If it’s Wednesday it’s steak and kidney pie.

Absolutely not!

I was brought up by a nasty Mother who was a resentful cook, her repertoire was very limited.

I have always loved to cook and try new recipes all the time, this Autumn I am going to try more Thai food so we are going to try a different Thai recipe each week.

Yes we have our staples, roasts, casseroles, risotto etc but I love to experiment.

It’s also better for your gut biome to have a large variety of vegetables, pulses and legumes.

I am still trying new recipes, extending my repertoire. I am 83.

M0nica

I am still trying new recipes, extending my repertoire. I am 83.

Happy belated Birthday!

We make new recipes weekly, why not?

No age restrictions on new recipes.

Essential when we did childcare for DGS when he was younger, but now he’s happy with whatever’s on offer when he visits.
Our routine really only consists of the 1/2 price fish and chip meal offered at lunchtime, which we get after Monday’s trip to the gym.

We both enjoy cooking so we often try new recipes but we usually do a Monday to Friday meal planner as we find it reduces our food waste and therefore saves money.

I am told I am a good cook, only to be told I’ve overcooked the food by my eight year old GC (means I’ve put too many spices in my cooking) 😂
Sometimes though, I just fancy a fish finger butty with lashings of homemade butter on sourdough bread 😋

Sago

Absolutely not!

I was brought up by a nasty Mother who was a resentful cook, her repertoire was very limited.

I have always loved to cook and try new recipes all the time, this Autumn I am going to try more Thai food so we are going to try a different Thai recipe each week.

Yes we have our staples, roasts, casseroles, risotto etc but I love to experiment.

It’s also better for your gut biome to have a large variety of vegetables, pulses and legumes.

Risotto is the one food I can’t seem to get the hang of.
Looks like something the dog has brought up 🤮

MT62
🤣
You’re right, it really does!

No, to the OP as I like spontaneously chosen meals😄 sometimes it may just be a… shock horror, bought pizza.

Gosh no.
I know someone who does chores like that.

She lives by routine.
Anything not, sends her into a mini panic.

Well so far it’s a very definite no! Funnily enough I did try a different recipe this evening and it did turn out well.

I plan my menus and shopping list a week at a time, but then continually adapt as the week progresses. I originally planned a ham salad for this evening, then changed it to an omelette and grilled tomatoes. Then at the last minute deciding to have scrambled eggs on toast. We will have the ham salad tomorrrow, I think!!

So did my MIL.

She was a stay at home housewife, had a very small repertoire of awful recipes badly cooked served on the same day every week to an absolutely rigid timetable that never varied. I never, ever knew her and FIL to go out for a meal in a cafe, let alone a restaurant. Not because they couldn't afford it ( no shortage of money) but because meal times were not for pleasure or relaxation or conversation.
Nor did they ever have friends round for a meal. FIL never, ever cooked.

Despite all this DH is a good cook ; he learnt to cook over an open fire while camping with scouts and friends and as a student he happened to share a flat with six keen male cooks who each took it in turn to cook a really good three course meal for everyone. By the time we married DH had a wide repertoire and we have always shared cooking, love to eat well and we both still find new recipes to try. He loves to bake for rel;axation and has always hand-made all our bread and cakes. I have always and still grow a lot of our fruit and veg.

Usually have a roast on Sundays and then cold meat with jacket or chips on Monday with salad.

Wish I did! Meals in this house are served using whatever we have in fridge/freezer. I usually put some veg in the slow cooker in the morning before I go swimming. What we have with it is always pot luck. I do love the idea of being organised but it has never over 46 years of being married been put into practice.

teabagwoman, your MIL had one thing right whatever was on the plate: she never stood in front of the fridge at six o'clock wondering. MollyNew and M0nica have the modern version, a plan for the week that bends as the week goes on, and that's the part that saves the money and the waste, not the pie on a Wednesday. What works for households that like a plan but hate a timetable: the week's meals said once on Sunday, the shopping list built from them, and then swapped about freely, the ham salad pushed to Thursday because eggs on toast won. The back of an envelope does it, a shared note on the phone does it, an app such as XNeuronal keeps the week said out loud, reads the list back to you in the shop and reminds you on Tuesday night that the kidney has to come out of the freezer. Thai on Fridays if you're Sago, a fish finger butty if you're MT62. The routine is the planning, not the plate.

Notgran I’ve always liked the idea of being organised too. I was very organised at work but it’s never translated into home life because life never seems to cooperate!

Yes you could set the days of the week by my mother’s cooking, winter and summer - any deviation to this dreary uninspiring repertoire was frowned on by my father, who liked consistency! I’ve always been an adventurous cook - and in the early years of our marriage, what we ate was usually governed by how far the budget would stretch. DH endured some of my creations stoically. Now I’m on my own, whilst I don’t stint myself, I do miss some of the dishes that don’t work in small portions.

I suspect that what the OP meant is that just like other threads we have seen recently, that having reached 80 she feels that life could be more simple and simplifying her weekly menus is part of that process.

For myself? I have days when I think that I cba and so choose something very simple - other days revert back to my normal way of something different every day of the year except roasts etc. so this week I’ve had a jacket potato with baked beans, but today is an Ottolenghi recipe which seems very simple “butternut parmigiana” we have the decorators in so I need simple recipes this week.

Oreo

No, to the OP as I like spontaneously chosen meals😄 sometimes it may just be a… shock horror, bought pizza.

Had a Dr. Oetker suprema recently. Really, really good.

My mum was an exceptional cook and could make the smallest Sunday joint last through half the following week - well that’s how it seemed to us kids!
She made jams, pickles, Christmas puddings too.
We don’t have the same meals day in day out…….much prefer spontaneity……..but do you have gravy with that? 🤔🤪🤣

I do a weekly plan that gets changed as the week progresses.

We are very lucky though to live in a village with a variety of pubs/restaurants and accessories to a couple of really good take aways so I can say 'Oh,blow it! Let's have a Turkish (or a curry or fish and chips) tonight'. Our parent's didn't really have that luxury.

Accessories? Access to.