Dream Dinners

I’m single and I live alone. No, I am not a monster. I’m also not a very efficient cook.
It’s hard to cook for one person. Produce goes to waste, leftovers don’t get eaten, and honestly, taking an hour to prep and cook an entire healthy meal just for myself just isn’t fun or satisfying. Most nights I pop a frozen piece of cardboard in the microwave or I throw together a salad.
But my neighbor (a fellow mutant single gal) told me about Dream Dinners and suggested we try it out. I’ve heard of these types of places before but thought it would only be good for someone with a family to cook for.
Not so! I love this place and the concept! It’s perfect for me and my non-​cooking habits and aversion to anything complicated. You just go to their website and pick out the entrees you want, the date and time you want to go in, and pay.
We went on a Saturday morning. They have 6 prep stations set up. You get an apron, preparation cards, and Ziplock baggies. Each station has 2 – 3 entrée recipes ready to be prepped and you make your way around to all of the entrees you ordered. The staff was EXTREMELY helpful and friendly and they kept everything sparkly clean!
It’s so simple. They have all of the ingredients for the entrees already diced/​prepped and you assemble the ingredients in baggies. For example, I made Buffalo Ranch Chicken. You add the spices and ingredients to various bags and put it all together to go into your freezer. When the week comes that you want to cook the entrée, you take it out and put it in the fridge to thaw, then follow the simple cooking instructions the day you want to cook it.
The recipes are healthy and everything I made looks delicious! You can alter the recipes as you’re making them. For example, I don’t like artichoke hearts so in a couple of entrees that called for them, I skipped them and added more of other ingredients I do like.
The minimum order is 36 servings, so my freezer is now full of enough meals for the month plus a few lunches! The cost turned out to be just over $ 4 per serving. What I’ve had so far is delicious! It takes about an hour to put together all of your entrees while you’re there and they also have lots of sides/​soups/​desserts that have already been prepared that you can purchase there. And the best part is you don’t do any of the cleanup!
I can’t wait to go back next month!