I missing cooking dinner wholeheartedly

@snlmommy First your husband needs to do more and stop utilizing weaponized incompetence. Second, I literally start the dinner process around nap time (chop stuff, get ingredients organized, get the right pots and pans) then around 3, I start cooking. There’s no way I would ever be able to make a cohesive meal if I started an hour before dinner. And this is with my husband’s help!
 
@snlmommy Ahh solidarity. I used to enjoy cooking so much. My son has a lot of food allergies so that has complicated things but I feel like I have the same few meals on repeat. Recently I was able to cook a meal interrupted and I forgot how good it felt.
 
@snlmommy I have been using recipes that call for a brine for the meat. It's cool cause it's so quick to make the brine. Then you get to put it in the fridge for 12 hours to 3 days and just put it in the oven when you are ready to cook it. The brine is the"gourmet" extra aspect of the meal. It turns out so flavorful.
 
@snlmommy Please do. We eat venison and had a shoulder, which is a cut my husband has never cared for. I brine the shoulder and even used some unusual ingredients (shaoxing wine and seaweed) not knowing how it would turn out. He loved it and we were both surprised by how well it turned out.

I love to cook steaks on the cast iron and I do a dry-brine on those. I coat with the seasonings and let it sit for at least an hour but more is better. And as long as you allow time for the meat to come to temperature before cooking, it only takes 10 minutes to finish cooking.

I love meals where I can do small steps hours in advance so when we are ready it all comes together so easily.

I also make my own frozen biscuits, Golden Pantry style, using a whole 5 lb bag of flour, half gallon of buttermilk and 16 oz of lard and cut and freeze those. It makes like, 60 biscuits, and its and extra homemade touch to certain meals that is so easy to prep for.
 
@snlmommy I get it! It takes until my kids are 2ish to be able to help/entertain themselves enough for me to make more elaborate dinners.

One thing that does help is using precut veggies, or cut them ahead of time. I also like to "make" dump in the crockpot meals, where I freeze everything together ahead of time (so I can use my preferred ingredients) so it still tastes homemade.
 
@snlmommy I’m not a chef. I just want decent, hot food at dinner and not too many dishes, so I use the crock pot a lot plus do a bit of prep the night before once the kids are sleeping. If cooking is your thing, set up once or twice a week for you to have that time. Maybe Saturday morning, for instance, and have a nice dinner at lunchtime. Or Friday evening if that’s a day that you don’t mind everyone staying up a little.
 
@snlmommy I can relate. What I found to be helpful is cooking dinner earlier in the day (like between breakfast and lunch or afternoon when my youngest naps) then I put it in the fridge until dinner. It’s not ideal but it helps so I’m not rushing at night.
 
@notly1988 We all go to bed at like 9pm. lol he wakes up at 5am for work. And I try to sleep when LO goes to sleep. If I wait until she goes to bed, we’d be eating dinner at like 9/10pm. Idk. 🤔
 
@snlmommy My LO is seven months old. I also love making dinner and my husband and I have made it a priority to give me time to cook.

Our routine is (roughly) this:
7:00 - LO wakes up
9:30 - nap
13:00 - nap
16:00 - nap
17:30 - husband watches baby while I make dinner
18:30 - we eat together
19:30 - bedtime routine
20:00 - LO is asleep

Perhaps you can try adjusting your nap times or bed time to give you more time during the night to make dinner?
 
@snlmommy i always prep during the day if it's something that's gonna take longer so like when they're taking a nap i'll cut everything up / marinate it whatever so that when it's close to dinner time i can just cook it
 
@snlmommy A crockpot and precutting/measuring ingredients has helped me the most to still put a delicious and nutritious meal on the table! I get everything washed and chopped a few days before I'll need it. On the morning of I'll get it in the crockpot and then there's minimal steps in the evening to have dinner ready.
 
@snlmommy I definitely go in and out of phases of making more complicated meals, but when I want to I try to find a meal that involves maybe a lot of prep that can be done ahead of time, but quick cooking time (my personal favorite is trying new recipes from “The Wok” cookbook). I prep during naps over the course of a couple of days, leisurely with no stress, then everything comes together super quickly when it is time to cook, plus the dishes are spread out too making the whole thing so much more manageable.
 
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