New *almost* wife recipes/tips/help

[MsPony]

I have been engaged for awhile now (since late oct?) and wont be getting married for awhile, our money and time is focused on our 1000+lb thoroughbred child, toting him to "school" and buying new "school supplies" for him. (I love going to clinics and buying him stuff!!) Btw, im not a wild child, we WILL be getting married

Anyways I have started to relax and get into a wifey type role, were moving into a house soon, so I am sure thats helping. I have NEVER been a home maker of any kind, in hs and first year in college, all I made was pasta. I cleaned when someone important came over, and you can FORGET dishes. I have a skill with microwaves. On the other side, my better half wants to be a stay at home dad, loves cleaning and cooking, etc. But recently I have thought about how awesome it would be to help him, or do things for him. I, on my accord, clipped his toenails the other night, huge milestone for me

So now I am going through everything on this site, I think it would be awesome for us to make soaps and candles together, and for me to give him a good meal.

Which means I need all the recipes and "wife" tips I can get! He gets off around 5, usually goes and hangs out with our horse, then goes home and waits for me. I get off at 7/7:30 and hes starving by then! So I need quick meals, and meals that I can make in advance and just heat up for him.

I really don't know how to cook. But I am a quick learner I will also have his friends wife to take me under her wing, she has expressed a need to teach me how to be a wife, hehe.

 

[Jamsoundsgood]

Just as long as you stay away from Martha Stewart you should be fine. And get a rice cooker.

ETA: And HOORAY! Welcome! And Congrats on getting married!

 

[tamlynn]

Not that I'm any good at this, but you may want to look up crockpot recipes. That way you could start something in the morning, and when you got home, it would be ready to eat. We didn't get a crockpot for a wedding present (I thought everyone got at least one) but we didn't. I may have to go buy one after 15 years.

BTW, I think I'm a pretty good wife and I have never clipped my dh's toenails. Ick.

 

[tortoise]

Hi there! I'm a stay-at-home momma and I do it "1956-style." I fix up a hot lunch at lunchtime, and dinner too. I do pretty much all of the housework.

I think it's important that you guys TALK about it. I do anything I can to give my SO more "time off." I'm taking over the things he doesn't like to do. First grocery shopping, folding laundry, next mowing the lawn.

Is there something you don't like to do? Let him do it! Even though I stay at home and my SO has a rough job (Veterinarian), he helps out with housework too. If I've had a bad day, he will take care of my son - and dinner - in the evening and let me sleep.

Here's my advice - start with what you know.

I started with ZERO confidence in my cooking. I knew how to cook, but through and ex-husband situation, I had lost all of my enthusiasm and confidence in cooking. There was one thing I thought I could make pretty well - marinara sauce. So I made it every once in a while. (We had A LOT of frozen pizza then!)

Then I tried something else - white sauce. And I was pretty good at it! There are so many meals that can be made with a white sauce and a red sauce. White sauce can become anything from gravy to amazing mushroom sauce to yummy mac-n-cheese sauce. I stuck with those two things for quite a while.

Then I learned how to bake a roast. (It's really easy). That gave me huge variety in what I could make. Plus I could make gravy to go with.

Now I'm starting to experiment a little bit more, with good results. For instance, I took a pork roast, smothered it with leftover tomato alfredo sauce and baked it. Serve it up with potatoes au gratin (white sauce + cheese + potatoes) and salad. I made it on a morning I had a migraine headache - it was THAT easy. (And impressive!)

You can cook a lot of things over the weekend and eat it the rest of the week. It can be fun - not like you eat the same thing every day!

Let's say I bake a chicken with veggies.

Slice and eat the breast. Bone the chicken. Make creamy chicken soup with the tiniest bits of meat and most of the veggies. Make broth out of the bones and the rest of the veggies. With the rest of the chicken, I might shred it and add BBQ sauce and make sandwiches, cut it up with scissors, add mayo, diced celery and spices to make chicken salad (sandwiches). There is probably enough to make chicken noodle soup with the broth too.

That $5 chicken has just made:

Baked chicken breast (1 meal)
Creamy chicken soup (2 meals)
1 gallon chicken broth (freeze or can)
Chicken noodle soup (2 meals)
BBQ pulled chicken sandwich (1 meal)
Chicken salad sandwiches (1 meal)

There - you cooked one afternoon and have meals for the week. (and cheap too!)

One more word of advice - chuck the cookbooks. They rarely help. They're full of ingrdients you probably don't have. They make things over-complicated. The number of recipes is overwhelming.

Take it one little step at a time. Use a site like "all recipes" to look up a recipe if you don't know how to make it. READ ALL OF THE COMMENTS on the recipe. People post how they changed the recipe. You'll learn about how the recipe should turn out and how easy it is (or is not) to make.

Most of cooking is not complicated enough to need a recipe. Not everything will be perfect, so relax and have fun.

 

[gettinaclue]

Wow Tortoise!!! Way to stretch a chicken!!!

I think being a good wife depends on the relationship you're in. A good wife to one man isn't necessarily a good wife to another.

I am not a good "traditional" wife. At least not traditional the way I was brought up. I don't run a bath for my DH every night, I don't cook every day yada yada. But, I did make it clear to him before we got married. "I am not your mother, I am not your maid. I am not the only one who eats off dishes, I will not be the only on washing them. The washing machine doesn't need my hands specifically to work and the house will not get mad at you and kick you out if you help clean it.". Maybe not a direct quote, but pretty close. I have rarely gotten upset that he leaves all the house work to me, but we all need a break.

As far as cooking, I totally agree with Tortoise, go with what you know and toss the cookbooks. I have several and rarely use them. May I recommend allrecipes.com? I have been a member there for several years and it is really great. I almost always become inspired after looking for a few minutes.

Again agreeing with Tortoise, CROCKPOTS are GOOD!!!

 

[hwillm1977]

I also really like Rachael Ray's recipes... everything is flexible, she never uses measuring cups or spoons and even when I don't everything from her website seems to come out great...

You can also search by how long things are going to take to cook, like 30 minute, or 15 minute meals.

I'm a member at www.savingdinner.com and bought their 'Five for the freezer' meals cookbook. It gives you 5 recipes each week that you can throw the ingredients together in a freezer bag, freeze them and whenever you need a quick meal you can just pull one out and it takes no time at all.

The Kraft website has great recipes too, nothing that really takes over 30 minutes and they all come out great (I don't necessarily use their kraft ingredients, just subsitute generic ones)

I think being a good wife is totally different for every person. My boyfriend likes when I pack his lunch for him, so I do. He works 14 hours a day driving a truck so I'm home more than he is.

If your boyfriend gets home first, why doesn't he have supper ready for you? Then you could make lunches for both of you when you finish supper...

I wish I could get my boyfriend out to the barn more than he is, he's never even sat on my horse... lol

Tortoise, I would love to find a whole chicken for $5, around here they'd be closer to $12-15.

 

[Aidenbaby]

When I was starting out, my favorite place to go was (and still is) Allrecipes.com. Generally, I only ever make recipes with 4 and 5 stars. You can use the calculator to downsize recipes but remember that when you do it, it doesn't know to change cooking times on things like meats and lasagna's so you'll want to keep a closer eye on that.

Another tip I have for the new cook is to find something you enjoy making and cook it to help boost confidence. Once you have that recipe down, try something similar and expand outward. I LOVE baking.

Don't be intimidated by what others' think is hard. Just because they overwork a pie crust or can't make pancakes (okay, that one was me, I've since improved) to save their lives doesn't mean that you shouldn't at least try.

Savingdinner is a good site for recipes for two. You buy subscriptions or "cook books" and it's pretty handy. We stopped using them because, for us, some of the food was a little too mind expanding. The kids and I would make it and eat it but hubby wouldn't touch it.

Hwillm1977, I can NOT believe how expensie your chickens are in your area! Even the all-organic, hormone-free, vegetarian-diet ones here aren't that much. I'd go into growing meat birds if I were you. CHA-CHING!!!

 

[hwillm1977]

Hwillm1977, I can NOT believe how expensie your chickens are in your area! Even the all-organic, hormone-free, vegetarian-diet ones here aren't that much. I'd go into growing meat birds if I were you. CHA-CHING!!!

An organic, super chicken here would be $7/pound... regular chickens are about $3.50/pound... but they do go on sale for $1.79/pound.

I'm getting meat birds for myself next year, we started with layers this year and will gradually work up to it.

Oh, I also bought a book on how to be an organized house 'wife', but it could work for husbands too... lol... it's called Sidetracked Home Executives... it's basically just a system to organize chores and get everything done that needs to be done. I'm still working on implementing it, but I can see how it will help me a lot.

 

[Aidenbaby]

Hwill, If I remember right, that is the book that inspired FlyLady. I love FlyLady. I quite often "fall off the wagon" but FLyLady always says to just jump in where you are. She's been a monumental help with my self-esteem too.

 

[tortoise]

I love flylady. If I ever get stuck, I go to that site.

Haha - the ladies here helped improve my "chicken-stretching" skills.

I second gettingaclue about talking it out. When I was in college, I left home before my SO woke up and got home when he was getting ready for bed. You bet I wasn't doing ANY housework or cooking then.

If you want to divide things up, make a list of everything that has to be done and find out what he DOESN'T like to do. Maybe it's something you like to do or don't mind. It doesn't have to be a formal you-do-this-I-do-that list, but a way to find out how your work is most appreciated.

If he gets home before you, he could cook - but maybe you clean up or pack lunches or something. There are awesome non-traditional ways to split things up.

My brother will get his PhD this spring, and then is going to be a stay-at-home dad after that. His wife has her PhD and is finishing up for her MD now. They have a very cool relationship where they are both equally comfortable in the kitchen or with the kids. They're not into traditional gender roles.

I just happen to like a traditional gender role. Maybe I'll get tired of it someday. That's OK. Then I'll work and the relationship will change a little bit again. No big deal.