Another meal-sharing idea.

One of the things Hannah and I do on Tuesdays is make dinner.  She plans it and buys the groceries; we make it together, at her house (since right now our schedule has me at her place every week); and I take my family's share home.

We used to alternate weeks, one at my house and the next at hers, and we figured that made us even.  When we switched to all Tuesdays at Hannah's, we agreed that I'd compensate her for the extra planning and cost two ways:  (1) I'd bring lunch and tea-snack, and (2) I'd give her a dinner's worth of meat out of my freezer each week.   It works pretty well.  I miss doing the planning every other week, and making stuff together that my family loves but that I hate to do single-handed -- e.g. calzones and samosas -- but what goes around comes around, and sooner or later we'll have some other arrangement.

Yesterday, not long after we'd all enjoyed the crockpot full of hot dogs and sauerkraut I'd brought for lunch, Hannah was about to thaw meat for a lasagna that we were to make together.  I opened her fridge, looking for the ricotta, and saw about a quart of chili left over from Ben's birthday party on Sunday.  There were still two pans of the accompanying cornbread on the counter.  "Hey Hannah!"  I called down the stairs.  "Before you get the meat out, I have a proposal."

"What?"

"How about I just take all that leftover chili  home in my crockpot?  And the corn bread?  And a bag of frozen vegetables?"

"All right!" she called up.  "We've been eating that stuff for days!  My family'll eat crackers and summer sausage tonight!"

That was easy.

It got me thinking.  One of the reasons Hannah and I usually make dinner together on Tuesdays is because it's a pleasant job for us to do together.  We like chopping and stirring as we discuss the weekend past and the rest of the week ahead.  And it's kind of fun to discover new recipes together -- foodies that we are.   It's also great because, dinner freshly made, we don't have to end our day together early just so we can each put dinner on the table.   I hope we don't have to  change our schedule anytime soon.  But yesterday, pressed for time because each of us spent more than an hour voting (that's another story), I was content to serve my family her family's seconds.  (Fortified a bit with an extra can of chili beans.)

She warned me it was really bland chili, made to suit her kids' tastes.  She was right, it was really bland, but in a really satisfying, stick to your ribs, bean-stuffed, comfort-food way.  We ate it all, yum, and my family drenched the corn bread with honey and ate that too.  I poured my chili atop the slender cooked green beans, crumbled the cornbread on top, and couldn't finish it all, it was so filling.

Anyway, I was thinking -- another model for families who get together in the afternoon, if they don't have time to actually cook together, could be the Leftover Swap.  

Let's say Jane gets together with her friend Sue every Wednesday afternoon for a cup of tea.  On Tuesday night, Jane's family eats lasagna, salad and green beans on the side.  Meanwhile, Sue cooks up a brimming pot of chicken vegetable soup, with fruit salad and saltine crackers.

 On Wednesday, Jane brings the lasagna, plus extra bagged salad and bagged frozen green beans to Sue's house.  They have their tea, the children play.  At five Jane goes home with Sue's leftover chicken soup and fruit salad and the extra box of crackers that Sue remembered to buy at the store.  Sue pops the lasagna in the oven, tosses the salad with her own favorite dressing, and boils the green beans for a quick side dish.

I like it.  You each cook once and eat leftovers, but since they're somebody else's leftovers, they're not the same thing you had last night.  I think it would work best with a regular arrangement, but you could also do it for get togethers planned only one day ahead; I bet everybody reading this could make at least one full meal, on short notice, with enough to share for another family.  Heck, I probably have enough Spanish rice in my crockpot right now to feed two families, at least if they didn't have any teenage boys.

Comments

[Christy P]

I will add to this thread for any working outside the home folk -- variations of this work for office lunches, too. A friend of mine participated in 'lunch club' in which every Thursday there was a gathering of people from the office who ate together. They rotated whose job it was to bring the lunch and agreed to keep it vegetarian. Each week they had a convivial gathering (serving to liberate them from cubicles and into actual social interaction), and they only had to prepare the lunch about every 6th week. In order to keep things fair, they actually had a contract about participating in the group for a certain number of weeks (no quitting just before your turn!), but I suspect that in many workplaces it wouldn't have to be that formalized. YMMV

[bearing]

Hey, that's a great idea!

[Kim]

Speaking of making a full meal with leftovers... Yesterday, I had a crockpot of beef stew going inside while I was raking leaves outside. I had planned to eat half last night and put half away in the freezer. Anyway, while outside, my neighbors came over and used their leave vacuum (attached to their John Deer) to help me out. We did the whole yard and he took turns giving the kids rides on the tractor! Because I had enough dinner for two families cooking in the crock pot I was able to deliver dinner to their house as a "thanks!" Worked out well... I like making two dinners at once!