Love and Hate; Garlic and Onions

I'm sure every cook has random things they hate doing. For me it's peeling anything. It's just a nuisance that makes me yearn for a sous chef. I especially hate papery things like onions and garlic--the building blocks to 90% of what I cook.The nice thing about a prep day is that there isn't much more effort in peeling 10 garlic cloves than there is in peeling one. Ditto onions. And then you don't have to think about it EVER AGAIN. (Well, for the week at least.)

And this week's menu is planned. Some repeats from the first week which ended in a blaze of late work nights and desperate food scrounging at the office. (And then I've been a bit sick and living on Pho.) I'm also going to have to watch the pot pie intake. It is a little bit too exciting to have weekly.

 

And a week's worth of prep work is finished:

It's such a small pile that represents half a Sunday's efforts: planning, shopping, cleaning, peeling, slicing, dicing, chopping, packaging. But as someone who wants to cook every night that she can, it's most definitely a labor of love. There's also a cucumber-tomato relish to eat with a naan/keema-muttar (ground beef/pea curry) soft taco and raita sauce for lunches this week.

The other massive bonus, which is obvious but still caught me by surprise, is how much less money I'm spending on groceries as well as how much less food is being wasted. My fridge is less packed, but everything is more accessible and relevant.

I think it'll take a few months to really see the difference in my expenses, but so far I'm spending about 1/2-1/3 the amount I usually spend at the market.

More money for shoes! I mean, for my savings account...

 

 

Comments

[Becky B]

This is absolutely brilliant. I have to say, I never thought of doing the prep in one day but OF COURSE! Will I ever do it myself? Well... I'm certainly going to keep it in mind as an option. :-)

[Jeena Khan]

I won't lie, it's not so much fun on a Sunday (or whenever) when you're methodically cleaning a bushel of produce; but it has made dinner every night this week so effortless!