New kitchen

[rainbowstardrops]

This isn't really an AIBU but it kind of is at the same time.

The situation is, we're having a new kitchen very soon. Our old kitchen is being ripped out completely and being replaced (except for the white goods/fridge freezer etc)
What with levelling the floor, plastering the walls, new fuse boxes and then the whole refitting etc and it therefore means we're not going to have any sort of functioning kitchen for about three weeks (that's if there are no hiccups along the way). I'm dreading it.

We are lucky that we have two downstairs rooms but we obviously can't use the larger room when the floor is being levelled etc because we have to access it through the kitchen. But this room is where the fridge/freezer and all of the kitchen will be boxed up, plus the new kitchen units etc will have to be stored. I honestly don't know where we're going to put it all!
Anyway, I will have a slow cooker, an air fryer and a microwave in the larger room (somehow).
My AIBU is, how awful would it be to order a shit load of takeaways, or more importantly, what can I cook with my very limited cooking options?
It's me and two DC and an H that comes home at about 10pm
We usually rely on pasta etc but I won't have a hob.

I just need ideas for some meals please, or a thumbs up that we can all just eat shit for three weeks!
Joking. Obviously. Kind of.

I'm sure my kids would love McDonalds etc too! Maybe that's the spin that I need to put on it ..... making memories lol! Mind you, DH is a tight arse and will probably moan about the cost!

Stand your fridge freezer on cardboard to protect carpet if you move it. Use paper plates so you don't have to wash up as much. When our kitchen was redone the dishwasher remained in the middle of the room plumbed in.

You should consider a remoska.Its so easy to cook and entire meal in the larger one and they're quite airtight so you're not getting condensation issues or a lot of cooking smells.My kitchen was replaced 25 years ago and hopefully won't need updated again as it's freestanding and items can be replaced individually.
Dishes were a massive problem and I always remember the bath being full of dishes.Your situation will require a lot of good humour and planning but I'm sure it's all going to be worth it.

Had our kitchen done in the summer and apart from a cooked chicken from the supermarket with salad and fresh bread once or twice we ate out/got takeaways. The washing up, cleaning up, prep was just to much with all the mess the kitchen refit was already causing. Ours was due to a flood so my entire downstairs was a right off so a large renovation in reality maybe that made it all a lot worse I don’t know, it was horrendous worst 16 months of my life and it has permanently put me off any type of renovation ever again. We didn’t have the storage issues though as everything we owned was destroyed so I guess that was a bonus.

We had just under 3 weeks of this.
We batch cooked and used microwave or air fryer but it was much harder than i anticipated . The washing up was the hardest. We gave in for the last few days and ate out.
Do whatever makes your life easy.
I love my new kitchen but i never want to endure that again!

We went about a month without a kitchen. As people have said the self leveling stuff takes a day at most. Cook meals are fine supplemented with salads etc. Bigger issue is the washing up. Paper plates/bowls/cups for cold drinks.you can get ones that compost easily. So only had mugs & cutlery/ odd bits to wash. We had water pipes moved etc. But were never without water (no water no loo!) Once the builders left for they day. They also rigged up my washer asap, so that was a bonus.

And don’t get me started on the cost of the laundrette £8.50 a wash 😮 for a 12kg machine and £5 to tumble dry it! When you are living in a building site your clothes, towels, bedding get dirtier and dustier than normal.

Do be careful with camping hobs as they should be used outside. Plug in ones come without the risk of carbon monoxide.

That's a really good point @HarryVanderspeigle

I feel your pain!
I don't think anyone will make us dinners unfortunately but we do have a family member who said we can take our washing to theirs!

That sounds really tough on you all at an already difficult time 😕

I factored in the expense of takeaways/eating out into the cost of our new kitchen.

Do what you gotta do!

Since you have a microwave, I would err towards using ‘Cook’ meals rather than takeaways and supplementing with salads or microwave veg. At least most of them resemble home cooked meals.

That's something to consider. Thanks @ocelot3

Stand your fridge freezer on cardboard to protect carpet if you move it. Use paper plates so you don't have to wash up as much. When our kitchen was redone the dishwasher remained in the middle of the room plumbed in.

We have wooden floors but that's a really good point re cardboard on the floor @Needtosoundoffandbreathe and it would be lovely if they could keep the dishwasher plumbed in because that's not moving but we're having the floor levelled so not sure they'll be able to.

a plug in hob (ours is IKEA) makes everything easy planning wise, or you could get a multi cooker or rice cooker, but like PP we found the washing up the biggest pain. We had multiple washing up bowls so we had one for dirty, one for clean, maybe one for dry as well.

I would suggest starting with mainly home cooking and keep the takeaways in reserve for when you "need" them later on. Some nights we found ourselves painting etc so def needed takeaways those nights. Couscous, bread or microwave potatoes for carb, salad bag and cherry toms for veg, deli ham/chicken , scotch eggs or rotisserie chicken etc.

When we had our extension we were without a kitchen for about three months. We ate about 40% microwave meals (a combination of bought-in dishes and things we'd made and frozen in advance), 50% newly cooked dishes, and 10% takeaways.

For cooking we mostly used a slow cooker (great for cooking meats like chicken wings, ribs and pork belly as well as the obvious soups and stews - oh, and jacket potatoes!), a rice cooker (also good for cooking pasta, and you can make approximations of various rice dishes like pilaf, risotto - at the risk of upsetting any Italians in the vicinity), and a large George Foreman contact grill (for toasted sandwiches as well as grilled meat and vegetables, including finishing off the meat from the slow cooker), as well as the microwave for simple stuff like veg.

Cous cous was a godsend - just pour boiling water over it and leave to stand.

YANBU, I'd buy some paper plates for days where you really can't be bothered washing up in the bath! If the weather stays dry, BBQ could be another option to mix things up a bit. I'd probably eat a lot of toasted sandwiches for lunches, assuming you already have a toastie maker.

We had this a few years ago. Also for around 3 weeks. In our case though it was just DH and I because DD was at Uni.

All we had was kettle, microwave and toaster though we did have access to the freezer as it lives in the garage. Beforehand I tried to plan it out by having some things in the freezer that we could just reheat in the microwave and also getting ready meals. This was OK to begin with but by half way in we were getting fed up and started to eat out a lot or get takeaways!

Hardest thing was having to do the washing up in the bath and do all the washing at the launderette.

Anyway, I am sure it will be worth it when you get your lovely new kitchen.

a plug in hob (ours is IKEA) makes everything easy planning wise, or you could get a multi cooker or rice cooker, but like PP we found the washing up the biggest pain. We had multiple washing up bowls so we had one for dirty, one for clean, maybe one for dry as well.

Multiple washing up bowls is a good shout and I wouldn't have thought of that! We have a 'sick bowl' but don't fancy using that! 🤣🤢 Thanks!

I certainly hope it's going to be worth it too!

We lived on ready meals and takeaways when we did our kitchen.

This is all making me feel much better, thank you!
Like I said, my kids aren't little but they'd happily eat shite every day if it was up to them, so I'm feeling guilty about not shoving enough veggies their way!

A bag of salad or some carrot sticks with the microwave lasagne counts as veggies! ;)

Survived for 2 months during refit with Microwave, Air Fryer and one of these
Aobosi Induction Hob,Single Induction Cooker with Portable Ultra-thin Body(32 26 4.2),20 Power and Temperature levels,Booster Function 2000W,Safety Lock,10H Timer : Amazon.co.uk: Home & Kitchen
We were lucky in that we had a downstairs sink we could still use
Cleaning up is the pain.
You would not be unreasonable to have takeaways but paper plates would not be unreasonable either
Batch cook some things that can be microwaved in advance.

We were without a kitchen for a few months, and our DC are little, plus there are no decent takeaways in our village unless you want fish & chips every night. Luckily the plumbers were able to temporarily move our old sink, dishwasher and washing machine and plumb them all in together in a temporary location, so we only actually had to wash up in the bath for two nights (and drain pasta into the drain outside the back door!). It's worth asking if they can rig you up something temporary downstairs, as the lack of water is the most annoying part. I would also say definitely move the fridge into the room you're using. We had a portable induction hob, instant pot, rice cooker and microwave, and pretty much cooked as normal.

I'd be more than happy with this but the kids would think I'm feeding them poison!!!
They sometimes have a tiny side salad with lasagne, as long as there's garlic bread too to soften the blow 🤣

just had our kitchen done & it took weeks & weeks. We survived mostly on jacket potatoes & eating out