San Jose Mercury News (CA)

WHAT'S FOR DINNER?
THREE SOLUTIONS TO THE MIDWEEK MENU PUZZLE
MEAL SERVICES REMOVE PREP TIME AND CLEANUP FROM HOME COOKING

Author: JULIE SEVRENS LYONS, Mercury News
Appeared: March 2, 2005
Edition: Morning Final
Section: Food
Page: 1F
Estimated printed pages: 6

Maybe you love cooking but detest the cleanup. Or loathe the prep work. Or maybe you just don't have the time or energy to whip up something sensational during the workweek.

Do you have to settle for McDonald's?

Eat your words!

One of the newest trends to hit the family dinner table is drawing rave reviews for its convenience, cost-effectiveness and creativity.

People from empty-nesters to single parents are taking advantage of inexpensive services that enable them to quickly churn out several batches of home-cooked meals in one sitting -- in someone else's kitchen.

Many companies are now providing the food, recipes and baking dishes -- and they do all of the tiresome slicing, dicing and dishwashing. Customers spend an hour or two measuring and assembling recipe ingredients and arranging them in foil cookware. Then they take home their multiple meals and pop them in the freezer for later cooking in an oven or slow ! cooker.

The result? Six to 12 family-sized entrées at prices that are cheaper than takeout. No meal planning. No trips to the grocery store. No crying over chopped onions. And no midweek scrambling to figure out what to have for dinner.

"It couldn't get any more picture-perfect than that," said Hillary Bessiere, 33, a full-time tech worker and mother of twin boys from Pleasanton who credits the concept with helping her lose weight and save money while putting dinner on the table each night.

A few of the meal preparation services have popped up in the Bay Area. Santa Clara boasts one. Pleasanton is home to two, both of which opened last year. And the national chain Dream Dinners, just 3 years old, continues to open new franchises throughout California.

"This is a big deal for Americans on a nightly basis," said Harry Balzer, vice president of the NPD Group, a consumer-marketing research firm that has tracked how people eat for the past 25 year! s. But, Balzer said, the meal services are still too new to say if it' s a lasting trend.

Still, the allure is obvious. Customers experience the joy of cooking and get to tailor recipes to meet their families' tastes and nutritional needs. And the result is maximum meals for minimal effort.

"The best part," said Kathy Sensiba, owner of GourMade Cookery in Pleasanton, "is we clean up after you."

That hooked me.

Still learning to juggle a career and new motherhood -- and growing tired of the prepared meals that Trader Joe's has to offer -- I was intrigued by the concept. Spend an hour on a Saturday morning "cooking" and come home with meals for my family for at least 12 weeknights? It was definitely worth a try.

For $110, clients of Sensiba's business can pick six entrées to assemble, each serving four to six adults. That's about $4.60 a serving for four; $3 if you stretch an entréeentrée to feed six. Selections have ranged from scallop and shrimp brioche to winter vegetable potage. At a recent cooking session, ! customers made chicken marsala, turkey tetrazzini, souvlaki, old-fashioned meatloaf, chicken jambalaya and Southern-style catfish. For $194, customers could choose 12 entrées to make from the list of 14. That breaks down to about $2.70 to $4 per serving. And entrées can be purchased already assembled for a slightly higher fee.

Food and cookware are included in the price.

The process, I found, is fairly simple. Customers view the monthly list of meals on a Web site, select the items they would like to make and then reserve a spot in a cooking session at least three days in advance. At GourMade Cookery, Dream Dinners and Santa Clara's 1 Dinner Solution, they are greeted with an apron and directed to an assembling station.

You don't need to be a good cook to make good meals. If you can read a recipe -- or are willing to ask for help if instructions are unclear -- you'll be fine.

The work itself isn't hard, either, involving layering sliced onions, c! arrots, whole pork chops and apple chunks in disposable baking dishes. Or marinating meat in lemon juice, olive oil and herbs.

I was somewhat intimidated by the idea of making a full-sized turkey pot pie until I realized the crust was pre-assembled for me by GourMade's pastry chef. And an assistant even taught me several ways to crimp the edges.

All measuring cups, spoons and mixing bowls needed are within arm's reach.

"This is easy," said Becky Dunn, a Danville real estate consultant, as she prepared the sauce for a batch of turkey tetrazzini at GourMade Cookery in January.

After assembling her entrée, Dunn affixed a printed label to the container, which detailed freezing and cooking instructions, as well as nutritional content. She placed the meal in a refrigerator unit and started work on her next entrée.

Veterans know to bring large ice chests to their cooking sessions for easy transport home.

"It's been a godsend for my family," said Bessiere, who sipped coffee as she made 12 entrées in less than two hours. The food would feed her family of four dinner for an entire month because the portions are so large.

The experience has been popular among mothers' groups like the one Bessiere belongs to. And couples, businesses and friends have held private cooking parties at the meal preparation sites, noshing on pastries as they go along.

John Gregory, a Pleasant Hill administrator, went with his in-laws and made a care package of foods for his daughter, a student at the University of California-Berkeley.

"We're busy families. And we're always looking to eat healthy," Gregory said, as he dusted catfish in cornmeal and bread crumbs. It didn't take much convincing to get him to try the meal service.

"I've been on a kick to not eat any fast food," he said.

GourMade Cookery boasts homemade sauces and chicken stock, as well as fresh seasonal vegetables and herbs. 1 Dinner Solution uses restaurant-quality meats, fish and produce.

Ma! ny of the entrées are not too spicy for children. And the companies st rive to include menus for special occasions. Dream Dinners, for instance,featured a "Super Bowl Sunday brunch strata" in January that customers could serve weeks later on the big game day. In December, GourMade Cookery offered "holiday French toast bake."

In my household, the Mexican stuffed shells were the biggest hit, followed closely by the chicken marsala and turkey tetrazzini. The chicken jambalaya wasn't spicy enough for our tastes, but Sensiba explained that many of the recipes are intentionally mild so that finicky young eaters will like them, too. A couple of extra dashes of red pepper and chile seasoning and the jambalaya was markedly improved.

The service has helped my husband and me get our weeknight dinners down to a science. He gets home, preheats the oven, pops a pre-made entrée in and plays with our toddler while I carpool home from work. One of us makes a salad, and voila, dinner is ready.

Sensiba, a former financial analyst who tire'd of her daily commute over the Sunol Grade, is enjoying running her "once-a-month cooking in a retail format" business. Trained as a personal chef, she tests her recipes on her husband and their seven children and makes sure that all are freezer-friendly.

And everyone leaves her kitchen, in an office park, with a list of recommended side dishes for each entrée.

"I've got my whole block hooked on it," said Bessiere, a repeat customer. "Why wouldn't you be?"

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