Cooking for a Month in a Day

I have wanted to try this Cooking for a Month in a Day thing for quite a while.  When I found this amazing site that does all the work for you I knew I had to give it a try.  I thought, "Why not make it into a party?" so I sent an email to my mom's group to see who was interested in participating.  Thank God only 4 gals were able to make it work at this time and on this day!  We learned a ton from try number one.  We learned 1)it is exhausting, but worth it 2)cooking all day is really messy 3) having kids around, even if they are really well behaved might not be so helpful, 4)doing 4 families simultaneously is actually only easily doable in a commercial kitchen with commercial cookware;)

If you consider doing this, I would recommend doing it with one partner.  It would be tough to tackle this one along...especially since it REALLY does take all day, but too many partners makes for some confusion and just not enough space to prepare and cook everything.  We actually took longer, I think because of the mass quantity of food every recipe needed.  I would also thoroughly check everything on the grocery list with the recipes.  The site does all the work, but there were a few mistakes that necessitated a grocery store run.  (We were short two dozen eggs and 20 chicken breasts- so the mistakes weren't minor;)

This is just the dry goods....we had my kitchen table loaded with refrigerated items too...

 and coolers filled with meats...

 Laurie is an amazing baker...but after spending more than 8 hours baking one has to wonder if the "likability" factor has decreased a few notches...

Christina took great delight in grilling ham and cheese quesadillas.  

 Beef Stroganoff, however, was another matter entirely.  Perhaps one could even go so far as to claim it was the thorn in her side.

 Broccoli and Cheddar biscuits...I would never have made them on my own, but they look kind of cool.

 Does she look a bit more tired in her second photos?  That is what happens when you cook all day!

 Ashley spent almost an hour trying to figure out the labels that I had already messed with and could NOT get to print properly.  In the end, it turned out I had loaded the paper upside down...ouch!

 

I would complain about the paper cut I got on my knuckle, but Ashley actually took a chunk out of her finger so....

 Yes, it DID and DOES feel like a major accomplishment!

I don't care if you're interested or not;)...all that hard work gets a second look!

Thank you Ashley, Christina, and Laurie for learning with me and hangin' tough!  We certainly do have plenty of food and I actually keep laughing at the insanity of it all today;)