Do you do batch cooking or once-a-month cooking very often? Every now and then I’ll have a kitchen marathon where I just go nuts and do a whole bunch of cooking at once. I’ll usually flip on the TV and watch something that I never get to see and just motor through there. The picture above shows the mess that can result from one of these big batch cooking days!
I’ve labeled everything you see there, and you’ll find the corresponding links to each food listed below:
- Homemade cinnamon rolls - a once in a while treat.
- Beef broth – a superfood!
- Beef tallow cooling on the counter – after using it the evening prior for guilt-free deep frying!
- Spelt sprouting – so I can dry and then grind for sprouted spelt flour to have on hand.
- Crispy pecans – just out of the oven.
- What’s left of the kids’ lunch – read more here about plastics dangers and why we use the stainless steel water bottles that you see there (you can buy them at the first link listed at the bottom of that post.)
- Homemade ice cream sandwiches in the Bosch – also called “Whoopie Pies” (to take to a party we were going to).
- Barbecued beef for dinner on homemade buns (see next link).
- Homemade buns
- Foliage spray for the garden (it just happened to be on my bar that day).
- Napa cabbage for Napa salad – I know most cabbage should be slightly cooked, I wonder if the same is true about Napa cabbage?
- Parsley for Tabouli salad – I love this salad, it’s light and refreshing.
(Thank you Diana from Facebook for helping me figure out how to get arrows to show up on a picture!)
That day I was sort of helter skelter all over my kitchen, but I know many of you do “monthly cooking marathons” or something similar all the time. I’d love your tips for doing this in a more organized fashion, or for getting the most done in a day as possible.
Any experts on this out there?
- Have you seen these kitchen tips and added your own tips there, too?
{ 22 comments… read them below or add one }
awesome…. looks like you were hard at work ! I love your kitchen by the way…. you should do a kitchen tour with AnnMarie for her blog posts ! That would be cool
Looks great, Kelly! I recently made salsa, mayo, and a couple of other things in one day, I already forgot what. Also did some lard. It’s hard fitting anything in, but that’s the only way I get it done!
Omygosh. Yeah, I really need to set aside a day just for that. I am getting really lax about making homemade bread and granola and snacks.
I know, I go in streaks like that, too. After a day like this, usually I take a break for a while!
Wow!! what a happeenin’ place your kitchen is….
What fond memories I have of comng home from St. Mary’s and walking into the house blasting with the fragrance of pot roast and veggies.
It wasn’t called organic then, but chances are it was pretty close as we had our own beef and farmers let them graze in the pastures.
Alas, somwhere along the line, like many others, Diet Rite, came into being, my Mum thought Metrecal might help her lose weight [she wasn't fat] and things shifted.
Fortunately, they shifted back. Now I observe “fads,” no different than “new fashions” in the clothing industry, there are NEW fashions when it comes to pushing the next industrial concoction.
But, with you watching our back, Kelly, we’ll be led back to what is real, tasty, filling and leave the table feeling pleasantly full, while not even eating too much. That is also my fist memory of eating a WEston PRice meal in Vancouver, BC at a seminar w/Fallon and Cowan. It ROCKED!!!
Thanks for this cool picture of your kitchen. I woulda loved a video speeded up ,,,U can just see it….you dancin’ through the day. You got all these recipes memorized?
Great and thanks again.
No, I don’t have them all memorized, but that’s why I keep my iPhone handy to look up all my recipes.
Wow, Kelly,
I’m impressed. When I end up doing a whole lot in one day it isn’t planned. It just happens and I get flustered doing too much. I can’t cook up a whole lot of food at one time. I already don’t have any room in my freezer to put it, but sometimes I do have a bunch of ferments, soaking and kefir grains at the same time. Honestly, I have to mark everything I do on my calendar or I wouldn’t remember when I started them.
BY the way, what kind of crockpot do you have? I need to replace mine because I’m sure it has lead in it & I don’t want to use it anymore.
Don’t be impressed, I rarely plan these days, they just happen somehow and I’m usually somewhat overwhelmed as it’s happening, too!
It’s a Hamilton Beach, I’ve heard that’s a good one.
When I have a big cooking day like that, most of the jobs are done at the (huge) dining room table because the kitchen has such impossibly small counters. Sadly, you can see the dining room from the living room and hubby hates messes! (One of the downsides of having a work-at-home hubby, and there aren’t many.)
For a while, I shopped on Wednesday and cooked on Thursday. Then the schedule exploded and I don’t even have 4 hours altogether to cook anymore. I have to do bits and pieces as I dash in and out between appointments, work schedule and taxi service. But, that’s okay because the family really hated the OAMC recipes!
A good share of our dinners are like that, too, so I keep my “fast food” recipes handy for those nights! (http://kellythekitchenkop.com/2008/05/fast-food-healthy-options.html)
We have been buying grass fed beef for the last couple of years from a local farmer. One thing I’ve noticed is the roasts taste way different than the other beef we have bought. It’s almost an off taste, maybe slightly gamey. And the fat turns to this gelatinous goo. It’s totally disgusting. Is this normal for grass fed beef?
yes.
Feedlot beef is force fed grain and corn and fatten a year faster than grass fed beef.
Garbage in; garbage out. Grain finished cattle have more Omega 6 in their fat, which, on a molecular level, handles heat differently.
Thanks for this! This is very inspiring and helpful. I am into marathon-style cooking too, but my kitchen gets much messier than yours : ) The one thing I have figured out though, is to repeat the same group of recipes so that you develop a system and figure out what things are easy to do the same day (i.e. baking while making stock works well for me because a hot kitchen makes the bread rise faster.)
Don’t forget to “CAYG” (clean as you go)
Bonnie, the “gelatinous goo” is the super nutritious gelatin, it’s very good for you! Here’s a post I wrote about the off-taste in meat sometimes (be sure to read the comments for good info): http://kellythekitchenkop.com/2009/07/does-your-grass-fed-meat-or-raw-milk-ever-taste-off-reader-question.html
Now that I have an apartment and not a dorm this year and am in my last year of school, I’ve been cooking up one batch of a baked dinner meal – like roasted vegetables and then some sort of protein. Then each evening I have one serving for dinner. Lunch is raw crunchies (celery, cucs, carrots) and/or salad with cheese, nut butters and egg or chicken sausage. I think batch cooking is GREAT and that’s why I do it
I am saving up my chicken bones for a stock eventually. Now that fall is approaching I will be doing a big batch of soup soon!
thanks! We actually split this cow with 2 other families and neither of them noticed. I though we were maybe going nuts. I absolutely can’t stand the “off” taste! And now that I am pregnant…ugh… We have noticed however that smoking the roast actually made it taste the least “off” of all other cooking methods. Generally I love liver, but I’m terrified to even open the package. Thanks for everything!!
Hey Kelly, We do a big batch of cooking on Sundays, where we pre-prep ingredients that take a long time to make, so that they’re ready to go for quick dinners during the week, without having to compromise on the quality. We actually developed a workshop around that idea, so others could benefit from 1 hour of cooking on Sunday and quick meals all week, including meal plans, grocery list and the magic hour of cooking on Sundays. It works brilliantly for us and our clients. I love the kitchen! The slight chaos has a very familiar feel. hahaha
I used to do this a lot when all three kids were still living at home because it made sending school lunches so much easier, as well as hurried evening meals were still healthy and fast. Now with just DH and me, not so much mega cooking goes on. A couple of the things I still make in big batches and freeze is stuffed green peppers and stuffed cabbage rolls. Those get even better after they’re frozen for some reason!
Question: I love crispy nuts, but my DH refuses to let me make them because he says we are NOT leaving the oven run for 24 hours. Period. I don’t have a dehydrator (three tries with those things and I give up) so that’s out of the question; plus they’re expensive, too. Any suggestion for another way to make them? Or a faster way maybe? Would it work to do small batches in the microwave (I know, but I’m desperate).
My oven doesn’t go down to 150* anyway (to preserve the enzymes) so if I do them in the oven I usually put them up on a little higher temp and they don’t need to go as long. Watch that they don’t burn though!
Kelly
In summer, try a sun oven. Keep the door cracked open.
The excalibur dehydrator might be expensive but works great & should last for years.
Also perhaps try a convection oven–works very fast.
Are you spreading the nuts out in the conventional oven? That might solve the problem by making them dry a lot faster.
My oven does not go low enough either, and the toaster oven does but takes forever because I can’t spread them out in a single layer. Once I tried blowing a fan through it, which worked TOO well! (the nuts got burned). But I might try that again & use an even lower heat, or crack the door open.
Perhaps consider that using the conventional oven for a long time might be justifiable if you are using less heat from a heater.