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Love, Laugh, Live
© May 2007 Gretchen Alawneh All rights reserved.
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What is OAMC?
Once A Month Cooking
Once A Month Cooking
Once a month cooking is exactly what the name implies, you cook only once during the month, then eat the meals you prepared during that day for the rest of the month.
Sound impossible? Well, people are doing just that across the country every month. It takes a huge amount of organization and is quite tiring, but then again, it is only once - then you get to relax for the next 29/30 days.
Most women I've spoken to who do OAMC plan out thier monthly menu one day, go shopping on another day, preprep the food (dice up the onions for every recipe you will be making, get the cheese grated, and so forth) on the next day, then cook on the forth day. Even broken down like that, in my opinion, it is a difficult task. Plus, there is no way I can plan to be 100% free of kids and distractions for one whole day.
Most people chose to do a variation of OAMC instead. Here are a few different versions:
1. Enlist the help of several friends. You can cook all together or everyone in their own home. Plan a menu together that everyone likes. If there is a group of say, 5 friends, everyone chooses 3 recipes each to make. They each make 2 meals per friend of that 1 recipe. For example, one friend chooses to make a casserole, a roast and a mexican dish. She would make 10 of each recipe. 2 for each friend and 2 for herself. All of the friends would get together and trade dishes (after they are frozen) and then each friend would have a freezer full of 15 different recipes (2 of each recipe to equal a full month's meals).
2. Instead of doing OAMC, do it as Twice A Month Cooking. It is less to prep and cook at once, so maybe a little less overwhelming to do.
3. My personal favorite and (in my opinion) the easiest way to go:
Double or triple your recipes when you are cooking dinner at night. For example, if you are making a lasagne, triple the recipe and create 3 pans of lasagne at the same time. The extra time it takes to do this is minimal. Then, throw one in the oven for dinner that night, and wrap up the other two for the freezer. Now, during the month, you have two meals that are ready. Do this 2 times a week, and soon you'll have a freezer full of meals for those days when you have company just show up with no warning (don't you just love that!), or when the kids are all sick and you haven't slept in ages or simply when you just need a breather from cooking, but don't want to do take-out. *Don't worry about having all your pans tied up in the freezer. Just line the pan you are making your lasagne in with foil and after it bakes and cools, place it in the freezer to firm up. When it is semi-frozen, just pull it out of the pan, and wrap it for the freezer.
Other ways to make dinner time easier on you is by using the freezer to store partially made items, to lessen the time you spend cooking.
Chocolate chip cookies is a good one for this. Just make a double batch of your favorite cookie recipe and drop by spoonfuls onto cookie sheets. Throw the first one into the oven for today, then place the other pans of uncooked cookie dough into the freezer. This is called Flash Freezing and prevents foods from sticking together when you store them later in the freezer (so you can take out just the amount you want-easily). When the cookies are frozen, pop them out of the freezer and put the frozen cookie discs into ziplock bags. The next time you want to make fresh baked cookies, just grab the bag from the freezer. *Most cookies can also be baked and then frozen.
Another great one to make is Egg McMoms. My version of the McDonald's breakfast sandwich (If I'm doing the cooking, I'm taking the credit). Toast some English Muffins in the toaster, scramble up some eggs, fry up some thin ham slices or bacon, and then assemble the sandwiches together with a slice of cheese (English muffin bottom, cheese, egg, meat, muffin top). Wrap the sandwiches in plastic wrap, than foil and toss them into the freezer for a quick breakfast. Just remove the wrappings, wrap a paper towel or napkin around them (keeps the bread from becoming soggy from the steam) and toss it into the microwave for 30 seconds to a minute. The paper towel doubles as a carrier then for the mad dash to the car or bus.
If you prefer, put the above ingredients in a tortilla wrap and store in the freezer the same way as a breakfast burrito.
Put your meat that you like marinated, into ziplock baggies with your marinating sauce, and freeze it that way. While the meat is defrosting, it will marinate your meat. It's easy to make it in advance that way.
Also, if you use browned ground meat in alot of your dishes (like pastas, seasoned taco meat, and casseroles), cook your ground meat all at once. Divide it up, cool it down, put it into ziplock baggies and freeze. It is ready to go straight into your recipe this way.
The best part of freezer cooking (besides the obvious time savings) is using it as a way to save at the grocery store. If things are preprepared, you are less likely to run to the store for missing items on things you decide to cook that night. I don't know about you, but every time I walk into the store for that one item, I end up buying things I wasn't planning to buy. Another savings is that you can buy what is on sale that week (chicken, beef, and so on) and make up all of your freezer recipes that week for the meat that was on sale.
Here are a couple of good OAMC sites that offer some terrific freezer recipes:
Real Food 4 Real People
Ellen's Kitchen
Organized Home
Sound impossible? Well, people are doing just that across the country every month. It takes a huge amount of organization and is quite tiring, but then again, it is only once - then you get to relax for the next 29/30 days.
Most women I've spoken to who do OAMC plan out thier monthly menu one day, go shopping on another day, preprep the food (dice up the onions for every recipe you will be making, get the cheese grated, and so forth) on the next day, then cook on the forth day. Even broken down like that, in my opinion, it is a difficult task. Plus, there is no way I can plan to be 100% free of kids and distractions for one whole day.
Most people chose to do a variation of OAMC instead. Here are a few different versions:
1. Enlist the help of several friends. You can cook all together or everyone in their own home. Plan a menu together that everyone likes. If there is a group of say, 5 friends, everyone chooses 3 recipes each to make. They each make 2 meals per friend of that 1 recipe. For example, one friend chooses to make a casserole, a roast and a mexican dish. She would make 10 of each recipe. 2 for each friend and 2 for herself. All of the friends would get together and trade dishes (after they are frozen) and then each friend would have a freezer full of 15 different recipes (2 of each recipe to equal a full month's meals).
2. Instead of doing OAMC, do it as Twice A Month Cooking. It is less to prep and cook at once, so maybe a little less overwhelming to do.
3. My personal favorite and (in my opinion) the easiest way to go:
Double or triple your recipes when you are cooking dinner at night. For example, if you are making a lasagne, triple the recipe and create 3 pans of lasagne at the same time. The extra time it takes to do this is minimal. Then, throw one in the oven for dinner that night, and wrap up the other two for the freezer. Now, during the month, you have two meals that are ready. Do this 2 times a week, and soon you'll have a freezer full of meals for those days when you have company just show up with no warning (don't you just love that!), or when the kids are all sick and you haven't slept in ages or simply when you just need a breather from cooking, but don't want to do take-out. *Don't worry about having all your pans tied up in the freezer. Just line the pan you are making your lasagne in with foil and after it bakes and cools, place it in the freezer to firm up. When it is semi-frozen, just pull it out of the pan, and wrap it for the freezer.
Other ways to make dinner time easier on you is by using the freezer to store partially made items, to lessen the time you spend cooking.
Chocolate chip cookies is a good one for this. Just make a double batch of your favorite cookie recipe and drop by spoonfuls onto cookie sheets. Throw the first one into the oven for today, then place the other pans of uncooked cookie dough into the freezer. This is called Flash Freezing and prevents foods from sticking together when you store them later in the freezer (so you can take out just the amount you want-easily). When the cookies are frozen, pop them out of the freezer and put the frozen cookie discs into ziplock bags. The next time you want to make fresh baked cookies, just grab the bag from the freezer. *Most cookies can also be baked and then frozen.
Another great one to make is Egg McMoms. My version of the McDonald's breakfast sandwich (If I'm doing the cooking, I'm taking the credit). Toast some English Muffins in the toaster, scramble up some eggs, fry up some thin ham slices or bacon, and then assemble the sandwiches together with a slice of cheese (English muffin bottom, cheese, egg, meat, muffin top). Wrap the sandwiches in plastic wrap, than foil and toss them into the freezer for a quick breakfast. Just remove the wrappings, wrap a paper towel or napkin around them (keeps the bread from becoming soggy from the steam) and toss it into the microwave for 30 seconds to a minute. The paper towel doubles as a carrier then for the mad dash to the car or bus.
If you prefer, put the above ingredients in a tortilla wrap and store in the freezer the same way as a breakfast burrito.
Put your meat that you like marinated, into ziplock baggies with your marinating sauce, and freeze it that way. While the meat is defrosting, it will marinate your meat. It's easy to make it in advance that way.
Also, if you use browned ground meat in alot of your dishes (like pastas, seasoned taco meat, and casseroles), cook your ground meat all at once. Divide it up, cool it down, put it into ziplock baggies and freeze. It is ready to go straight into your recipe this way.
The best part of freezer cooking (besides the obvious time savings) is using it as a way to save at the grocery store. If things are preprepared, you are less likely to run to the store for missing items on things you decide to cook that night. I don't know about you, but every time I walk into the store for that one item, I end up buying things I wasn't planning to buy. Another savings is that you can buy what is on sale that week (chicken, beef, and so on) and make up all of your freezer recipes that week for the meat that was on sale.
Here are a couple of good OAMC sites that offer some terrific freezer recipes:
Real Food 4 Real People
Ellen's Kitchen
Organized Home
Cooking
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