most people wouldn’t admit to living off frozen pies, pizzas and 3min microwave meals would they?
i do admit to buying ready rolled pastry but at least i’m the one making the pie filling 🙂

Agree that ‘ministry of food’ is a great book for people who want to get in to cooking. I still use it when doing a roast.

For currys the hairy bikers curry book is ace. No need to use a paste ever again!

most people wouldn’t admit to living off frozen pies, pizzas and 3min microwave meals would they?

This is true and we may suffer from a confirmation bias.

EDIT: Should we start talking about people we know instead? 🙂

I do most of the cooking in our house (2 adults, 2 young kids).

Apart from the occasional pie, I prepare all the meals from scratch. Some planning is therefore required and double / triple batches, freezing and a slow cooker help.

I find it also helps to fill the fridge with lots of good stuff that I might not usually fancy on a rainy night when I come home late, but no pre-prepared meals – so that I have absolutely no options!

Generally at weekend everything is done from scratch, sauces included. Lots of big batches made for the freezer for easier meed week meals.
During the week we may use bought sauces with the fresh ingredients.
Snacks are my weakness as I always go for the convenience of junk food over making something or even having fruit.

I work 12 hr shifts mix of days and nights, usually end up doing 13-14 hrs due to late finishes. My oh works between 10 and 15 hr long shifts on a 4 on 4 off pattern. We tend to batch cook from scratch then freeze food in meal portions so we just need to reheat after our shifts.

Another vote for Jamie’s Ministry of Food. In fact any Jamie Oliver book is good for starting out. Pat Chapman’s Curry Club books are worth a look although to be honest it’s just as easy to think of a dish and look it up on line.

Always cook from scratch and batch cook for weekday meals. Find ready meals and canned soup to be massively salty.

Cook every night, except when we have fish and chips. Often cook 1 thing for us and 1 for the boys. We both think its really important that the kids grow up seeing us cooking the food from scratch, they will then get used to eating proper food and not processed crap (apart form school dinners!) and hopefully eat properly for their whole life. My wife is Spanish and her Mum is very traditional – i.e. stay at home and spend all morning making the lunch for the family, so I think this has had a big part to play in how we approach things.

We normally cook things that last for a few meals – lasagna, Cottage pie, lentil dishes, stews etc. but also do a lot of simple meat/fish and veg, stir frys or even just pasta, sauce and tuna (we make the sauce in a big batch and freeze), also make big batches of veg soup (or pure) and freeze that (oddly a favorite of our 6 year old!). Occasionally the boys will have a pre-made pizza, but often we do home made ones as its easy to make the dough and freeze it. The 4 year old also loves baked beans so he usually has those for a weekend lunch after playing football.

We buy the normal processed/pre-made foods like bread, sausages (from the farm shop), pasta and have things that aren’t good for you too – nesquick, biscuits, nutella. But the main meals are 90-95% cooked by us.

I don’t really see the need for ready meals, they take 5-8 minutes to heat up if there are 2 of you thats 16 – 20 minutes. Stick a Chicken breast or bit of fish in the oven and cook some veg only takes a maximum of 5mins more, its loads better for you, tastes nice and your not eating it wondering if your eating arseholes.

I used to cook all the time, but the tidal wave of pretentious TV chefs and overpriced ‘Artisan’ ingredients have put me off the whole process.

Tonight I will be having Mini Kievs for dinner.

Yes, everything from scratch, if people can’t find time to prepare and cook good nutritious food perhaps they need to sort out priorities.
Boiled eggs on wholemeal toast takes less than 10 minutes, beats a Dominos pizza hands down.

Boiled eggs on wholemeal toast takes less than 10 minutes, beats a Dominos pizza hands down.

really ? I think my family would disagree 🙂

As a knife enthusiast or kitchen knife to be specific the joy of cooking is preparing the ingredients … chopping things up.

Yes, I cook from scratch so I don’t buy ready cooked meal.

I use Thai curry paste but I can to make it myself if I want just that it’s not worth my time.

I make vegetables pickles(Korean Kimchi … damn jar lid is stuck and wouldn’t open dammit!)

Boiled eggs on wholemeal toast takes less than 10 minutes, beats a Dominos pizza hands down.

what are you doing for the other 6 mins?

depends if your family are into greasy fatty salty artery clogging stodge really…

never really got dominos/pizza hut pizzas they aint all that good(flavour and texture) and the boxes make great firelighters afterwards. id rather the eggs on toast (which is a dish fit for kings ill have you know)

If i want a take away pizza for what ever reason ill nip down to the local italian restaurant and grab a take away. thin crust, stone baked crunch,doesnt leave a drop of grease on the box and cheaper to boot.(fellow formite rustymac found this gem of a pizza place – you wouldnt look twice at it normally for getting a pizza)

I use Thai curry paste but I can to make it myself if I want just that it’s not worth my time.

With one of these it takes about 30 secs

i got one of them for xmas dmorts – has revolutionised soups/salsas/guacamole/currys

I wouldn’t be without one!

Everything from scratch here as well. That includes bread, stock, spice pastes, etc. We do make large batches of staples and reheat from frozen. A load of things are made from leftovers and we have very little food waste. We both work full time and one of the best things that I have found is that the kids now take part and make some meals themselves (12 and 9 yo). We have just been decorating and the kids took it upon themselves to make lunch and dinner whilst we we working so this is a definite result.

Most of this comes from two drivers: being tight and liking the taste of food. The contents of a lot of prepared food is eye popping (palm oil, just don’t start me on that one, it is in everything!). My wife has a very restrictive diet and the best way to cope with this is to make all our food from scratch. I still manage to waste time one here so it can’t take too much time 😉

is the question about what we (STW) do or what people do?

We cook from scratch most of the time – in fact when we are both late from work we sometimes resort to takeway as there are no fallback options.

But i don’t think that’s normal.

My brother thinks cooking involves the oven, even if you just heat stuff up. A special dinner he made for a girl: Breaded chicken breast sliced & lettuce in a wrap!

He also recently served his GF breaded chicken breast for dinner, nothing else! she was not impressed 😯

is the question about what we (STW) do or what people do?

Both

dmorts – Member

I use Thai curry paste but I can to make it myself if I want just that it’s not worth my time.

With one of these it takes about 30 secs[/quote]

Yes, I have that gadget I still need to wash the blade and container if I use it … 😀

Ready made Thai curry paste (made in Thailand) is much preferred for me. Just scoup two (or as desire) table spoons from the container … add other fresh ingredients and everything is done.

i get weird looks at work for turning up with a tub of home made soup and bread wrapped in tinfoil…… usually followed up by you know they sell that in cans for not very much money right ?

so no i dont think its normal at all…. but seeing how some folk eat is quite scary …..

im definantly in the

being tight and liking the taste of food. The contents of a lot of prepared food is eye popping (palm oil, just don’t start me on that one, it is in everything!)

. camp how ever im not holyier than thou when im traveling with work i can go for weeks without seeing a cooker or a meal and exist on noodles by kettle….

Just means i appreciate good food more when im home and dont shovel in the shit.

is this a real question? ‘do people cook?’

I think its a question a lot of people don’t really ask themselves. I remember in dim and distant past of the iDave threads – that discussion often revolved more around how to cook than how to eat. I think people ‘thought’ they cooked until the things the diet excluded made them realise they didn’t. Theres a spectrum between microwaving ready meals and catch/kill/eat where people often think they’re cooking but they’re actually warming up various pre-prepared components.

On the whole I cook – except for the rest of the family’s love for filled pasta.
So no I don’t bake bread or make pasta. I use curry paste (as the rest of the family aren’t keen on spice so keeping ingredients and making paste is not economical).

Yes I am economic so don’t waste much food and only occasionally eat out as it’s often lower quality than home cooking.

they’re actually warming up various pre-prepared components.

I think this is a good way into cooking proper, but you need to keep trying new things.

An example is Dolmio ‘bolognese’ sauces. I think one of the first things I learnt to ‘cook’ was spag bol using Dolmio. Essentially brown the mince, add the sauce and simmer.

If I make a bolognese/ragu sauce now, it’s sauce from scratch and never served with Spaghetti. Tagliatelle or other flatter pasta instead. This isn’t being a snob, flat pasta picks up the sauce, spaghetti doesn’t 🙂

Today’s sauce has at least 2 hours on simmer, the old version had about 20 mins.

EDIT:
Just looked up Dolmio out of curiosity. The instructions are as follows

Brown 400g of mince for approx. 5 mins, until cooked through. Add your DOLMIO Bolognese sauce, bring to a simmer for 5-10 mins whilst gently stirring. Serve over spaghetti, or your favourite pasta and enjoy.

5-10 mins! Lovely chewy, indigestible mince there!

Bit of both here,

We have 2 kids and both work, so it takes some doing.

The week starts on a Sunday with the roast dinner, this week a 2.5kg turkey crown that was £8 in January after every one stopped eating turkey again for another year.

So, roast dinner out of that, then 3 Tupperware-ed roast dinners for the freezer for lunch Monday, Tuesday and one left over.

Made a thai red curry out of half of what was left of the mega turkey crown Sunday night and chucked that in the fridge for heating up for Monday night’s dinner, yes I make my own paste. 3 of those in the freezer as well, for today’s (eating it right now) and tomorrow’s lunches.

The cheese sauce from the cauliflower cheese that was part of the roast (don’t judge me) I made too much of to keep some back for the white sauce of the lasagne that I put together last night, fed 4 people, and have maybe 1.5 – 2 portions left of indoors.

Tonight, I need to do something with the remaining turkey, thinking maybe either a risotto with a bit of chorizo, or maybe just a good old fashioned soup, not sure, but there will doubtless be leftovers of that as well that can all go in the chest freezer.

It’s been a good week, but, off work Friday and going away so won’t be in at the weekend at all. Therefore next week will be a blur of egg and beans on toast, Costco chicken nuggets in fajita wraps, fish finger sandwiches and curly fries while we desperately try to catch up with the mountains of washing and ironing, shopping, tidying, cleaning etc, and living out of the freezer for work lunches. Then back to the beginning again the following week.

palm oil, just don’t start me on that one, it is in everything!

Yep, very difficult to avoid completely.

can some one define what “cooking” is before I answer this question

It seems to involve “ingredients” and from “scratch”.

Me and my wife like stir frys and we like rice, also we dont “need” particularly strong flavours, we also like vegatables.

So normally the plan is fry up what ever meat we have, ie chicken, turkey, beef, lamb. Boil up some rice.

Then cut up a load of vegatable’s what ever we have ie onions, peppers, runner beans, courgeuts, brocoli, what ever is there.

We then normally add a few herbs/garlic or ginnger to add a bit of taste.

This takes no time about 20mins, no thought and no skill. It often quicker than putting a ready meal in oven (although u cant sit down).

Is this “cooking” ?

We have 2 kids and both work

Is that legal?

Is this “cooking” ?

I’d say so

palm oil, just don’t start me on that one, it is in everything!

Yep, very difficult to avoid completely.

And as someone who can’t eat it …. frickin Skimmed Milk Powder – its in so, so much food

I’ve always considered cooking a waste of time. I stopped thinking that I had to have a cooked meal every night years ago. Now, I mostly have some toast, or open up a tin of soap and warm it up.Sometimes beans or cheese on toast. Maybe my wife will cook a meal over the weekend. And no, I don’t get bored with the same thing every night.
Doesn’t seem to have done me much harm.

^ Wash your mouth out! Oh, hang on…

perchypanther – Member
Generally we/I cook a meal every night and by cook I mean starting from base ingredients
Guessing you don’t have kids?

err – surely that’s the best reason to cook and start from scratch!

I cook everything except the odd waitrose pizza or curry if I’m smashed from biking or boozing. I do know people who don’t cook though, and there are a few people in the office who’ll usually demolish a microwave lasagne or something for lunch with all it’s 30g of fat. They don’t look very well though.

palm oil, just don’t start me on that one, it is in everything!

I was dissapointed to notice it’s in Soreen Malt Loaf yesterday

Vast majority of meals yes, we got lazy a few years ago and it wasn’t good for our health. So we stopped being lazy and started cooking properly again. Yes I have kids but not sure why that makes a difference.

I do know people who don’t cook though

Yep – same here.
My Sister-in-law (late 30’s – single mum to ‘challenging’ 9 year old lad)

Cannot cook anything beyond boiling pasta and grating cheese over the top.
I sometimes wonder if living on student food/toast/pasta with cheese+tomato puree is the reason her kid is such a little sh*t.

We cook the vast majority of our meals from scratch, except for things like the odd jar of pasta sauce. Once every couple of weeks or so we might have oven chips and a pie or something. Never microwaveable ready meals. Probably the most processed things I have are tinned soups and they’re quite rare.
As MrsSalmon is vegan we don’t actually have a lot of choice though!

Drac – Moderator
Vast majority of meals yes, we got lazy a few years ago and it wasn’t good for our health. So we stopped being lazy and started cooking properly again. Yes I have kids but not sure why that makes a difference.

I was just responding to the post that suggested with children you couldn’t cook, due to time constraints I guess from the post. Personally i try to be a little bit aware about what i feed mine so prefer to cook from scratch or as near to it as i can. And no i’m not some knit your own yoghurt earth mother type – i just feel they should have healthy food.

It takes the same amount of time to rustle up a quick meal as it does to reheat a ready meal

Made some dumplings yesterday with vegetable suet. The fat that came out of them was pretty nasty….Yip…..Palm Oil….I will be going back to the old stuff