How To:Once a Month Cooking

Once a month cooking (OAMC) is a way to get nutritious, delicious , homemade food on to the table with minimal daily work.Basically, as the name implies, you do the majority of your shopping once a month, and take a couple of days to prepare main courses and put them in the freezer. We call that one day Hell Day at our house but it has been so helpful over the years.Some people do once a month cooking literally once a month, others use the principles to help with organization and to have things made ahead in the freezer for those days that they are too busy. I generally use a combination of OAMC, crock-pot meals, and regular cooking during the month with good results. Mainly, you need to tailor it for your family and your life-style. Think of it as being your own personal chef!Day One : Menu

Day one is going t be your menu making day. You will choose main courses for as many days as you wish. For the purposes of this article, we will assume 30. One of the ways that I have found to make this part easier is to have theme days every week. For example:

Monday-hamburger based meal

Tuesday- Smoked sausage based meal

Wednesday- Chicken based meal

Thursday- Pasta

Friday- homemade pizza

Saturday- soup

Sunday- Stew or roast

I like to laminate my menus and rotate them monthly, having a different menu for each month but keeping the same menus year in and year out. Variety with out all the work!

With that in mind I will choose my recipes, and keeping track of ingredients. If I need an onion for the pizza sauce and two onions for the stew then I will need 3 onions total. Figure up all the ingredients that you need for the month and make a list.

Hamburger- 25 lbs

Stew meat- 8 lbs

carrots-5 lbs

and on. It will seem like an extraordinary amount of food but you will actually be saving money by shopping this way because you will use everything. You will also need freezer bags in several sizes, and microwave friendly casserole dishes. I like to pick them up at thrift stores when i see them because I can often get casserole dishes for 1-2 dollars each and just freeze the food in the container I plan to serve it in.

You will also need heavy duty aluminum foil.

Plan the steps you will use in your cooking. For example, put stew ingredients in crock-pot, cook all of the hamburger at once and set aside. Cook all of the onions and set aside, cook all of the macaroni and set aside…

Day Two: Shopping and Preparation

Take another adult with you and leave the little ones at home. You will need to concentrate when you shop.

Because you are buying in such large amounts you might want to try Costco I do not shop at Sam’s or Walmart personally, however Sam’s would be another place to get items in bulk. Buy yourself a special snack, a special tea or coffee, and your favorite magazine. Do NOT skip this.
When you get home arrange the food on the counter (if you have space) according to how you are going to use it. Put it away in that order so you can get it quickly and easily.

Chop all of the onions you need chopped and place them in a ziploc in the fridge. Chop all of the green peppers, the celery, the carrots…what ever you can cut up ahead of time do so. If you are going to be using a whole chicken, or a couple of whole chickens, put them in the crock-pot the night before cooking day so they will be cooked and ready to go in the morning.

Day 3: Cooking

Prepare the ingredients according to your plan. Once all of your ingredients are cooked you will begin to assemble the dishes.

1. Assemble all of the hamburger based dishes. Place in the containers you will be using for freezing. Set aside to cool. Take a label and write the name of the dish and short instructions on it and stick it to the top of the container. Also attach any added ingredient for toppings, like shredded cheese, in a separate bag.

example:

1/4/08 to be served 1/19/08

Lasagne:

Thaw over night. Bake at 375 for 45 minutes . Sprinkle with cheese. Bake 15 more minutes. Serve with garlic bread, green beans, and tiramisu.

Allow the dishes to cool while you go on to the next thing. Move through the recipes in a logical fashion as much as possible. Assemble all the hamburger meals, then all the chicken meals, etc.

Clean as you go! Keep a sink full of soapy, hot water, changing as needed, to toss dirty utensils in so they don’t stack up. Wipe up spills as the happen.

Take a break after 3 hours. Brew your coffee or tea, put your snack on a nice plate and go to another room, taking your magazine. Set a timer for 20 minutes, sit in a comfy chair and relax.

Return to the scullery and finish up.

Once the meals are packaged for the freezer, cooked, and labeled place them in the freezer with the meals you will use later in the month at the bottom. Save one meal out for dinner.

Now, just enjoy. Post the menu on the fridge and just remember to pull the frozen meal out the night before to thaw. If you are running late, sick, or something comes up you can simply tell someone to pop the meal in the oven and your dinner is done. Clean up is easy, most of the mess has all ready been taken care of. And, if a neighbor becomes ill you can easily take them a meal from your stash.

How cool is that? Here are some more links you may find useful:

Once A Month Cooking World

includes printable menus and grocery lists

Once A Month Cooking

Tips, links and recipes

Menu & Meal Planning

Printable forms

And of course, keep checking Baking Delights where I will be posting recipes and hints weekly!