I decided to attempt a modified version of the 30 meals in a day using software and a book called "Dinner is Ready" (you can buy it at www.30mealsinaday.com). I choose 8 recipes and based on serving size, I was able to generate 16 dinners, 6 lunches and an unexpected pot of chicken noodle soup (which equals 2 more dinners and 4 lunches).
Using the software, I picked my recipes, printed my grocery list, food freezer labels and cooking instructions for each item on the menu. I was all set to start shopping. I had a few extra days to look around for deals and I made some concessions on my organic food and bought regular chicken. However, the organic grass fed beef at whole foods was almost $2 cheaper per pound than Jewel's non-organic meat. I got all my canned goods at Target and bought the target brand to save more money. I got my dairy products at Jewel because everything was on sale. Over all, the total cost of food and packaging products it cost me $143.45 (my grocery budget is $220 every 2 weeks) However, when calculating the cost per meal, I didn't include the freezer bags or the aluminum foil because I will be using that for many many more freezer meals and I didn't feel it was fair to include in the per meal cost. So when all the calculations were done and the freezer was stocked it came down to $7.70 per dinner for the whole family. If I include the 10 additional lunches that were also created and break down the cost per meal per person, it comes to $1.92. That beats the cost of eating out any day! There isn't even a hot dog place where I could get dinner that cheap.
As far as the cooking goes, I started one stove top recipe, one crock pot recipe and then I started assembling all the recipes that didn't need to be cooked at all ahead of time. I had cooked all the chicken the day before and cubed and shredded it based on the recipe (these were the recommendations from the book). I also used the food processor to chop 7 onions and shred 2 pounds of cheese. (I always prefer to used cheese not previously shredded because it melts better in any meal.) I started cooking/assembling at 10:30 and I was mostly done by 2. I have most of the kitchen cleaned before bed time. At 9pm last night I started the crock pot again with the slow cook chili and let it cook on low for 10 hours overnight. We woke up to an amazing smell in the house and those meals will be bagged once the chili cooks.
All in all, it was totally worth it. I have 10 lunches for me and Erik and 18 dinners that only took me a total of 5 hours to create. I still have $60 in my budget to include fresh fruits and veggies and of course breakfasts and lunches. Here is the dinner menu I choose:
Broccoli Chicken ad Rice
Cheese Manicotti
Meaty Lasagna
Chicken Enchiladas
Corkscrew Chicken
Cream Cheese Chicken
Slow Cooked Chili
Taco Soup
Chicken Noodle Soup-this happened on accident and I had everything I needed to make it after the face. I made my own stock when I poached all of the chicken ahead of time. The fresh veggies I already had in the fridge!
This was an awesome experience. I would recommend this for anyone on a budget, anyone with time constraints, anyone who doesn't like to cook or doesn't really know how, and really anyone just looking to free up some time in the evenings. The other thing that I thought about was that I will likely only have to clean up the pot I use to reheat the dinner in and the plates we use to eat with :) That saves me TONS of time in itself.
If you live in or near Chicago and your looking to get cooking, I'll be doing this once a month so hit me up if you want to jump on the Once A Month Cooking band wagon and I'll help you get started! I'll let you know how things taste as we thaw and eat the meals!
P.S. If I didn't already say this, the book and the software were what made this a piece of cake!
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