Weezl and friends Phase 2 -giving it a whirl for Shirl! Testing meal plan for a month

Helen105

Weezl I've written a suggested form of the intro to batch cooking:

"In order to make the plan work for you, it is a good idea to start with a concentrated burst of cooking to get as much out of the way as possible. Somethings (bread, pate etc ) have to be made ahead whereas others (grating cheese, soaking and cooking chick peas for example) will speed up your cooking later in the week.
To help you we have written out a suggested plan for a day of batch cooking, this could just as easily be split into two morning sessions, over Saturday & Sunday for example. If you are very busy then choose two of the spreads (apple curd, pate, nut butter, houmous) and two of the snacks (carrot cake, raisin scones, cheese scones, savoury bites), these together with the bread will see you through the week, you can always fit in the other recipes later to add variety.”

Then write the plan as if they were making everything but put a distinct break in either for lunch or to finish Saturday morning and start again Sunday morning.
This is just a suggestion, others may think differently or think I was particularly slow at the batch cooking.

Helen105

weezl74 wrote: »

Helen, I've added in ingredients to melt the lard. What shall I add to the mayo recipe?

Would it be possible to say what it should look like? As in "It should now have the consistency of thick cream, it will however thicken up during the night" If that is how it should have looked, as I say I have never had any sucess with mayo so I don't know.

weezl74

tank you helen that's great.

I've added to melt the lard for the savoury bites, and hopefully shanks will give us some tweaks on the mayo and lesley can add her winning ways with the onion tart pastry

Were there other amendments I need to make?

I'll wrack my brains for what you can do about the mayo

Thanks for all your hard work

weezl74

Helen105 wrote: »

Would it be possible to say what it should look like? As in "It should now have the consistency of thick cream, it will however thicken up during the night" If that is how it should have looked, as I say I have never had any sucess with mayo so I don't know.

thank you helen :A I've added your wording now.

Do you feel that's more helpful for shirley now?

weezl74

pate-wise, we can up the onions or we can add a little mashed potato to make a blander pate? do you feel that would have helped?

How thickly spread did you guys have it?

In_Search_Of_Me

morning all!
Helen just out of interest do you normally cook from scratch? Just me being nosy!! As one who has gradually gone from always eating ready meals to mostly cooking from scratch I know I would have been quite overwhelmed by so much cooking at once but now would be ok - but would prob do it in couple of stages! You also have my sympathies with mayo...I just cannot seem to get it (despite sucessfully doing merangue, jam, profeteroles etc!!) and have always ended up chucking it...now get it in aldi! Will have a look at menu and see what mum would like to try (here recovering from pneumonia)...am now lodgerless and reclaiming my space! bliss!!

kezlou

Wow the threads shot up over the weekend. Looks like you have all been busy.
Hi to all newcomers!
I haven't started batch cooking today as i'm shattered and only just finished my driving lesson. But will start in a sec and crack on with it..

Will look back over the thread to catch up with up with you all x

artybear

Helen-your introduction is very helpful to more inexperienced cooks, I think an emphasis on how it will help save time throughout the month is important or else people may not bother to do it and I feel you have put that across nicely.

Its good you bread came out nicely *dont be jealous arty, dont be jealous arty*

You are all doing a brilliant job-Weezl the website is fantastic and I am very envious of your photographic abilities. However what are the little grey boxes next to all the headings?

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weezl74

artybear wrote: »

Helen-your introduction is very helpful to more inexperienced cooks, I think an emphasis on how it will help save time throughout the month is important or else people may not bother to do it and I feel you have put that across nicely.

Its good you bread came out nicely *dont be jealous arty, dont be jealous arty*

You are all doing a brilliant job-Weezl the website is fantastic and I am very envious of your photographic abilities. However what are the little grey boxes next to all the headings?

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would a tiny picture look more effective there instead arty?

artybear

I dont no weezl-they were just confusing me? They look like they should be clicked but when I clicked nothing happened. Its a purely aesthetic thing so dont worry about it.:)