Wean me from my ready meals please!

alyth

Right, as the title suggests, my idea of cooking is to go to M&S and buy the food for the week. However, I'm starting to realise that whilst it's easy, it's not particularly healthy, and there's a limit to how many varieties of chicken in sauce or salmon dishes you can eat in one week! So, I'd like to try and make supper when I come home from work at night. I'm aware of meal planning, and will try and do that. But there are a few obstacles:

neither partner nor I enjoy frozen meat.
I have a very small freezer so batch cooking isn't really viable.
Neither of us enjoy pasta in any form.
I'm a terrible cook, and don't particularly enjoy it.
I get home from work at 6.30 each evening and don't want to spend an hour preparing a meal.

Can anyone reccomend either a good basic cookery book or some decent recipes I can start with? We eat a lot of fish and meat, oven chips figure in a lot of our meals, and whilst I'm not on a budget I really am getting fed up of eating the same thing over and over again!

I'm going to sit down this weekend and try and menu plan a bit, but my partner can come home any time between 6.30 - 8.30 each evening so it would be nice to have something quick, easy and simple!

Weekends aren't a problem because we always try and cook something together, and if we have for example a chicken on a Sunday I'll make a curry for the Monday evening, but it's so easy just to throw something in the oven and I'd like to try and improve my cooking skills, and I know so many of you on this board are skilled at making decent meals in the space of 5 minutes, can anyone offer any advice? Thanks.

Lil2002

Sounds like you need a slowcooker! The perfect end to a long day at work, opening the door and smelling dinner is already done.

Loads of recipes here - http://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/showthread.html?p=1332010#post1332010

alyth

thanks, I had thought of that a while ago but hadn't really looked into it in any great depth - I'm out of the house for maybe 10/11 hours a day at work, so not sure whether they would be suitable, but I'll have a quick look at the link you posted tonight and see if it would be any good - thanks, I appreciate it.

Lil2002

I do it all the time with mine (out of the house at 7.30 AM, home about 5 PM), and everything just tastes better. You can buy cheaper cuts of meat because the long slow cooking time just improves it.

Beef stew with red wine, yum. Chicken thigh curry.:j
Best thing I ever bought for the kitchen.

Elliesmum

I go with the slow cooker idea as well. There are loads of recipe ideas on here to start you off. I'm just getting together the ingredients for a sausage casserole for tomorrow's dinner which everyone says is nicer out of the slow cooker.

HTH's

EM Xx

alyth

oh my god, sausage casserole, my mother made me eat that for years when I was a kid and I cannot even bear to think about it 20 years later!!! I'm just browsing through some SC recipes now, and I have to say it's looking good! apart from stews/casseroles, what other sort of things can you cook in them? I'm terribly ashamed of my ready made meal indulgence, I'm starting to realise they're not that great even from M&S, and if I could chuck some chicken in a SC and then do potatoes when I came home from work, that would be brilliant! It's the health aspect rather than money-saving to be honest, when I try and menu plan I end up spending more than I would on the ready meals, but having sorted out most other aspects of my life now I feel cooking is something I should tackle!

I'm still reeling from the sausage casserole!

badkitti

if you get a slow cooker, then i found this book really helpful:
http://www.amazon.co.uk/200-Low-Carb-Slow-Cooker-Recipes/dp/1592330762/ref=sr_1_1/202-4841597-5823847?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1187300209&sr=1-1



However, forgive me, but I don't understand what you mean by frozen meat - you mean as opposed to fresh? Is it worth buying a small freezer?

I find a helpful trick is to have a standby of quick meals for emergencies when you really, really can't be bothered. For us these are tuna pasta (i appreciate you don't like pasta) or haddock fish fingers. i also keep udon noodles, thai curry paste and tins of coconut milk handy and 10mins in a supermarket gets me some salmon to make a lovely thai curry salmon meal. if, due to a feezer lack, you're already popping to M+S regularly for ready meals, this shouldn't be difficult.

Buy a mandolin and make stirfries as well.

I quite lie cooking myself and hope soon to make it a jint coupley time where we can chat about day whilst we cook.

I hope like me, that after a while of home cooking you'll find that you can really tell the difference between them and ready meals.

lil_me

Best thing I did to get off ready meals was invest in a bigger additional freezer to keep my own HM ones (meal in a plastic carton saved could be defrosted ready to reheat when you get home) and a slow cooker to bulk cook easier.

I also struggle to understand the frozen meat issue, goes into a lot of ready meals (I know people who work in the factories, I won't bore you with the horror stories) freezing stuff just keeps it 'as it is' for longer.

I didn't enjoy cooking, to be honest still a bit of a chore sometimes, but I enjoy the results and the fact what I am making for me is a darn sight better for me than the slop (ready made food) I used to eat.

odds-n-sods

not sure I understand the frozen meat issue either, can you explain?? If its about texture; if the meat is wrapped up well, and frozen quickly - iE: not in a block with other unfrozen stuff trying to freeze in the freezer, then there is little difference between fresh and frozen.

Stirfrys are quick and easy; and Nigella does a great dish as well - chicken pieces, new potatoes, courgettes and peppers all roasted in 1 pan, bung everything in with drizzled olive oil, salt + pepper, a few garlic cloves, a chili if you like, and maybe some fresh herbs if you've got them, then into the oven for 45 minutes or until the chicken is cooked. Fast to do, you can have a salad while you wait and easy.

lynzpower

best thing to do is to think about what sort of things you buy regularly, and what sort of thing youd like to make at home?

thriftlady_2

Get yourself a copy of Nigel Slater's Real Fast Food from the library. It's full of excellent ideas that are easy and very quick;)