Sad fact of life

My solution is just to act like I'm cooking for 12 people, and have leftovers for the rest of the week.

Yep I batch cook too, I make 4 portions then eat 2 and freeze 2. Eating over 2 days obvs
- Yup, I'm doing the same. Cooking 4 portions, then eating them all while crying

You forgot the 40+ hours of work a week just to afford the ingridients.

Yep, you don't cook.
- Thanks for your input, Chef Boyardee. I always make sure to put great store in ad-hominems from fictionalized canned MRE mascots. Take your shitty ravioli high horse and go ride off into the sunset with the Sunkist tuna.
  Edit: "fictional" to "fictionalized"
Working many of the hours to afford a car. So that you can get to/from work.

leftovers are the goal

The term is meal prep

just cook bigger portions, i usually make enough food to last half a week

I’ve been eating the same two-pound portion of taco meat for the past four days. Usually in soft-shell tacos, but sometimes in frittatas. The trick is to be dead inside.
- You're not dead inside until you move to hard tacos.
- This is ideal because the tortilla IS the plate.
- I love tacos. I could eat tacos every day and never get tired of them. All varieties are good with me. Corn tortillas, flour tortillas, crispy fried tacos, taquito, even crunchy taco shells. There used to be a dive bar near where I lived in 2015 that would do $5 for 5 beef or bean crunchy tacos with cheese, lettuce, dice tom, and sour cream and I'd easily polish off 10-20 of those with a beer or two (I don't live near there anymore and the bar closed down right before COVID due to the building be demo'd)
  My wife isn't big on eating the same thing for more than 2 days in a row and I miss the days of eating tacos 4-5 times a week by choice.
  You're not dead inside. You're living a dream of mine right now.

2 hours of cooking for a 10 minute meal sounds like a skill issue.

My last dinner was 12hrs of cooking for a 10min meal. I love slow cooker beef and veggies stew
Yeah that's like first time making a recipe. Third time around, the kitchen should be doing most of the work for you. You can just casually prep and blend while listening to a podcast.

I wash as I cook. Usually you have moments when you're waiting anyway. Means I have serving dishes only afterwards.

Had to make it a habit though in order to force myself to do it. Took years to train the habit.

I’m trying to not do that, because I always forget that I’ll need the things I’ve just washed again.
I do that, but the more complicated the meal, the less down time there is, and the more stuff there is you can't clean up until the end.
Also, if you use serving dishes, rather than just serve out of the pot / pan, that's another thing to clean. It's true that cleaning a pot or pan is normally a bit harder than a serving dish. But, IMO the extra bit to clean means it's not worth it.
It is a bit of a triumph when the only thing to clean after dinner is a single pot or pan though. And, pro-tip, you can make the pans easier to clean after dinner if you dump a bit of water in them as you're sitting down to eat. Even 30 minutes is enough to turn the remains of a delicious sauce into sludge at the bottom of the pan. But, soaking while you eat makes it super quick to scrape it out afterwards.
I wash as I go too, but there are still the after dinner dishes, and like the main pot/pan left over, the forks, the endless cups the just accumulate everywhere with having a whole family with adhd..
I tend to make everything by scratch, so I've only myself to blame (it's cheaper tho). Washing as you go helps, but it's not a full cure.
I posted cookies I made last night, and the only reason I didnt melt the butter with the lemon zest was to save pulling out and dirting my sauce pan I just cleaned from dinner.
This is what I do, so nice to have just a few dishes at the end

Just spend 2 hours eating, easy

Meals in countries that take food seriously last longer and are meant to be enjoyed with family and friends. Its just our shitty culture that causes this problem.

What do you mean by countries that take food seriously? I lived in a few different countries (never in the US) and can't really picture that
- If food is viewed and enjoyed as an experience rather than a necessity as a culture, I think it leads to huge shifts in so many aspects of daily living.
- I dont mean EVERY meal but getting together with neighbors, family, friends ect. is more common in places like Italy for example.

Slow cooker is fren

Turns beef into beef flavored chicken, I love it.

do you people just cook for a single meal wtf

If you’re Single yea why not
- so you don't end up like the meme? idk what being single has to do with anything. if you're spending two hours to cook it better not be for one meal; that's a huge waste of time.

For real, folks need to watch more Jamie Oliver. Condense your pans and ingredient lists, make sauce for a few days, use parchment paper, etc
You underestimate how bad we can be at cooking. It takes me like an hour just to peal and chop up ingredients for even a simple dish like mashed potatoes or stir fry.
Spoken like someone who has never made soup.

Make less elaborate meals or learn to chop faster.

2 hrs?

Do you spend 6 hrs a day cooking and do not do any clean as you go?

Wtf are you preparing? Are you stuffing a turkey each meal?

Clean as you go and there is very little left to be done after the meal.

Remember, you are dealing with people that never cook, and for some reason think they know what they're talking about.
- And I suppose you have personal knowledge that they never cook, since they are constantly pulling your shitty food off the grocery shelves?
There is a reason why the cooks and bussers are different people. Not everyone wants to get dishwater in their food from whatever tool they use to clean, nor do I have time while things are cooking and requiring near-constant attention to properly wash my hands 10 times as i go back and forth while cooking a single meal.
- What? Cleaning as you cook is about cleaning the shit you use to cook as you make your food.
  That just mostly means wiping shit down, stacking pots and pans as they're used, and organizing before you start (mise en place is a huge help in this).
- Whatever. Really, I just love how there is always someone willing to climb that hill and tell me how to cook. It takes no time to clean as you are cooking. If you can't properly wash your hands that is on you but somehow I manage to cook my meals and the cleanup at the end is always brief.

This is why i dont eat. ᕕ( ᐛ )ᕗ

Jk kind of lol

Make it so it last 3 days. Not really a big deal.

I feel like the post is more about the moment of, not the days after. Making several days worth of food doesn't delay the need to do dishes once you're done eating tonight's dinner.
Like they're going to eat left-overs.....
I might get away with white rice that I can make fried rice out of the next day
I think you over estimate people's ability to cook these days.

So true! I am trying to cook one pot or bake recipes, dump it all and forget about it. It is the only way not to go insane with 1000 pots and dishes to clean.

And after all that cooking turns out you have leftovers for like 1 extra meal at best

Skill issue.

During the pan my relationship with food became standing over the sink and eating quickly prepared meals. Only now that I'm in a relationship are real meals happening again because she loves to cook. She had to persuade me to buy a two-seater kitchen table before we lived together.

This is why Huel.

Those numbers are off. It takes me about half an hour to cook a meal. I clean while things are cooking if I can. And it takes me about the same time to eat. I get that it's a joke, but it's entirely unrealistic unless you're doing things very wrong.

Depends on what you're cooking.
For example: I can throw together some pasta and have it be done in 20 minutes, 45 minutes, an hour, 2 hours, or 6 hours. All depending on the type of pasta I'm making, how many people I'm serving, and how complex I want to get and how many layered flavors I'm trying to build or if I want to make my own fresh noodles or use some dried noodles in the pantry.
However, no matter the process I use, at the end I usually only have one pot, serving utensils, and dishes used for the meal. I clean while I cook very effectively, but there are times where timings of cooking techniques prevent that and I'll have to do some quick cleanup before serving.

Meal prep, and cooking stuff that doesn't need much involvement.

I eat 6 meals per day when I'm trying to gain weight, and it can be done with very little time spent cooking.

Boiled chicken and rice with a side of protein shake doesn't count as food.
- I haven't had the need for that in a long time. I've been working out for so long that my maintenance calories are 3700 right now. I can eat whatever I want and still hit my protein goal within my calorie budget

Avocado and canned tuna for the win baby.

That’s why I know I’m never going to be a foodie or even remotely enjoy cooking. I just don’t want to spend all that time only to be done eating so soon. Some dishes just aren’t worth the time invested.

If you enjoy cooking as a hobby, great. But since I don’t, I’m choosing easy to make things whenever possible.

Heck, I don’t even like going to restaurants. The wait is usually far too long compared to the actual meal.

Cooking isn't just a hobby. It's a necessary life skill.
- Yeah, and part of that skill can be recognizing some meals arent worth it just to enjoy as a hobby. Like I dont fuck with recipes I cant make large batches for leftovers and freeze
I like cooking but only for other people lol. If it’s just me you know I’m throwing in this week’s seventh Red Baron Classic Crust Pepperoni pizza.
I also kind of hate the foodie thing (probably class resentment), so I like making easy "one pot" type meals that aren't too fussy on the timing. Like tomato baked beans, dal, tossed chickpeas, etc.
I like that even if I decide to just do the simplest version imaginable. Like lentils with salt and pepper, it's still going to be delicious and nutritious. Then if I feel like doing a bit more work on it, say adding some more interesting spices, I get to see the benefits of every little bit of extra effort immediately.
But I'll fukn die before I call myself a foodie rofl.
- I'm a foodie and I make those kinds of meals. I just probably use more spices than average.

im a fast eater

looks like its another night of pbj sandwich. again.

You say that like it's a bad thing

it's a skill. learning to live single after growing up in a family is a big change. i still remember paying a co-worker fifty bucks once to wash my dishes.

Idc just give me big enough sink and Space to unload dishes on and im all good

Imagine if you had to hunt for it.

This is what doordash is for

But then I have to work an extra 10 hours of my minimum wage job just to eat for 10 minutes. The ratio is even worse!

And that's why my "necessary life skill" cooking lifehack is to just know that if you cook something big enough, it'll last you enough portions for two or three days without that much extra cooking work. And you'll only have to clean the cooking pot half (or one third) of the time.

Thats why Im having waffles tonight

Get a dishwasher.

Cooking a steak takes 5 minutes. You make a side salad while it's frying. Everything goes into the dishwasher in a few more minutes. Not sure what your problem is...

This is great, do you have any more recipes?
- If you have a Ninja Speedy, you can cook loads of dishes in 10-15 minutes, but only for 1-2 people at once. My fav is to cube potatoes and pork belly at 2cm size, mix with salt, spices and oil, put everything in the device and cook for 12 minutes in steam + air fry mode.