Wednesday, February 11, 2015

The Lazy Cook..........

I am a lazy cook.  I spend as little time as possible in the kitchen, but I do like to cook.  I tend to go into the kitchen at 4 pm and have dinner on the table by 5 pm.  More often than not, it'll only take me half an hour to cook dinner, which I think is about as long as it should take in my humble opinion.

So due to this "laziness" of mine, I try and do things to cut down on the prep.  If you remember I picked up a club pack of ground beef (mince).  A "club pack" means its a bigger than normal pack, which in this case was just under four pounds of ground beef.  Paid $15.25 for it, as it was "on sale" at $3.99 per pound.  Gone are the days when you could get lean ground beef for under $2 a pound {{SIGH}}

So on Tuesday I decided I had better sort out this pack of ground beef.  I cut up three large onions and browned them along with the ground beef in batches.

I also cooked a large pan of potatoes at the same time.

I ended up with this:
A shepherd's pie, which also used up some mashed carrots and turnip.  Six 8 oz bags of ground beef and onions and one 4 oz bag of ground beef and onions, all ready to pull out of the freezer when needed.  I also have a large tupperware container of mashed potatoes and a bag of mashed potatoes that I am going to put in the freezer.

When we were in Britain I picked up the following:
I used the shepherd's pie mix for the shepherd's pie.  We can probably get all these mixes over here, just wanted to try them and at 1 British Pound for all three they were a good buy I thought.  The 4 oz bag of beef and onion, will be used when I make the Bolognese, as I will "beef" it up with other veggies.  Just having the packages of beef and onion and the mashed potatoes all ready to go will save me time in the kitchen and time wise it probably took less than two hours.  

Would have been less but the mail lady called by with my new Passport............no excuse why I can't fly now!!!  {{{SIGH}}}

By the way feeling much better.

11 comments:

Boopnut said...

I would say you are rather industrious to make ahead that much for your meals! I have been thinking along those lines as well, but haven't put it into practice.
I am so sorry to hear you weren't feeling well. Did you try something like Gas-X? It is something in the states with charcoal to help rid the gas.
Hugs,
Deb

Maggie said...

I'm with you, I don't like cooking much and tend to batch cook similar to what you have done. I buy extra lean minced beef and it's gone up so much 500g was almost £5 in Tesco last week, I buy it when it's reduced, not difference if its going into the freezer anyway :-)

Aodhnait said...

You're my type of cook Gil!

Boyett-Brinkley said...

I should make more of an effort to cook ahead but when I do, I forget it is in the freezer! I am really, really bad at domesticity.

Country Gal said...

I used to make my Shepperd's pie with ground roast lamb from the Sunday before but now I just use ground beef and make a cottage pie . One of Papa's favorite dinners . I don't mind cooking gives me something to do lol ! Thanks for sharing , Have a good day !

Jane said...

That's the way I like to cook too - big batches and freeze half for another day...or two. Economical too!

William Kendall said...

My mother would tend to buy club packs like that, divide up the meat, and freeze everything.

Rose said...

Our beef prices just keep raising and raising...bacon has settled down for a while at around $4.50 per pound. At least at one store.

I do not mind cooing if something sounds really good.

Jane and Chris said...

I batch cook,so we have several ready prepped meals in the freezer,so I just have to do veg etc on the day.
Jane x

Linda said...

Hi Gill,

So glad you are feeling much better. I love the idea of Shepherd's Pie with turnips and carrots!

Fat Dormouse said...

Most of my meals are cooked in under half an hour (or prepped & then cooked for longer in the oven) If you want to try some different recipes you can pop over to see what we have each week. Nice to read your blog - I came via the Maple Syrup Mob

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