Organisation and Planning

I expect we all have our own methods of organising our lives to make things easier, and I do not wish to try to teach Grannies to suck eggs. It just seems sensible to write down what works for me in the hope that someone else may find it useful.

I was watching Paul Merrett in My Kitchen, a TV programme about famous Chefs in their own homes, the other evening and gained the impression that he follows a similar system to me. He has gained his experience from formal training and working in professional kitchens, I’ve picked mine up by trial and error.

When I first started cooking, I tended to shop two or three times a week and often had to run out to buy ingredients I needed that were not in the cupboard. Sometimes as I was preparing the meal. I now plan my menu for the week. This is not too onerous since there are only normally the two of us in the house and I only really plan the main meal of the day. Breakfasts and lunches tend to look after themselves, so long as there are cereals, bread, eggs etc. available. In the evening we only eat a main course. I only make starters and desserts on high days and holidays or when we have visitors.

Having planned the menu, I then list on a spread sheet all the ingredients I need for each day and this forms the basis of my shopping list. I can check to see what I need to buy and know for which day I’m buying. This is useful in store when checking use by and best before dates. I try to buy things when they are in season and also keep some flexibility in my menu so that I can buy the special offer or for example buy trout instead of mackerel because one looks fresher than the other.

In the store cupboard, where room permits, I keep a spare packet or jar of the most used items so that I always have a back up. When I finish a packet or jar I immediately make a note on a list I keep in the kitchen to remind me to buy that item the next time I go shopping.

I have collected well over one hundred recipe books, which became very unmanageable when I tried to find a recipe I had seen somewhere for a particular ingredient or occasion. So just over two years ago I started cataloguing recipes, that I may like to cook, on a database. I categorise the recipe by type of dish: starter; main; dessert etc. ; if it is vegetarian; main ingredient; book title; author; page number; name of recipe etc. I also keep a record on the database when I cooked it and my comments. So far, I have a database of about 1400 recipes of which I have made just over 170. At the present rate of progress it is going to take over 16 years to cook them all, but that isn’t really the object of the exercise. I can search the database by the main ingredient and immediately see a list of recipes for that ingredient and where to find them.

If this makes me sound like some sort of nerd so be it, but I do have other interests and activities in my life apart from food and cooking.