If you’re doing the traditional Boxing Day thing and cruising the sales, you’ll be whacked by the time you get home this afternoon. If ever there was a time to fall back on pre-made meals – either your own or from the supermarket – this is it!
Loblaw’s in-store, pre-made Stuffed Bell Peppers: Great value for your money at just $3.35 per serving.
Not all bad
Pre-made meals and entrées are not all bad. Just the ones that are stamped, extruded, piped or otherwise machine made. Homogenized, filled with easily machine-processed ingredients, and precursors. Overloaded with salt, sat and extra sugar.
“But what’s the choice?” I hear you asking. Well, there is a choice, one that didn’t exist in a really viable way just a few years ago.
A statue of the Rotisserie Chicken!
The Rotisserie Chicken deserves a statue to commemorate its part in the development of in-store made take-home meals.
A decade ago, a Rotisserie Chicken with some standard, factory-pre-made salads on the side was about the limit of your choices for a, hot take-home supermarket-sourced meal. Then, customers started asking for more, and store workers started thinking.
Now, you can walk in and cruise a whole aisle of pre-made entrées and full meals, prepared freshly in-store many from fresh ingredients, according to employee-developed recipes.
The chefs go shopping early…
The in-store cooks often have at least some professional cooking training or experience. I’ve been over at my go-to supermarket more than once, right as soon as it opens, and found the in-store chefs cruising the same aisles and departments I was. But they were filling the carts with the ingredients they needed for the entrées entrees and sides they were planning to make that day.
They were not – I repeat not – just unpacking factory-prepared, ready-boxed meals and meal components they could simply re-heat in their mammoth ovens. Or just allow to thaw in the refrigerated display cases. They were getting ready to cook.
Make the most of the opportunity!
I particularly enjoy visiting the ‘Independent’ supermarket in my neighburhood, where crews of up to 6 cooks supervised by real chefs make their own dishes right before your eyes, in open-air kitchens. You can ask them what’s going into the mixing pots and frying pans. And discus their theories about added sugar, salt and fat. And you can ask them on what day of the week a certain dish you and your family like will be prepared so you can roll in around noon and get it super-fresh.
More importantly, knowing what’s in them, you can gauge how healthy the in-store meals are and what kind of value they represent.
Good value for your dollar!
I’ve found that in-store-made entrées and full meals generally offer good value for the money.
For instance, We often get a tray of 5 Chicken Parmesan cutlets (breaded, baked and topped with a rich marinara, grated cheese and halved cherry tomatoes) for just $8. Figure it out. That’s just $3.60 per serving. And they’re large, juicy cutlets. Make your own rice or noodles and toss together a small side salad. A great meal, and you couldn’t have made the entrée yourself, from ingredients purchased at the same store, for less. Not to mention, you’re not left with left-over ingredients that encourage waste.
Other favourites in our house – that headline our fave stores’ deli cases on different days of the week – include: Butter Chicken, Hunan Beef Stir Fry, and Stuffed Bell Peppers. No dish is over $20 per tray (4 x Chicken Parmesans at $5 per serving; see photo, top of page). Dishes like the Stuffed Peppers, where you get 6 servings per tray, represent the best deal at just $3.35 per serving.
Tap your own enthusiasm and energy wells…
And don’t forget the advantages of making your own Pasta dishes, casseroles and other meals in advance and stowing them in your freezer for occasions exactly like Boxing Day!
There’s more than one way to meet the challenge of rising food prices: Buy common ingredients like rice and noodles when they’re on sale. Ditto, pre-made pasta sauces, canned veggies, and other culinary supporting actors. Combine these with carefully-curated ‘Enjoy Tonight!’ meat bargains from your freezer and you’ll find you have great meals, made just the way you and your family love them, whenever you want them – just by sticking them in the microwave or conventional oven and pushing a few buttons while you enjoy a beer or a glass of wine, and take a few minutes to exhale after a busy day…
Now, go get them deals!
~ Maggie J.