This is not a Cooking Blog but...

This is certainly not supposed to be a cooking blog! However, I see that my last post (almost a month ago) was all about my first try at once a month cooking and this post is going to be about my second attempt at it. 

I wish there had been some posts in between...but you see life gets in the way and that's why I am absolutely in love with this new way of cooking! Yes, it's a ton of work. Yes, it takes a lot of planning.  Yes, it eats up an ENTIRE day.  Yes, it is tiring.  BUT, the work is worth it.  The planning can save money on the food bill.  The time that I spent in the kitchen yesterday was busy and went by quickly thanks to some great company! And it is tiring, but it is a satisfying tired that ends with a fully stocked freezer and the most sound and restful sleep of the month! 

Some things I learned:

 I wish I had a double sink! It would make clean up a little smoother I think!  It's hard to cook and clean when the sink is being utilized for cooking and cleaning at the same time.

I feel really blessed to have paired up with Janene. I quickly realize that she and I have the perfect temperaments to work together well.  We are able to compromise and we are both easy going enough that when we run into a snag we agree on a course of action quickly and keep moving.  We know each other well enough to feel comfortable around each other, but not so well that we have nothing to talk about. It's been fun getting to know each other better. 

I am going to start a journal about our cooking day and how well my family enjoys the recipes we make.  Maybe one month we can compile our family favorites and cook them all again!

We had music playing for a good bit of the day, when the Steeler game wasn't on in the background and it was fun making our play lists and sharing our musical tastes together too!

So what did we cook this month??

For Breakfast: Homemade Applesauce--SO much better than the stuff that comes in jars!

Maple Oat Scones (tea anyone?).

Green Chili Egg Muffins--so messy! My husband reports that they taste wonderful after about a minute in the microwave, but that the muffin liner kind of sticks to them.

For Lunch: Pizza Muffins--these smell like pizza flavored Combos! But they have a slightly sweet taste to them. Dipped in pizza sauce they will be a good mid-day treat.

BBQ Baked Potatoes--they seem like they will taste good!

Beef Stew--a heartier version than last month I think.

And Black Bean and Salsa Quesadillas--Yummy!

For Dinner: Pepperoncini Beef Sammy's,

Pizza Casserole,

Eggplant Parm (really looking forward to this one!)

Shepherd's Pie--this isn't something I would typically make, so I'm interested to see how it goes over in our house!

Cream Cheese Chicken--looks simple and tasty. 

Crock pot Chipotle Lime Black bean Soup---this has a KICK!

We had four crock pots going at once!

Mexican Baked Penne

and Chicken Lasagna Roll ups!

 You can find the site we use to find grocery lists, recipes and instructions right HERE. 

 We started at around 9:15am took a short break for lunch and dinner and we were cleaning up by 7:30pm.  I hope to shave more time off this cooking day next month!  I am so grateful to Janene for pairing up with me!  Dinner is no sweat now!!!

Dinner is Done.

For the entire month. 

What would possess someone to cook a month's worth of meals in one day? I became possessed by the idea of freeing up that dreaded dinner hour.  I became possessed with the idea of not having to rack my brain for dinner ideas and scurry around the kitchen trying to make a dinner that should take an hour fit into the 45 minutes that I actually could spare to get it on the table. 

I found the answer months ago when a friend introduced me to OAMM and I remember putting out a feeler on Face book about it.  I think some people where intrigued, but no one took the bait.  That is until one day last month when I got an unexpected message from Janene asking if I had been serious about my interest in giving it a try.

I had to think about it for oh....two seconds before I wrote back to say that I wanted to do it. I kind of thought it would be hard work.  But I also thought the rewards could be worth the effort and then some. My biggest concern was figuring out how to keep four kids occupied!

Cooking once a month is a good thing for the following reasons: 

You don't have to think about what's for dinner.

You don't have to mess around with mixing and pulling out ingredients and rummaging through cookbooks all early afternoon. Every. Single. Day. Of. The. Week.

You can feel confident that when handing the keys to the kitchen over to someone else, they can do better than pulling a prepackaged pizza from the freezer.

When you've had a busy day it is as easy as preheating the oven and popping in a pan.

If you prepare in the month prior to cooking, you can save money by shopping sales and using coupons!  We cooked our whole menu for less than $150 a piece and from that we each got 16 dinners, 8 lunches, 6 breakfasts (the breakfasts I have been using as grab and go, so it actually seems like more than 6!) That means feeding my family of 6 costs a little less than $5/meal.

'Twas the night before our Big Cooking Day!

These are as delicious as they look!

I was so nervous about these bags leaking! It was tough dividing our White Chicken Chili, Beef Stew, and Chili into those bags!

I cannot wait to dig into the black beans and rice. They smelled REALLY Good while cooking.

I think I'm in love with my Food Processor. It was SO under utilized before our big cooking day and WOW. I am in awe at that thing! Those perfect cheese shreds from the black beans and rice dish?  Under 2 seconds using this baby.

This was during the last third of our cooking day and LOOK! We are still smiling!

And the kids stayed out of our hair for the most part!

Some of our meals packaged and ready for the freezer!

I can't wait until next month!

Thanks, Janene!