Summer Meals
During the summer months many would rather spend time outside of the kitchen in part due to the heat, and their lack of appetite. Trends tell us that more than 50% of all adults rely on frozen, packaged or take-out meals for dinner on a regular basis; more than 30% rarely spend more than 30 minutes on meal preparation, and 25% indicate speed and ease are the most important factors when purchasing foods. This is disconcerting as nutrition may not be a consideration for many when preparing meals. Learning to prepare fast, easy and nutritious meals can be as simple as having a plan, having the ingredients on hand and thinking ahead.
When women entered the workforce they quickly recognized that home cooked meals would have to change. Prior to frozen foods and pre-prepared foods master mixes were the solutions. This time honored process saves time, energy and helps you plan meals rather so you aren’t tempted to make a quick trip through a drive in. Using master mixes means you spend one day a week, or even one day a month if you have a freezer, partially preparing meals to cut down on final prep time when a quick meal was needed. The concept is that you brown the meat, add basic ingredients such as onion, celery, salt, pepper and spices usually used, package the mixtures into ready to use sizes to be popped out of the freezer and used to prepare quick meals. Defrosting one pound packages takes one day in the refrigerator or if in a microwave safe container approximately five minutes on defrost. To ground meat, add kidney beans, tomato soup, and chili powder and have chili or noodles, cheese and you have a casserole, add prepared sauce and you have spaghetti with meat sauce, add cooked rice, and place the mixture into green peppers and have stuffed green pepper. What about stew meat? Add your own special sauce to make stroganoff, add cooked vegetables and have stew, add leftover vegetables and prepared broth and you have a soup. The same can be done with chicken that you precook and package into containers. Endless meals can be made with this little bit of pre-preparation.
Master mixed doesn’t sound like your style; consider preparing doubles if you have freezer space. With this method you prepare double the meal and freeze half of it for later, planned-overs, rather than leftovers. Be sure to label these foods as well as the master mixes with the type of food and date prepared, otherwise they many get in the back of the freezer and not be used.
Unearth your Crockpot, many people have a one but don’t use it on a regular basis. Crockpot cooking does not require much in the way of preparation time, it allows for foods to be ready when you walk in the door and allows you to use lower cost cuts of meat, fast, easy and nutritious, what more can you ask for! Recipes abound on the internet and at the grocery checkout lines, but you really don’t need a new recipe, adapt something your family loves. The simple concept is that this is a slow cooking method, using little water. Most recipes ask for as little as a half of the usual amount of water, broth, soup or wine in the bottom of the Crockpot, this is because liquids do not evaporate during the cooking process. If you need to brown your food ahead of time that will need to be done in a skillet, but many recipes do not need to be browned. Beef will continue to be pinkish when fully cooked. Gravy will not thicken. Milk, soft fleshed fish and pasta do not do well as they breakdown through the long cooking time. Fragile foods can be added in the last hour of cooking. Herbs and spices should be used in the whole rather than crushed form to allow for adequate flavors. Chicken, pork, soups, puddings, breads and one dish meals can also be prepared in the Crockpot. The conversion for most recipes is simple cut down on the water, use less fat and do not lift the lid! Pot watchers will have trouble wanting to stir. One source indicated that for each time you lift the lid you add twenty minutes to your cooking time.
For more information, contact Mary Beth R. Salisbury, Osceola County Extension Services, University of Florida/IFAS at
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or 321-697-3000. The Institute of Food and Agricultural Sciences (IFAS) is an Equal Opportunity Institution authorized to provide research, educational information and other services only to individuals and institutions that function with non-discrimination with respect to race, color, age, sex, religion, disability or national origin.