Meals in a Jar: Quick and Easy, Just-Add-Water, Homemade
Recipes
Author: Julie Languille
Publisher: Ulysses Press (2013)
Everybody’s busy. These days, between shuttling from work
to ballet practice to soccer to swimming, putting a meal on the table is all
too often just left by the wayside. The need to feed the family on those days
usually results in a quick pop-in to the local fast food joint, or at best the
20 minutes it takes to make a box of mac and cheese. It’s true that these
prepackaged shortcuts are handy solutions in a time crunch or when cooking from
scratch isn’t an option (due to lack of time or ingredients), but they are full
of preservatives, colourings and other artificial additives too. Julie
Languille, creator of the meal planning service Dinners in a Flash©,
attempts to bridge the wholesomeness of scratch-cooking with the convenience of
the box in her book Meals in a Jar: Quick and Easy, Just-Add-Water, Homemade
Recipes.
Meals in a Jar contains 125 recipes for every meal
of the day, including desserts, snacks and even beverages. Everything is
designed for medium- to long-term storage and minimal preparation time come
cook day, although a good portion of the meals take at least 45 minutes to cook
due to their use of dried beans and grains. While Languille breaks down the
process of creating these packaged meals, it is not apparent until you are in
the middle of reading the recipes that “Quick and Easy” is a bit of misnomer. To
use this book, most home cooks will have to purchase several pieces of
equipment including a pressure canner, a food dehydrator, retort pouches, mylar
bags and a vacuum sealer. In addition, readers of this book should plan to
clear out a large section of their basement or garage and install shelving to
house the ingredients, as well as the finished goods. This is because all the
recipes in Meals in a Jar make between six and 8 meals, each serving
between six and 8 people. Some recipes like Muesli
(p. 33) call for 27 cups of oats, 6 cups of dried fruit and 4 ½ cups of
nuts – amounts which are not typically practical (or economical) to purchase
and store. The time it takes to create these “simple” meal pouches is also
prohibitive for most people, since the main reason for turning to prepared
meals in the first place is lack of time!
Because the meals are only really suitable for larger
families (6-8 servings), smaller families and singles are mostly out of luck
for go-to meal solutions. The idea of leftovers would be nice in normal
circumstances (albeit a bit tiresome after the fourth day of Tuna Noodle Casserole (p. 83)), but
since this book seems to be intended as a resource of food for “emergency” situations
(a la MREs), what would be the chances of adequate refrigeration (or running
water and heat for that matter) in those circumstances?
The only items I could see myself ever making from this
book as a singleton (who occasionally cooks for her mother) are the dried soups
and desserts, which are handily broken down into “one meal” batches by virtue
of the assembly instructions (stating “in each bag...”). Of these, I will
probably give the exotic Armenian Lentil
Soup (p. 64) and Cranberry Walnut
Oatmeal Cookies (p. 160) precedence, though I won’t bother with the “seal
in bag” portion and simply make the recipes straight through. I’m sure that
those recipes relying on normally “dry” goods like pasta, rice and beans will
fare much better taste-wise over time, especially with those who are
unaccustomed to the taste and texture of freeze-dried produce and meats.
Some recipes in Meals in a Jar, particularly for what
Languille calls “side kits”, are simply inane to include. Does valuable space
in a meal preparation guide need to be devoted to packaging a Corn Tortilla (p. 130) mix (comprised of
corn flour and salt), or Dried Beans (p.
133)?
One of the other major issues I had with Meals in a
Jar was that simply locating any
of the ingredients or equipment was impossible. Freeze dried food and specialty
powdered items (like eggs and cheese) is rarely found in standard stores, and
when purchased online is too expensive for most budgets. There is no resource
guide for either equipment or ingredients in the book, which is frustrating. Between
the equipment, ingredients and power required to create these packets, it’s no
wonder that the store shelves are lined with 75-cent cans of soup and $1 boxes
of pasta.
It must be noted that some omissions in this book can
cause dangerous health risks as well. This is especially the case with regards
to the use of retort pouches, which can only be safely sealed with chamber-vacuum
equipment – industrial devices running between $500-$1000. Suggested shelf life of the meals is not
provided either, and considering many of the recipes include “packets” of “waxed
cheese” and various fat-based products, it looks like a recipe for food
poisoning.
For those intent on preparing for emergencies or long
camping trips who already own a good deal of preserving equipment and
knowledge, Julie Languille’s Meals in a Jar: Quick and Easy, Just-Add-Water,
Homemade Recipes can provide some interesting ideas and combinations. However,
for the majority of consumers out there looking for a truly “quick and easy”
fix for dinner, a box of pasta, a can of beans and a jar of tomato sauce is
just as healthy and “homemade”, while being cheaper, easier and faster than
dragging out the pressure canner.
