I am the worlds messiest cook. When I have cooked a meal, the spectacle I leave behind is rivaled only by what other people’s kitchens look like on Thanksgiving. It is partly because I make most everything from scratch. Partly because I have the attention span of a gnat and usually have started eight things when I really should just have started 1. I love to cook. It is my stress reliever, my art, and generally the only way I know to take care of people. I have trouble if you come over and don’t let me feed you. I would rather make a fuss over you in the kitchen than look you in the eyes.The problem with this however is that I HATE CLEANING MY KITCHEN!

Anyways. I have a new favorite thing I want to share with you. For the first time this month (in preparation for the craziness that is September at our house) I did ‘once a month cooking’. I made a mad mess in my kitchen (like I would for making a simple kitchen meal) but this time I came out with 24 meals in my freezer.

I prepped:

Cilantro lime chicken (2 meals)

Steak fajita (2 meals)

Lasagna (2 pans)

spaghetti Sauce (1 bag)

Taco Soup (1 meal)

Butternut Squash Soup  (3 meals)

Borscht (5 meals)

Thai Chicken Wings (1 meal)

Pizza dough (5 pizza nights)…I always keep this on hand. It makes beautiful focaccia bread as well.

Beef Stew (2 meals)

balsamic onion pot roast (made and eaten today)

Everything is ready in Ziploc bags labelled with the instructions for the day and requires only that I either toss it in a crock pot or fry it up quickly. I feel like this is going to make a huge difference in my life. I will never be organized enough to be a meal planner, but I feel like this will give me a little bit of structure but still allow me choice if for example I end up with unexpected company or whatever. It saved a TON of work because you just kept cooking…the fry pan was in use the whole time, so I didn’t ever have to do more than a quick rinse. Onions for borscht, then onions and meat for stew, then straight on to browning the roast. At another stage I had two fry pans going with ground beef. One I seasoned for italian and the other mexican. Then I added tomatoes and paste and proceeded to whip up two lasagnas and freeze the rest for spagetti. The mexican seasoned beef was also split in two…one left as just seasoned meat for taco salad or burritos and the other added to the ingredients to make taco soup. I did my own thing but I found this, this and this helpful. Thanks for the inspiration Esther!