Massive Cook Up - wdyt?

[briggsy's girl]

as much as possible, i eat as local as the backyard!

[Lulu]

Yeah, you are right on the veg BG. I wish I knew of a spud farm around here. The last lot I bought were OLD and I wasn't happy.

I also want to choose where my veg comes from, I live close to the Yarra Valley and I want to be able to take advantage. I'd rather die than buy veg from a supermarket (truly - there is no actual food in supermarkets at all), but some times I get stuck. I was half thinking of getting together a co-op type thing together, I will see how I go sourcing things first.

I am pinching back my slow cooker FOR SURE, I was drooling reading through the slow cooker chat. At this point I'm still going to do the big cook up -soups, pasta sauces, lasagnes, veg meals for the teenrager. I will plan it with precision!

Thanks for all the tips, I'm looking forward to it all. Hopefully I can get my own apetite back too...

[briggsy's girl]

hun - i should be coming down next weekend (or whenever the do at your place is) - want me to grab you some spuds on the way (even if they're just from the spud shed at Traf or the berry farm at garfield - not sure anyone will be back to thorpdale this week in the next week or so) - and pumpkin - well, i reckon i could almost say ours will be ready for picking by then (and they're HUGE so you'll be able to share with someone else if you wont eat it all)....

[Lulu]

She comes bearing veggies!!!!! Yaaaayyyy!

[briggsy's girl]

gotta find a way to hide myself from scrutiny - i can hide behind a bag of spuds and a huge pumpkin! lol

[Lulu]

You silly banana! We will all be absorbed in the other things to look at darl......tee hee heee!

[Pandora]

Someone I know does this, Once a Month Cooking, on a permanaent basis (in her own home though) and has written an e-document on it and everything that she sells on her website.
I think I have a copy of it i will look for you, but most of it is fairly obvious. It does have good hints though for dcoling times prior to freezing, and how par through to pre-cook things..stuff like that.
If you have a chest freezer it will help a lot as you can store things for a lot longer.

[briggsy's girl]

well, Lulu, you can be proud! this thread inspired me to actually get a big amount of cooking done. last weekend was the first vegie soup, which i was able to freeze. DH got home yesterday morning, went shopping during the day at the local market for the veg we didn't already have, and did a mammoth cook up yesterday. three slow cookers, the cooktop and the electric fry pan were going at one point, but it's worked out brilliantly!

now, we have in the freezer:
7 vegie soup (from last weekend)
3 curried chicken (from the slow cooker sachet things - not bad if you like coconut based curries)
2 beef and red wine casserole (another slow cooker sachet thing - DH likes it - i don't do red wine so didn't even sample)
5 herb and garlic lamb (the third of the slow cooker sachets we tried - too herby for me, but i have issues with heartburn and reflux, so anything like that was bound to be out of my tastes!)
5 chow mein (DH made from scratch)
8 chicken and corn soup (plus one for mum - we made the stock from scratch then just kept adding stuff - it's soooooo thick and yummy!)
9 vegie soup (a little different to last weeks!)


spag bol is still in the SC at the moment - without pasta there is about 9 meals worth in there (lotsa vegies!) - with pasta, we'll probably close to double that....

and tonight, when DH gets back from his friends place, we're going to do a heap of vegies in a white sauce - it's easy for DH to heat up to go with meat when he's travelling, and has a bit of everything in it - and when we're home - well, we can chuck it in a dish in the oven - it's delish either way! i think we'll get maybe 10 meals out of that, maybe more

not bad for what has, realistically, only been about five hours "hands on" work...

[DoubleK]

wow, you ladies really inspire me... i struggle with cutting/crumbing 3 or 4 chicken breast fillets to freeze for the week! im happy to leave the kitchen after doing that.. i couldnt imagine myself cooking for a months worth of dinners!! lol

good luck with it Lulu!!