Cable, and The Frozen Food Project

[same_sky]

Something is bound to go wrong shortly, for I just called to transfer the cable modem / local telephone service, and it took five minutes and culminated in "okay, great, we'll call you within a few days to schedule your installation!" That is entirely too simple, and I have found that these people are not so good at the simple. I was also told by someone who switched that he hooked the thing up before they came out to officially install the modem, and it worked, so we just might be trying that shortly. Otherwise, I'm just going to hope that they can come out two weeks from today, or maybe that M will let me skip work another day to stay home to wait on them. That would be excellent. M wouldn't actually tell me that I couldn't do that if I wanted, but it is so, so hard to motivate taking time off right now that isn't strictly necessary. And can I just add that flex schedules are the most wonderful, wonderful benefit of my job? Having an extra day off every other week is fabulous. Of course, it also means that I get stuck with all of the administrative tasks that must be done within regular working hours, but it's worth it. (Update! They called to schedule the installation, but their offices are closed on my next day off. Drats! They'll call me so I can come meet them, at least.)

This post is all about the procrastination, for there are taxes to be done and laundry to be switched over and carrots to be chopped for the roast, which is simmering in the crock pot. I got a crock pot for our wedding six years ago, and I used it for the first time last month. This is the third time it's been used--one unqualified success (being repeated today) and one southwestern chicken soup failure. (It wasn't BAD, exactly, but it never really came together and it just wasn't our style.) I am not yet brave enough to leave it on all day while I'm not here, though I'm working on it, so it's become my flex day thing. This is probably not the time to tell me about your Aunt Bertha, who left her crock pot on while she ran out to church one morning, and came home to no house. Because that is exactly why I can no longer leave my dryer running while I'm gone. It is, however, probably the time to tell me about the absolute best thing to cook in a crock pot.. keeping in mind that if it calls for cooking meat beforehand, I am going to not like it. Bonus points if it's cheap, because this roast thing I'm making is kind of not cheap at all.

Last year, after we moved--our house came with an upright freezer in the basement that we requested that they leave--I got a bug in my bonnet about how much money we were spending on frozen lunches and how completely terrible said lunches are. I rarely ate them, but M took them to work most days. So, I started freezing lunches in individual containers, and so M has hearty, healthy lunches for very little money. He was a little skeptical at first when I started on this plan, but quickly came around and we both absolutely love doing it now. I could eat the frozen ones, too, but I come home for lunch and usually just fix something fast.

It was a bit of a struggle at first to get organized because I wasn't used to cooking that way, and as always, the tendency is to over-do it and then you lose interest. Although it is true in theory that making three lasagnas is not much more work than making one... it actually takes quite a bit longer. Go figure. Anyway, the best way to do it for us is just to freeze leftovers from normal meals, making just a reasonable, manageable amount more than usual, if any. I've also taken to throwing vegetables in wherever they'll fit, because M and I are like children, and apparently do not know enough to eat our vegetables if they're not hidden in a casserole. ;) That makes the leftovers go farther, though. I have occasionally doubled batches of chili or soup or Sveedish meatballs or lasagna (which are M's favorites) to plump up our reserves, but I don't have the disposition for the true once-a-month style of cooking. It took a little while to readjust our way of thinking, but it is now perfectly natural to spend five minutes at the end of every meal boxing up the leftovers, considering our schedules and leaving some out in the fridge for immediate use. M will take the rest of the boxes downstairs right away and pile them up in the freezer. I don't really even plan meals for their leftovers anymore, like I had to do at first--we have enough of a stockpile at the moment that there's just no need. At some point recently, we had thirty (THIRTY!) individually-packaged meals in the freezer downstairs, plus seven commercially-packaged frozen lunches (purchased on sale). At first, we would have periods where we were out of lunches, so they were good to have for that, or so he could have some variety and not eat the same thing all week. Now, we haven't run out in a very long while, and he has a pretty serious variety to choose from by now, so he hasn't eaten one of them in a long while, I don't think. We've also found that basically anything will freeze and reheat as long as you're not terribly picky about appearance after it reheats (otherwise, avoid most dairy products, although cheese works fine, usually.) A touch of water usually helps with the reheating, too. This obviously requires freezer space (though you could do it on a smaller scale with just your regular freezer) and freezer containers. We've bought ours over the last year very gradually, and throw out/replace them as needed. We currently use the cheap plastic ones (Glad, or Reynold's, or dollar store equivalent) that they market on the premise that it's no big loss if you lose them. The next step is to upgrade our containers to the durable glass types--we have some Pyrex soup bowls, but we haven't replaced the entree dishes yet.

That became a bit long and rambly, but it's one of my favorite Things That We Do, and sometime in the last year, it became a hobby in addition to just economically sensible. We get downright giddy when we realize that a meal made six batches of leftovers (rare!) or we calculate how many weeks he could exclusively eat frozen lunches before he runs out. I should also add that it took me a while to really get started on doing this, and I found inspiration in a lot of different places before settling into our style. I finally asked Carrie about her insane food system and she was nice enough to post about her super-organizational food skills. Strangely, that was all pretty much exactly a year ago, so apparently I think about food preparation at this time of year. My newest project involves making my own stock, for which I was inspired by mayna, and I began saving vegetables just today for an upcoming stock-making weekend project. I have a long way to go, but my food resolution this year is to eat and cook better foods. I may even force myself to buy organic now and then. (I desperately want to, but it goes against my grain to willingly pay twice as much for the same item. I'm working on it.) Hopefully at this time next year, I will be telling you all about my progress there, too.

If you do something weird or fun or helpful or creative or organized with your food, I'd love to hear it. :) Especially if it pertains to eating healthily or cheaply!

Comments

[ladysunrunner.livejournal.com]

Haha, I promise I won't tell you stories about my Aunt Bertha's crockpot, not only cause I don't have any stories like that, but also because you sound exactly like me as far as leaving-appliances-on-while-not-there paranoia goes.

I wish I could do the whole freezer leftovers thing, but I am not that good about cooking the original meal in the first place, and then I so don't have very much freezer space and I'm in an apartment so I don't have much choice about getting more, either. Oh well, someday I'll do that too.

I think probably my best food habit is buying things in larger sizes, then (sometimes...when I'm on top of things anyway!) dividing them up into reusable containers as soon as we get home from the store, or at least, when I'm making lunches on Sunday afternoon or something. This makes it a lot easier for me to take lunches to school rather than buy them (more expensive of course and usually less healthy), since I'm always in a huge hurry to get out the door in the morning and if preparing lunch is any more complicated than "grab 3 containers, toss in backpack, leave" I just won't do it. It also keeps me from eating overly large quantities of things, something I'm really bad about, if I've only given myself a pre-decided portion. I know that a lot of things come in "individual sizes" already, but I much much much prefer to buy stuff in large, single bags/containers/whatever rather than waste all that packaging on 8 little pouches in a bigger box wrapped in shrink wrap or whatever.

[same-sky.livejournal.com]

Ha! It's so funny that you commented on this post because I thought of you, my most environmentally-friendly friend, while writing it, but decided that a tangent about our freezer was off-topic. ;) I feel the need to confess that our much-loved freezer is bound to be the least energy-efficient model ON THE PLANET. I suffer a little guilt when I see it because it is ancient and much bigger than we need, but yet, it was free and came with our house, so replacing it is pretty far down on the priority list. Of course, my problem has always been the random guilt. ;)

I agree on the individual sizes thing. The excess packaging in the US drives M crazy. Apparently, there's a law in Sweden that says that retailers are required to (at the consumer's request) keep the product packaging... M's favorite story was of the guy who went in and emptied his toothpaste into another container so they had to keep the tube. Anyway, I need to learn to think ahead for my own lunches more than I do, and getting in a habit of repackaging would help... if I wasn't so lazy right when I get home from the store!

[ladysunrunner.livejournal.com]

LOL, I like the toothpaste story. Although, the tube would still go in the trash so... hmm I'm not sure how productive that was...???

Eh, it doesn't matter really if you do it right when you get home. Half the time I don't do it then either. As long as it's done before the lunch needs to leave the house.

[courtesy.livejournal.com]

"We get downright giddy when we realize that a meal made six batches of leftovers"

THIS is what I love about you. This brilliant. GIDDY. I LOVE it.

I have this weird urge to buy you both and keep you in a little hamster cage in my flat and watch you both obsessively. And I mean that nicely.

[same-sky.livejournal.com]

Thank you. I think. Good luck getting me in a hamster cage, though. I am having trouble getting into CARS these days. :) It would probably need to be a pretty large cage, though I am contemplating the idea with less and less horror when it occurs to me that if one were in a hamster cage, one could not go to work. Hmm. Sounding better and better.