Returning to Work- KOAMC edition

One thing I was so nervous about before returning to work after a long maternity leave was not having enough food in the freezer.  I remembered how tired I was when I’d come home from work and the last thing I wanted to do was cook for dinner/Shabbos.  So, in the few days I had between Pesach and work I shoppped and cooked.

I first made two lists- the first was a cooking list and the second was a shopping list.  My shopping list was based off of the ingredients I would need for the cooking list and also included the items I wanted to stock up on, such as frozen salmon, snacks, cereal, chicken nuggets, pasta, fish sticks, frozen pizza, etc..

I knew that I wouldn’t be able to cook all the dishes I wanted to in such a short amount of time, so I made sure that my shopping list included key ingredients I would need for the dishes I would cook later (ex: frozen broccoli for broccoli kugel).

My cooking list mostly included kugels, since that’s what my kids like eating for Shabbos.  None of the recipes I make are hard, but they do take time and then leave a bunch of dirty dishes.  I also tried to make all the kugel recipes that require a food processor on the same day.  By cooking in advance I have the ready made food without the mess every week.

In the end I made 6 quarts of vegetable soup, 6 onion kugels (recipe to come), 3 butternut squash kugels, 2 carrot kugels and 1 potato kugel (we ate it on the Shabbos following Pesach).  I already had some zucchini kugels in the freezer and just did not have the energy to do any more cooking.  Hopefully this stash will tide us over until my next cooking day.

Having a stocked freezer gave me peace of mind when I returned to work.  I knew that after a long week I would have everything I needed for Shabbos already in my freezer.  And as it turned out, my first Shabbos after returning to work was a breeze to make!

Until next time,
Shaindy