Last fall when I was home, I was doing the majority of the cooking for me and my parents. Not that my mom doesn’t cook, ’cause she does, she would just rather have me do it because she has less time. But last week, she and a friend went to Dream Dinners, a program where you make a month’s worth of meals in about 2 hours. You pick the meals you want to make and bring a cooler, they provide the food and the recipes. As my mom said, “You go in with nothing!” I think I saw something about this or something similar on the Food Network once. Basically, their philosophy is that it’s easy to make a homecooked dinner every night of the week if you set aside a couple hours on the weekend for basic prep work, such as chopping vegetables, making sauces, etc. and freezing everything. When you get home, all your meals are labeled in plastic bags, you stick them in the freezer, and defrost and cook when you want them.

Tonight we had the Oven-Baked Almond Chicken, with a crispy panko-almond crust, and it was delish. Mom made 12 meals, of 6 servings each, for roughly $200- which is not a bad deal at all, considering that there are 3 of us. Tomorrow we plan to have the Grilled Salmon with Lemon Garlic Butter, which is defrosting in the fridge. (See the rest of May’s Menu)

It’s a darn good idea, and easy too! Mostly geared towards busy moms, but I think its great. Their philosophy of spending a few hours a week doing prep will work for anyone. Even if you can’t make it to a Dream Dinners location, try the method. And, they make it hard to screw up the recipes, so even someone who can’t cook could do it.