Over the last ten days or so I’ve been rather focused on my photography and doing long days whenever I can, often to the detriment of our meal plan. You know things have got pretty bad when your contemplating a take out for the third time that week and your just too shattered after ten hours in a hide to stand peeling spuds.  So a new plan of action was required and yesterday seeing that it was going to be a rainy day all day today I sat down with my laptop and ordered all of the ingredients that I needed to get a few tasty and well balanced meals in the freezer. I made a long list, I knew it was ambitious, but hey, if you don’t try you’ll never know.

I bounced out of bed and put all the spuds I could find in the house on to boil, four rings of the cooker covered and a pressure cooker, made me realise just how little I cooked last week, and the week before.  I cooked them in the skin and when cool peeled them with the tip of a knife. I then did a Delia, I remember seeing this years ago but never tried it, and mashed them in the kenwood mixer with a cake beater.  It made them a bit gluey to be fair, but, they puffed up lovely in the oven, so I think it will be alright. I made three different types of potatoes, plain, french mustard and a colcannon version with buttery leeks.

Then the Tesco delivery man arrived and he brought it all into the kitchen, he said I’d made him hungry coming into the delicious potato smells, we laughed. Doesn’t that save you a job and a half, not only do you not have to do the slog around the supermarket, but they deliver it to your kitchen, so one has all the energy just to cook, its brilliant.

Getting some of the veg prepped that was lying in the fridge.  Normally we are veg freaks, hence why we had an allotment, so I do really miss them when I don’t get them – although I have to say I did have some coleslaw with one pizza, but I don’t think that really counts. I started with a beef and veg stew with a mustard mash.  The stew was started in the instantpot on the saute mode, then switched to pressure cook for half an hour, out came a perfectly savoury stew, heavy on the veg of course. I then made man sized cottage pies, I am looking forward to these, with a plain mash and a good dusting of parmesan.  Followed by two family sized fish pies with a cheese sauce, colcannon buttery leeks and potato mash and a good sprinkle of parmesan.  The fish included was smoked haddock, cod and salmon. And those two pies made eight portions. I then made a provencal type stew with chicken to have with rice. And then I made 15 veg bags,  of a variety of vegetables to have with the main courses. The vegetables are blanched until just done, and set with cold water.I then made a mandycharlie ragu sauce, heavy on the mushroom, I think these are two portion pots.
Next was a pork sweet and sour, again made from scratch, Chinese white vinegar, pineapple juice, (pineapple in the dish) tomato puree, sugar and soy sauce. That made six dishes and its simplicity itself to do rice in the instant pot.And then I made a carrot cake with a plain orange icing, I think the cream cheese icings are too much for a family cake at home, nice for a treat though. And last but not least I made chicken fajita’s. Of which two will be going in the freezer and the rest will be our supper this evening.

So 45 main courses, 15 veg bags and 1 cake, not bad for a days work.