Sunday, July 18, 2010

Busy day cooking on Saturday......

I don't think I have mentioned but I am working Monday, Wednesday and Friday for the next couple of weeks.  One of the things I hate doing is coming home from work and having to start to cook.  So on Saturday afternoon I decided to do prepare a few meals for the next couple of weeks. 

My main ingredients were ground beef (mince) and potatoes.  I had a couple pounds of ground beef and 10 lbs of potatoes, plus a few other things.


I also bought some pork cutlets that were reduced and popped them in the slow cooker with barbecue sauce, to make pulled pork sandwiches which we will have on focaccia buns with onions and cheese and baked potatoes.  I am hoping there will be enough pork for two meals there.  I also picked up the buns half price.
With just under half a pound of ground beef leftover I decided to make some mini meatloaf/pies.  I added half a diced red onion, tomato sauce, a crust of bread made into crumbs, an egg and seasonings.  They should take around 25 minutes to cook in a 375oF oven.  We will have leftover mashed potatoes and peas from the garden.
I made stuffed baked potatoes.  I stuffed them with red onion, mushrooms and cheese.  We will have them with garden salad.
I made a Baked Bean Lasagna.  The recipe is here, and it's yummy.  I don't have the grated cheese on top in the photo, as it was still warm. This recipe only uses half a pound of ground beef.
With the other pound of ground beef, I made a couple of shepherd's pies.  Infact I think one of the shepherd's pies will feed us two meals.

There should be more mashed potatoes leftover, which I am hoping to make fish cakes with (recipe here.)  They freeze really well.  I have also grated all the cheese for the week, and will just keep that in the fridge ready to use.

All in all this took a couple of hours to prepare and cook and I made:
  • two shepherds pies
  • a baked bean lasagna
  • double baked potatoes
  • mini meatloaves
  • extra mashed potatoes
  • big container of grated cheese
I should do this more often, as it's handy having a number of meals in the freezer ready to pull out and warm through.

10 comments:

MyBulletinBoard said...

Now I am hungry!

Liz, The Republic

Lakeland Jo said...

It all looks very tasty Gill. Is ground beef what we would know as mince or corned beef?
I like both!
Baked bean lasagne? Sounds fascinating..
And pulled pork. Not something we have over here in the UK as you will know, but we had it lots in Seattle last year and loved it X

BadPenny said...

That's great - I could never be that organised ! Do the baked pots heat up nicely ? I'm using a lot from my garden - more planned for next year.

BadPenny said...

I meant the stuffed baked potatoes - sorry ! Do they heat up nicely or are they not precooked but stuffed & ready for the oven ?

I have a slow cooker too !

Justine said...

Very impressed well done -Justine

The Witch said...

Gill,
You really know how to meal plan!
So organized, and everyone looks so tasty.(what time is dinner?)
I bet the new air conditioning really helped while you were baking all this.
Good luck working next week and hopefully the traffic won't get you down.

Karine said...

Gosh, the furthest I go in organizing my meals ahead of time is making pasta the night before my choir practice so I have the leftovers for dinner the next day and just toss them in the microwave to heat them up! That and thawing meat or fish the night before I plan to eat them and sometimes I even manage to forget to do that...

~Kim at Golden Pines~ said...

Gill, I admire how organized you are and putting meals together beforehand. I have to admit that thinking about dinner after a long day at work is never what I want to do which is why I'm glad that Carl doesn't mind eating the occasional frozen diner, or having a bowl of cereal!

Winifred said...

My you are very well organised and that food looks delicious.

Thanks for the recipe, it looks good. I'll give it a try but I'll have to swap the mince for soya.

Have to say I occasionally make an extra meal but I don't freeze it, we eat it the next day! I just don't like frozen food, even home cooked.

Leora said...

So wonderful that you have all this energy. I guess being hungry after a day of work can propel one forward. I need to do some cooking - and it is again too hot here in New Jersey.

{{{SIGH}}}

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