The Real Deal!
Written: Sep 18 '00
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Product Rating:
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Pros: Save Time, Effort, Money
Cons: A little dull in places
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| Haven2000's Full Review: Deborah Taylor-Hough - Frozen Assets: How to Cook ... |
Greetings from the original Disinterested Cook! If you're anything like me, you can think of 6,593 things you'd rather do than face another dinner to fix. It's not the actual cooking that is so hard, even if it is mundane. It's the fact that you've already done this 649 times this year, and it's still Summer. It's the mind-boggling attempt to come up with something nutritious and affordable, that each member of the family will actually eat instead of decorate with, nevermind saying "yum!"
Every afternoon, my darling daughter eagerly asks what's for dinner. The times I DO know, and tell her, I am inevitably met with a disappointed "oh", or a depressed "can I make my OWN dinner?" (Tuna sandwich. She'll be growing fins any day now.) I am so tired of the perpetual negative comments that I now invariably reply to her predictable question with "monkey tails". (She always squeaks back "really??" ready to believe it...one of these days I'll have to buy some of that long curly sausage...)
But I digress...
What makes "Frozen Assets" better than any other "quick meals" book is the fact that it is full of normal recipes, made with normal ingredients. None of this "Phone up the deli and have them deliver 27 deveined, pre-diced octopus antennae, while you run to the safety deposit box and cash in your bonds to pay for it, but it'll be worth it because it only takes 14 minutes to cook!" No, these are basic, reasonably priced, from-scratch ingredients that your family is used to, (meat, potatoes, salt, pepper, pasta, flour, sugar, eggs...) and that WON'T take up more time than you save cooking by sending you all over town looking for "fenugreek".
Another time-saving aspect of this book is that it tells how to make a month's worth of dinners in just one day. So, instead of cooking for an hour every evening for 30 days, you cook for 7 hours one day. Come back here! Yes, a 7-hour cook-a-thon IS a daunting concept, but imagine your delight for the next 29(!) nights when you won't have to think up what to make for dinner, hope you have all the ingredients, and then chop, slice, dice, saute, simmer, boil and braise it. You'll simply pull dinner out of the freezer and pop it into the oven or microwave. That takes about 5 minutes. Now, what to do with the other 55 minutes? Read a novel, paint a masterpiece, say something to the kids besides "Will you get out of the kitchen?!"
Now don't panic, you don't HAVE to cook a whole month's worth of food at once! The book also includes instructions for making 2 weeks' worth of dinners instead. Or, you can do what I do, and just make a double batch of dinner some nights, and freeze the other half for some night when you can't stand the thought of making dinner (For me, that's usually the very next night...)
So how does all this save time? Well, besides the obvious (7 hours of dinner preparation for the month versus 30 hours), you have made one shopping trip for the month's dinners. Of course, you might have to go shopping for lettuce, milk, etc. during the month, but those trips will be shorter than usual, because you won't be shuffling through the store with the other rush-hour zombies, glazed look in your eyes, wondering what you are going to make for dinner. If you are preparing several dinners that require spaghetti sauce, you make one (big!) batch of spaghetti sauce, and clean the pot once.
How does this save effort? Besides the fact that you won't have that daily dinner dread, the author has done all possible organizing for you. She provides a menu plan for 30 days (14 different meals, some of which are served more than once during the month), the necessary recipes, step-by-step instructions for order of preparation, even the shopping list you'll need for the ingredients, categorized by store department (produce, meats, dairy, etc.) so you won't have to criss-cross through the store. The only way she could help more would be to do the shopping and cooking FOR you (Wouldn't THAT be nice!)
If you don't care for the recipes the author provides, it's fairly simple to adapt your own family's recipes to the system by following the author's example. She even includes a list of foods that do and don't freeze well, so you can decide which of your own favourite recipes will adapt well to the freeze-ahead system.
How does this system save money?
The recipes use basic, not exotic, ingredients, and most are completely from scratch (although the author does use prepared spaghetti sauce, and then stretches it with her own ingredients). Cooking several meals at once also saves the energy used to run the appliances. The other day I was making lasagna. While I was about it, I made 3 instead of one, and they all went into the oven at once, at the same time/temperature as if I had only made one. (You guessed it, we had lasagna 3 nights in a row...lucky for me, the crew loves lasagna!)
Another way this system saves money is by reducing the temptation to buy fast food when you just don't feel like cooking. This is probably healthier, too. Running out for fast food would probably take more time (sitting at the drive through) and effort (bucking traffic and trying to communicate with that disembodied mumble) and money, than it would to simply pull a healthy meal from the freezer and pop it into the microwave. Although, I did find it ironic that when the author had extra money during a shopping trip, she spent it on a U-Bake pizza! (Well, at least she admitted it!)
I wish I could say that the book was also fun to read. Unfortunately, I found myself rereading paragraphs several times because I'd zoned out somewhere in the middle. (Stop looking at me like that.) Still, it's a reference book, not a novel, and what it lacks in panache, it more than makes up for with awe-inspiring organization and content.
Besides a complete step-by-step dinner plan for 30 days, as well as one for 2-weeks, there is also a complete 10-day holiday meal plan (menus, shopping list, recipes, and order of preparation for 11 meals plus a breakfast) to get you from, say, December 25 to January 1. Additional recipes provided include more freezable-dinner, -lunch, and even -breakfast recipes. I particularly liked the idea of freezable breakfasts, considering how hectic mornings can be when you have to get this one to work, get that one to school, get the other one to a different school, get another one unclenched from the curtain rod, etc.
Among the helpful miscellaneous sections, the book addresses frequently asked questions such as; what to do if you don't have an extra freezer, extra time, or much kitchen space. There are worksheets for shopping list, menu and recipe organizing, and an index of recipes categorized by main ingredient. There are tips for shopping, cooking, and saving money, as well as other uses for pre-made meals (my favourite was the frozen meals baby shower).
Not limited to a book, the online Frozen-Assets website address is:
http://hometown.aol.com/DSimple/OAMClinks.html
where you'll find links to web pages, articles, recipes, and meal plans related to once-a-month-cooking. Now, if I could just "click" and conjure up a maid and chauffeur...
This book recommended for disinterested cooks like me, families, singles, friends, and people who like to make sure others are eating well when they may not have the time or knowledge to make sure for themselves.
Recommended:
Yes
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Epinions.com ID:
Haven2000
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Reviews written: 66
Trusted by: 59 members
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