Cooking at Home, Outside the Home

by Maricar on February 6th, 2006

Franchises are popping up all over the U.S. that give the home cook a way to prepare meals without the grocery shopping, preparation and clean-up usually involved in making “home-cooked” meals.

Customers sign up on the Web for “sessions” that last an hour or two. At a central kitchen, they visit stations for each entrée on that week’s menu, with a recipe and all the ingredients either pre-measured or available. Most people put together six or 12 entrees. They assemble the ingredients and put the entrees in bags, take them home and freeze them until ready to cook.

I look at this cooking and (dining) style as a blend of commercial microwave dinners, take-out, from-scratch home cooking and having a personal chef. The menus have enough variety on them to make them a sort of mini cooking lesson, a chance to broaden my repertoire of recipes and pick up a few tips here and there.

There’s a franchise in the city I live in. I think I’m going to drop by and see what’s up. Maybe I’d sign up for a session or two, as well.

Visit these websites. There might be a kitchen close to where you are.

Dinner’s Ready

Dream Dinners

Let’s Eat!

My Girlfriend’s Kitchen

[Sources: The Enquirer at Cincinnati.com, Orlando Sentinel]

Update (2/7/06):

Another website to check:

Dinner by Design
[Source: Greater Wilwaukee Today]