridge.

Cooking elaborate things from scratch is a total faff when it means many steps, juggling the timing for each part, juggling which item in the freezer needs eating, planning meals the night before or even many nights before, meal planning, multiple cooking methods, baking & boiling (steaming), sauce making, etc. I find most MNer recipes rather complicated (headache, actually).

Rice is a funny one. I only really like brown rice & that takes some prep or it takes too long.

planning meals the night before or even many nights before, meal planning, multiple cooking methods, baking & boiling (steaming), sauce making, etc.
I think that's bit overthinking for normal cooking. Maybe if you need to buy absolutely everything? The only time I plan many nights before is for "Christmas roast" because my sauerkraut needs to be ready on time. Plus it is lots of items around when we host.

cooking from scratch is extremely easy if you cook simple plain meals and don't need sauces. Spuds, veg, grilled meat, salt & butter?
Quick meals don't have to be plain meals (based on description I guess you mean plain as in flavour?). Lots of recipes from around the world can be quick and tasty and from scratch. Plus there is always option of freestyling a bit based on what's in.

The only time I plan many nights before is for "Christmas roast"

IYHZ: Not meaning to carp… just that You said you don’t preplan, but I think you said on this thread that you do this

I precook rice and portion it into freezer. It's then ready for any meal requiring rice from just side to egg fried rice etc. You can make your own yomato base sauce from mix of fresh and tinned tomatoes and fresh veg in slowcooker. I put basic seasoning (onion, salt, pepper, garlic, cinnamon, basic herbs) cook for few hours just to marry flavours and melt everything, portion in a freezer and then spice when using it based on what dish it goes into.

So that means cooking ahead & juggling what is in the freezer so it gets used before it expires. It means planning that you did the activity to have the freezer stock when you want it; the activity takes more time than one extra item on one’s supermarket list. Washing up the containers & having them ready for next batch cooking occasion. Reaching for a cheap jar when you need it, a jar with long life that doesn’t take limited space in freezer, is easier.

You also mentioned spices, Worces sauce, marmite & garlic. Getting the flavour balance right with those strong flavours (and remembering what potential conflict spices you already put in your frozen tom sauce/rice portions, and thawing them out in time) takes more thinking than some of us want to contribute to meal making.

it's great you love cooking. It's obviously easy for you to do all that. The more someone does all these habits the less cognitive burden they require subsequently.

Yes but it's not "planning" as planning "in 3 nights we will have x". It just get pulled when we fancy it or need it. Like having not cooked rice or the microwave rice in a cupboard isn't really "planning" either. When I run out of rice, I get/make more rice. Same with the sauce. Like people do when they go shop and stock up if something is on offer. It's in a freezer like people would have sauce in a cupboard. That's not meal planning. That's stocking up.

Honestly? Half of the list you put just sounds like absolutely normal things to do. Washing containers? It's just washing dishes. "juggling what's in a freezer"? It's not like one has massive walk ins at home? You just pull things when you want them. Most freezers nowadays do not let food go off. It may just change texture. No difference to having it in cupboard (like the rice I mentioned). Using flavours is standard cooking too. Yes it may be harder for those new to cooking but it's quite easily learnable.

It's fine not to like cooking etc, not everyone enjoys it, hence popularity of jars and ready meals. But there is no need making basic cooking sound like a task of Olympic proportions.

Managing the freezer here is looking in and pulling out what you want. If I see something I haven’t put in recently while I’m there I think “oooo there’s a leg of lamb needs eating” and probably remember to do that next weekend. The truth is I have a very large household by uk standards so we can’t afford convenience food and it’s really not that convenient. It’s easy for me to pour extra cream into a pot in the freezer, and extra rice into a tub for tomorrow. It’s less faff than binning it to be honest and certainly less than the alternative.

"But buying pasta and boiling it and throwing some chicken on a pan with some cream and spices won't take much longer than a ready made meal."

Oh come on. It takes quite a bit longer than a ready meal you put in the microwave. A micro meal is 3-4 minutes from the fridge and 10 from the freezer. No other prep needed.

"@OspreyLambocooking enough so that there are leftovers for the next few days is what I'd call 'cooking'."

No because leftovers are supposed to be accidental. If you are cooking extra portions on purpose I'd call that batch cooking, but I agree that there's a huge difference between making a few extra portions and people who prep for a whole week or who have freezers full of meals.

I'm the same OP.

If I manage to rustle up an oven dinner with a protein, carb and a veg, I feel like I've done well.
I LIKE to cook from scratch, but during term time (I'm a teacher), I just don't have the mental capacity.

I sort of get what PP is saying - if you want variety as in different types of meals and 'cooking methods' things can get complicated very quickly.

@lljkk

My techniques are simple - I do:

1. Single sheet pan bake, dump everything in,. different seasonings
2. Stir-fries - sauces made in same pan.
3. Instant pot one-pot meals.

4 basic flavours:

• Chinese (soy sauce, oyster sauce, ginger, garlic, honey)
• English (rosemary, sage, thyme other spices)
• 'Spicy' (paprika, curry, etc).
• Tomato

Everything I make is a variation on these themes. Meat, veg, carbs (rice/potatoes). I don't make pies, pasta, or anything like that. I won't make anything that has additional stuff I don't already have.

I do take care to prep like velveting and brining chicken, parboiling roasties but you can skip those if you want to. No biggie.

Exactly!

I love cooking, OP, we cook from scratch almost all the time. It’s our leisure time. But when my kids were small it was too much. I wanted zone out time a lot more than I wanted leisure time. I ended up getting ready meals most of the time. I got out of that funk by using Hello Fresh or similar boxes every other week for a while. I kept the recipes for our favourites and slowly started making them myself when we didn’t have the box.

Eventually the kids got older and I stopped feeling like a zombie and now I’m back to loving cooking, finding recipes to experiment with, going out of my way to find ingredients or try out new techniques, etc. But none of that was necessary when the kids were young. I just needed simply recipes that didn’t use too many ingredients, and that’s what the meal boxes provided. You may be able to just get the recipes off the website if the boxes are too expensive. Look for ones that use a lot of the same ingredients if you want to keep costs down.

Also, I would urge you not to be disheartened by the kids seeming fussy. Putting a variety on the table in front of them, even if they don’t eat it, is one of the best ways of having them develop into non-fussy eaters. We let them eat or not from what was made, then there was always a healthy snack available later if they hadn’t had enough. I know some families insist on a taste of at least two things on the plate or similar, which we sometimes tried when they seemed to be rejecting out of hand. If you can afford it (it’s obviously not as cheap as just making what you know they will eat), it’s supposed to be good to give them exposure and ours did grow up to enjoy all sorts.

I used to love cooking, and exploring food and flavour but my DP and DC are fussy with a variety of allergies in the mix too. It's so hard to get anything that they will eat. My DP mainly will only eat beige food groups and it kills my soul. So I sympathise, it's so hard to have the time to cook decent food anyway nevermind when you end up binning it.

I’ve found some great ideas come from just using up whatever’s left in the fridge. You could make a quick omelette with half an onion, some bacon, mushrooms, broccoli (boil first), eggs, milk and cheese. Dead quick and tasty, plus you get the veggies in there. My little 1 year old has been eating this with a baked sweet potato happily almost since she started on solids! 🤣
Smashed avocado with a squeeze of lemon/lime juice & chili flakes on sourdough (actual sourdough though, not the supermarket stuff) is another quick and easy winner.
In the winter I love to make a big batch of red lentil soup and with whatever veggies I’ve got lying around, maybe some bacon or leftover chicken too. Portion it and freeze down for evenings when you’re too short on time or energy, then serve with toast. It’s super filling. My top tip is to add a tablespoon of white wine vinegar right at the end and then sprinkle fresh coriander on top - delicious!

To those buying and using grated cheese - you do know that you are paying cheese money for flour, don't you? The pre-grated stuff is covered in stuff which is basically flour to stop it sticking together. And don't try telling me that supermarkets/producers don't maximise the ratio of flour to cheese to save money, cos I won't believe you. Pre-grated cheese is great (see what I did there?) for those with a disability. Otherwise it's just an expensive bit of added super-processing.

I dunno, is it that much?

Sainsbury's grated cheddar cheese, 2 grams carbs/100g.
(seems like same) Sainsbury's whole cheddar cheese (< 0.5 g carbs/100g).

So that's 2 grams of carbs max per 100g, that you can attribute to the flour or cornstach used as caking agent. And then I do things like sprinkle the shredded cheese on a wheat tortilla.
2%. I can live with that.

I like quick meals done from scratch, usually no more than half an hour.
One idea as you like fish - for four people gently heat frying pan with a little oil, slice into it two onions and two sweet potatoes (cut it in half across the fattest part, then slice it roughly downwards, ie. longways into quite thin shards). These will cook really quickly. Add lemon juice as they cook. Place fillets of fish on top of these veg and let it steam there with a lid on for ten minutes or until done. Add some olive oil on top if you like. Have with some green veg - five minutes max in boiling water - and you are done. This is cheaper and healthier than buying packets or pre-breaded fish, etc.

I also sometimes cook wholemeal spaghetti (12mins in boiling water) and have it with
a tin of cooked butter bean or chickpeas heated with a sliced onion and added tomato paste. Can add grated cheese if you want. Green veg on the side. This is superquick.

Me too!
Especially as my issue isn't grating cheese - it's washing the *ing grater with all the hard to reach bits.
Cooking shows always piss me off, because they show the easy bit - the cooking! With all the ingredients neatly prepped in cute little bowls.
In reality it's prep and clean-up that's the most drudgery.
One of the best things I ever bought was an electric vegetable chopper... with parts that can go in the dishwasher. Job done.

OP don’t beat yourself up; what you’re doing is fine - especially with 2 DDs and a job! And if you don’t like cooking.

I make curry sauce and tomato sauce or cheese sauce for pasta from scratch, but I’ve been cooking for years so it’s cheap and second nature. BBC Good Food is a great source of recipes that are budget friendly and simple.