Dinnertime Made Easy
By brooke, July 14, 2010, Family & Kids
Before our daughter was born, dinnertime was one of the highlights of my day. I got to sit back and relax while my husband would cook an awesome meal (cooking relaxed him and who am I to get in the way of that?). It really was a win-win for both of us! Now flash forward to our dinnertime today…meal prep has been replaced with feeding, bathing and getting our daughter to bed. The evenings are not quite as “relaxed” as they once were, and the cuisine has unfortunately declined as well.
After reading an article from the New York Times entitled, “Saving Time and Stress with Cooking Co-ops“, I realized that we were not alone. As lives turn more hectic with work, school and/or children, families are relying on their network of friends to share in the burden of cooking. What a novel idea! Every family would prepare one cooked meal per week (or month or whatever time frame is arranged) with enough to share with the other co-op families. In return, each family would receive multiple prepared meals from the other participating households, which means multiple nights of stress-free dinners!
So, this is how it works: identify a group of members, preferably those who have some culinary skills and don’t consider Whataburger their home kitchen. Nothing against fast food, but we are attempting to keep this healthy as well. Each week (or frequency of choice), prepare one meal and divide portions for each member in the co-op (be sure to include your household). Then package the meals into individual containers (reusable preferably), labeling each container with meal title, reheating and serving instructions. And if you like, include the recipe to share! The article went on to further say that some dinner co-ops make the meal exchanges a little more fun by providing wine or appetizers too. Now that sounds good to me!
Overall this sounds like a great idea! However, I would suggest one thing…set guidelines ahead of time with the group by discussing each member’s likes and dislikes, food allergies, portion sizes, etc. Commit this information to writing for each family to keep as a reference guide for meal preparation. Getting all this worked out ahead of time, will allow the members to experience their co-op as a truly wonderful experience, where they will actually look forward to that knock on their door with their nutritious and appetizing family meals!
This article has actually inspired me to try it with my own neighbors. I’ll let you know how it works!
Follow @BounceEnergy
