Jessa, Ben and Their Brood: Making a (Diaper) Mountain out of a Mold House

[Sew Sumi]

I think a lot of the apostrophe thing is the fault of autocorrect. I know I missed "it's" a couple of times and had to go back and edit. That's the most egregious apostrophe error that I've noticed. 

I assume that the vast majority of the witty posters here are college educated and know better but just happen to not notice autocorrect doing its evil deeds before they hit the reply button. 

[Lady Edith]

5 hours ago, SMama said:

 

@Lady Edith, please tell me you live in So Cal and tell me where that fabulous place is located. WOW, you have mad shopping skills. We should have a thread on that because I need to learn.

No, sorry...I live on the east coast. But I can tell you that there are other places out there, whether a wholesaler or butcher or farm store, that offer meats at a really reasonable price. Just google meat wholesaler and see if they sell direct to the public. 

Thanks for the kudos on my mad shopping skills. Unfortunately I had to come by them through adversity. Lost my job two years ago (luckily I’m employed again) and needed to feed the family on whatever was left from unemployment after the mortgage was paid. THAT was frugal living.  Not this “frugality” with millions in net worth that the Duggars enjoy. 

[queenanne]

10 hours ago, Westiepeach said:

It took me a long time to buy and cook a roast. Properly. My mother, bless her heart, would cook roasts to death. 

I live in a family that cooks all meat until it has no more blood tears left to cry.  Myself, I like it waved over the flame.  My mother is always snatching back perfectly desirable piles of meat from me... "Uhhhhhh, I'm not so sure about that..."  Sorry to say I usually wind up caving because I'm not really sure what temperature she cooked the meat at.

4 hours ago, Sew Sumi said:

I think a lot of the apostrophe thing is the fault of autocorrect. I know I missed "it's" a couple of times and had to go back and edit. That's the most egregious apostrophe error that I've noticed. 

I assume that the vast majority of the witty posters here are college educated and know better but just happen to not notice autocorrect doing its evil deeds before they hit the reply button. 

It is the very devil, is it not?  Mine's always lurching off and selecting words I had no intention of choosing, and never even click on, I swear.  I'm just merrily typing along... and it thinks I want to write "received" instead of, like "robots".  It will add it into my message too.  I'm like, "I am an English and Creative Writing Major, and thus cannot be predicted, Autocorrect!  Don't even try!  You WILL lose!"

[kokapetl]

The Duggars wouldn’t know what to do with a roast, a steak, or anything that isn’t ground meat. 

[ginger90]

What type roast did she make? Yes this is an important question for me!

Disregard, looked at her Instagram, beef lol! I would have used a bag in the crockpot, other than that looked good.

Edited February 3, 2018 by ginger90

[Churchhoney]

1 hour ago, Kokapetl said:

The Duggars wouldn’t know what to do with a roast, a steak, or anything that isn’t ground meat. 

Well.... we've seen Jessa cook some ground meat.... Pretty clear she didn't know what to do with that either. .... I'm thinking the ignorance centers on the word "cook" rather than on cooking any particular item. lol

[drafan]

11 hours ago, louannems said:

I applaud Jessa for cooking a simple roast.  Good for her.  She is learning!

Save your applause....she threw in two packets of premade Gravy Mix....blech. And of course she used a bag of baby-cut carrots (which are usually just whole carrots cut up and spun around in chlorine). Would've been too much to cut up some whole carrots. Not impressed.

[Caracoa1]

I believe Jessa is pregnant again but it is to close to Joy's due date to announce....she will announce shortly after Joy gives birth to bring the attention back to herself. I have a feeling she is due around the same time as Jinger...I'm sure Jim Bob very strategically plans when to make announcements to maximize the Duggar Gravy Train.

[Lady Edith]

33 minutes ago, Churchhoney said:

Well.... we've seen Jessa cook some ground meat.... Pretty clear she didn't know what to do with that either. .... I'm thinking the ignorance centers on the word "cook" rather than on cooking any particular item. lol

There was that one episode when they did the dinner theater.  They (Jessa, Jinger and Jill?) made shoe leather (I mean steaks) on the grill for JimBlob and Of JimBlob.  Way over cooked and tough. With sweet potato fries that looked awful. This from the teen daughters who supposedly know how to cook.  

[louannems]

That was so funny (and awful)!  The steak was so tough they couldn't even cut it!  They chewed it forever and had to force themselves to swallow.

[Jynnan tonnix]

10 hours ago, Sew Sumi said:

I think a lot of the apostrophe thing is the fault of autocorrect. I know I missed "it's" a couple of times and had to go back and edit. That's the most egregious apostrophe error that I've noticed. 

I assume that the vast majority of the witty posters here are college educated and know better but just happen to not notice autocorrect doing its evil deeds before they hit the reply button. 

Yup, I was mentally filing that under "benefit of the doubt" as well. It's too easy to miss a typo or renegade auto-correction when posting, and most people here seem to be pretty familiar with correct grammar, spelling, punctuation etc.

[DragonFaerie]

On January 31, 2018 at 11:07 AM, PradaKitty said:

One of my former co-workers is in her thirties and has confessed that she is unable to tell “round time”...

 

On January 31, 2018 at 11:26 AM, Natalie68 said:

There is no excuse for this.  None.  

I absolutely concur.  What happens when your cellphone looses its charge or you loose the phone? or when your watch battery dies?  It's not like I'm asking you guys to read a sundial, it's a CLOCK!

[DragonFaerie]

On January 30, 2018 at 6:28 PM, Natalie68 said:

WOOHOO!!!  I do cursive as well!  I don't want this to be a lost thing.  Yeah as a kid I always grumbled about thank you notes but if someone takes the time to get you something, you thank them!  I have turned into my mother. 

Everyone I know does cursive still.  Although I did get a contract job offer last year from a friend of a friend.  They had recently come into their great grandmother's journals/diaries and wanted to type them up so all the family could have a copy and they could be preserved.  She asked both of her college graduated kids to help her.  They took one look at it and said, I can't read this.  But I could.  One of the reasons I do online volunteer work transcriping cursive for a few Smithsonian projects through zooniverse

[Minivanessa]

On 2/2/2018 at 4:06 PM, SMama said:

What is it with the Razor Back crockpot? Why such an obsession with a team from a higher education institution, the type Duggars dismiss as unnecessary?

It's not really about higher education. It's about the University of Arkansas' sports teams, primarily their football team. IIRC the Seewalds have attended Razorback football games. In some regions, it's not unusual for people who didn't attend college to be big fans of their state university football teams. Especially if there's no local/state professional team to follow, and if the state university has a winning tradition and a bigtime powerhouse football program. I think Nebraska's like that, as well as Arkansas. Next door to Arkansas, Oklahoma has the interesting situation of two pretty bigtime state university football programs - OU and OSU. 

Anyway, it wouldn't surprise me that there's a lot of licensed Razorback logo merchandise out there. Arkansas is def a major presence in college football. Big bucks are involved. And knowing the Duggars, it's possible that the crockpot was a "love offering" from a fan. 

ETA: Sorry if the question was rhetorical. But I figured it couldn't hurt to answer. We have peeps here from all over, in the US and elsewhere, and some may not have experienced or witnessed the kind of college football fandom that the Razorbacks have.

Edited February 4, 2018 by Jeeves

[floridamom]

I still see the Razorback 'fan' stuff from this family as a contradiction in their own stated beliefs. Don't they 'encourage' others to believe and live they do? Yes, they have done that publicly many times. In being Razorback football team fans, they are supporting those college students who live and believe differently than they do. Those students wouldn't be attending any college so there would not be a football team to cheer on. I'm confused by this family yet again.

[queenanne]

23 minutes ago, floridamom said:

I still see the Razorback 'fan' stuff from this family as a contradiction in their own stated beliefs. Don't they 'encourage' others to believe and live they do? Yes, they have done that publicly many times. In being Razorback football team fans, they are supporting those college students who live and believe differently than they do. Those students wouldn't be attending any college so there would not be a football team to cheer on. I'm confused by this family yet again.

No need for confusion; Christian men make exceptions for sports, because they themselves enjoy them.  It's no more complicated than that.  

[lascuba]

On 2/2/2018 at 9:07 PM, louannems said:

Cooking two eggs at a time is silly in a huge family.  So is individual packets of instant oatmeal (shown in an episode where Jackson prepared instant oatmeal for his little sister).  We love our oats and cheaply buy 25 lb bags of oatmeal.  And we're just a family of four!

And the episode where JB made pizza using tiny packages of pre-grated cheese.  Why not buy the better and tastier blocks of cheese and give the kids a grater?

And buying frozen tator-tots when big bags of potatoes are fresher, more nutritious and cheap.

With a family that size, that huge pantry could have been lined with large, food grade containers filled with raw ingredients purchased in bulk.  Pinto beans, split peas and lentils, popcorn kernels, oatmeal, rice, etc.

And all that Styrofoam is truly just sinful!

I applaud Jessa for cooking a simple roast.  Good for her.  She is learning!

I think a lot of their food shopping habits stem from what they were used to getting deeply discounted (or donated) at that moment. JB was known to be an entitled asshole who insisted on deep discounts everywhere he shopped, including at already super super cheap places like ALDI's, and usually got them. For all their talking of saving money for the future, they're shit at long term budgeting, so they did things like buy tiny packages of pre-grated cheese for their planned "pizza" nights because they didn't want to spend more upfront for the large blocks of cheese that lasted longer. They also didn't want to take the time to cook from scratch--they already had to spend large parts of their day doing laundry and bathing (to the point that back in their rental house days, they only showered every other day)--so they did what was faster and cheaper in the short term. And once they had the money and space and time for better, those food habits were entrenched, both the actual "cooking" and their taste buds. 

[Nysha]

On 2/3/2018 at 6:00 AM, drafan said:

On 2/2/2018 at 6:07 PM, louannems said:

I applaud Jessa for cooking a simple roast.  Good for her.  She is learning!

Save your applause....she threw in two packets of premade Gravy Mix....blech. And of course she used a bag of baby-cut carrots (which are usually just whole carrots cut up and spun around in chlorine). Would've been too much to cut up some whole carrots. Not impressed.

I throw in a package of onion soup mix, a bag of baby carrots, and some whole tiny red potatoes, tastes great and takes no prep time. It can cook for 2 hours in the oven, all day in the Crock Pot, or 45 minutes in the Instant Pot. Go, Jessa, go, seek out new meats and semi-homemake in them in the best Sandra Lee way you can. It's still healthier and cheaper than frozen lasagna and tater tot casserole.

[momofsquid]

I've lived 50+ years without cooking a roast. It just isn't the kind of food my family usually eats. The Duggars likely never cooked roasts either because it would have taken several roasts to feed them all. And good for Jessa, teaching herself how to do it. I can't judge Jessa or Michelle on this particular issue, though I will joyfully judge them on a thousand other items.

edited to add: and I've only cooked a turkey once. We're ham people.

Edited February 4, 2018 by momofsquid
added fun fact about turkey

[BitterApple]

I get the vibe meals in the Duggar house were starch-heavy slapdash affairs. Jessa had never cooked a turkey prior to her marriage either, so I don't think they ate a lot of meat growing up, aside from the ground beef they used in casseroles.

[Nysha]

My childhood meals in my working-poor family greatly resembled the early Duggar meals. Cheap hamburger/pasta meals with canned veggies and fruits, plus white bread and margarine. We usually had a roast with potatoes and carrots on Sunday because that's what my stepdad had growing up, but it was a tough, cheap cut of roast cooked to the consistency of shoe leather, which is how my stepdad likes his meat. What we lacked in quality, we had in quantity. 

[Christina87]

On 2/3/2018 at 12:29 PM, Jynnan tonnix said:

Yup, I was mentally filing that under "benefit of the doubt" as well. It's too easy to miss a typo or renegade auto-correction when posting, and most people here seem to be pretty familiar with correct grammar, spelling, punctuation etc.

I think this site is the worst when it comes to autocorrect!!! It often completely changes the meaning of what I say! 

I will type: "Jessa has worn frumpy clothes before," and it will change it to, "Jessa has not worn frumpy clothes before."

it will even add the word NOT to something I say, and if I say, "have not," it will take out the not. Or it'll change the word to "hasn't." I'd say 90% of the time it changes the complete meaning of my statement!

Edited February 4, 2018 by Christina87

[Spencer Hastings]

I’m 30 years old and have been making meals since I was able to see over a stove, but I’ve also never made a roast.  I think it depends on your diet growing up.  We weren’t “roast people” and I’m guessing the Duggars weren’t either.  We typically cook what our parents cooked and what THEIR parents cooked...I definitely don’t think a roast is one of those must haves.

[cmr2014]

i think they had little fresh meat, too. Everything that they ate for years came out of cans -- hence the tuna spaghetti.

If J'chelle wasn't such a smarmy know-it-all asshole, I might have some sympathy for her for being coerced into the role of homemaker for which she clearly has no aptitude, but she chose this life for herself.

I get that Jessa had no other options, and given a choice, she might have chosen very differently.  This is, however, what "God has chosen" for her, and I just don't see her stepping up to the challenge. I respect the people who have expressed admiration for her for "trying," but I think she should be beyond that now. If I had an employee who, after three years, was still incapable of performing even the most basic tasks required of her and who expected admiration for "trying" to do even the smallest task, I'd be pretty exasperated.

[DangerousMinds]

5 hours ago, Spencer Hastings said:

I’m 30 years old and have been making meals since I was able to see over a stove, but I’ve also never made a roast.  I think it depends on your diet growing up.  We weren’t “roast people” and I’m guessing the Duggars weren’t either.  We typically cook what our parents cooked and what THEIR parents cooked...I definitely don’t think a roast is one of those must haves.

Same here. 

[Catfin]

4 hours ago, cmr2014 said:

i think they had little fresh meat, too. Everything that they ate for years came out of cans -- hence the tuna spaghetti.

If J'chelle wasn't such a smarmy know-it-all asshole, I might have some sympathy for her for being coerced into the role of homemaker for which she clearly has no aptitude, but she chose this life for herself.

I get that Jessa had no other options, and given a choice, she might have chosen very differently.  This is, however, what "God has chosen" for her, and I just don't see her stepping up to the challenge. I respect the people who have expressed admiration for her for "trying," but I think she should be beyond that now. If I had an employee who, after three years, was still incapable of performing even the most basic tasks required of her and who expected admiration for "trying" to do even the smallest task, I'd be pretty exasperated.

Just saw a co-worker of three years finally let go for inability to do the job, even at its most basic point. Felt horrible for her from a human standpoint, but relieved from a professional standpoint. Ultimately disgusted with the management team that hired her for her assets and countenance rather than her ability. 

[doodlebug]

12 hours ago, queenanne said:

No need for confusion; Christian men make exceptions for sports, because they themselves enjoy them.  It's no more complicated than that.  

There's also the fact that Arkansas doesn't have any pro football teams, so, folks that like football are going to root for the local college team.  Happens a lot in places like Arkansas, Oklahoma and Nebraska that football fans who wouldn't even consider attending college root for their regional college team.

[Nysha]

10 hours ago, cmr2014 said:

If I had an employee who, after three years, was still incapable of performing even the most basic tasks required of her and who expected admiration for "trying" to do even the smallest task, I'd be pretty exasperated.

I don't think this analogy works because nobody in Jessa's life is expecting her to be a better cook, housekeeper, and/or mother than Michelle. She's been brainwashed since birth that her parents and their lifestyle were the Godliest on earth and anyone questioning that was a sinner who deserved hell or some other Gothard approved punishment. For all their know-it-all arrogance, in reality, Jessa got married with the cooking skills easily learned by a 10-year-old with a microwave. I'm all for applauding any and all steps taken to grow beyond what she was taught because it's damn hard to overcome early childhood brainwashing.

[SMama]

9 hours ago, Nysha said:

For all their know-it-all arrogance, in reality, Jessa got married with the cooking skills easily learned by a 10-year-old with a microwave. I'm all for applauding any and all steps taken to grow beyond what she was taught because it's damn hard to overcome early childhood brainwashing.

I’m offended on behalf of all ten year olds, and highly offended on behalf on my 10 year old. SGirl can cook a meal and that means stove top, she hates using the microwave oven. It’s far higher than the stove. All true but said in jest. My baby out cooks the hell out of Jessa Blessa.

[louannems]

Well, Jessa's pot roast story inspired me enough to load my crock pot with veggies and a sirloin roast for tonight's meal!

[lookeyloo]

It inspired me to make a roast in the Instant Pot last night which turned out delicious!!

[MyPeopleAreNordic]

Ha! I just decided I'm making a roast for tonight, too!

My mom purposely never went out of her way to teach me how to cook, but I was responsible for making dinner twice-three times/wk as a teen. My mom gave me the recipes and got the ingredients (they were simple recipes) and told me "if you can read, you can cook." I worked in a cajun meat market in college and learned a lot from watching the owners there cook us meals (they'd make us lunch, yum).  Otherwise, I wouldn't have known how to make a roast when I was in my early/mid-20s, like Jessa.  

I normally wouldn't snark on Jessa not knowing how to cook a roast BUT like others have said, she was allegedly brought up to be a helpmeet.  I get that the Duggars couldn't afford a lot of meat, etc, but you think they would have gone out of their way to teach the girls a tad bit about basic culinary skills SINCE THEY WERE RAISED TO BE TRADITIONAL HOMEMAKERS! My mom purposely didn't teach me a ton about cooking because she told me she wanted me to have an education, career, and identity outside of the home.  She also encouraged me to choose a patner who cooked! Ha! (My husband is indeed a much better cook than I am and he enjoys cooking, while I do not.)  I still learned the basics, though.  But I was not raised to think that my only goal in life was to marry, have tons of kids, and then cook and clean for those people for the rest of my life. The Duggar parents really did not prepare any of their kids for their roles in life (or anything outside of those roles, either) besides modeling grifting & reproducing. UGH. 

I do like that Jessa asked Google how to make the roast instead of Michelle. At least Jessa is smart enough to know that's a waste of time.  If I was Jessa, I'd have told Bin that since he wanted/bought the roast, HE could make it. 

23 hours ago, cmr2014 said:

i think they had little fresh meat, too. Everything that they ate for years came out of cans -- hence the tuna spaghetti.

EWWWWW.  Tuna spaghetti sounds awful! Was it tuna in marinara sauce? Gross!

I can get eating Chickenetti once or twice a year, but not canned tuna in marinara sauce. Yuck!

Edited February 5, 2018 by MyPeopleAreNordic

[Angeltoes]

Quote

I don't think this analogy works because nobody in Jessa's life is expecting her to be a better cook, housekeeper, and/or mother than Michelle. 

Ha, that's a pretty low bar to leap over, too.

[BitterApple]

I agree with everyone's comments, and I think part of the problem is Jessa was never raised to think independently or research different methods of doing anything, so the lack of cooking skills after three years of marriage is just a continuation of her limited and insular upbringing. I remember Erin Bates making dinner for her younger siblings and she said she encourages them to try vegetables, because fresh produce isn't something they eat at home. Jessa is apparently trying to branch out, she's just on a slower learning curve. 

Edited February 5, 2018 by BitterApple

[Arwen Evenstar]

How many pages have been dedicated to roast already? I grew up in a British family where the tradition here and with my UK Family was Sunday roast. It was the 11th commandment:  on Sunday’s shalt thou partake of roast. It was usually beef, sometimes lamb, but roast pork loin was a treat. I got tired of this routine meal, and longed for something else on Sundays, which already sucked due to limited cartoons that day and having to go to school on Monday.

My best friend grew up in New England, and I asked her if she thought Sundays sucked growing up. She said, yeah cuz every Sunday we had to eat roast!

[FairyDusted]

Hubby made one Saturday. Before I read this! It was a MISS. I think he bought the wrong cut. Too funny!

[bigskygirl]

I would not mind having roast once a week because I love roast especially the left overs. I would not want to eat what the Duggars considered food.

[Jynnan tonnix]

I never really learned to cook growing up - my mom was a good, but very basic cook who saw no need for any recipe which had more than a few steps or ingredients. She never really enjoyed cooking, but her meals  were tasty and nutritious.

Since I was an only child and she was a stay-at-home mom, I guess there was never really much need for me to help out in the kitchen, and given her ambivalence about cooking  in general I guess I was never particularly inspired to try. When I got married, I knew how to make scrambled eggs and cheese-on-toast (the British answer to grilled cheese), which was about all I ever needed to eat to stay happy LOL.

My husband was actually a much more experienced cook than I was back then, and taught me some of the basics he'd grown up with, but it wasn't really until I stopped working late into my first pregnancy (which slightly predated the actual wedding) that I discovered Julia Child reruns on daytime TV and her enthusiasm for cooking was a real revelation! Suddenly it was exciting to take simple ingredients and turn them into something, if not necessarily exotic, at least somewhat decadent. I learned how to make various sauces... My cooking over 30 years later still tends heavily towards the French style, and I do love to have sauces, gravies, and drippings to enhance the flavors and textures. I love to try to recreate special meals that we have when we splurge on a fancy restaurant, and can generally come pretty close :) It's still pretty exciting to discover a new flavor or technique to add to the repertoire.

[Arwen Evenstar]

The French seem to be masters at taking humble, simple, ingredients, and turning them into the most delicious things.

I wouldn’t mind roast every week now.  I’d welcome a crockpot cooked meal that lasts for days. I wouldn’t have to do anything but put everything in a crockpot and switch it on. 

[DragonFaerie]

9 minutes ago, Arwen Evenstar said:

The French seem to be masters at taking humble, simple, ingredients, and turning them into the most delicious things.

I wouldn’t mind roast every week now.  I’d welcome a crockpot cooked meal that lasts for days. I wouldn’t have to do anything but put everything in a crockpot and switch it on. 

I love doing simple freezer to crockpot meals - spend an hour or so on prepping ingredients - stick them in a labeled ziploc bag and you can have meals for a few weeks.  Take out the night before, stick into fridge.  That morning dump into crockpot with water or whatever and you're pretty much done.  But then i also try and make some of my fav casseroles and quiche's in batches - put into freezer and super easy to cook

[GeeGolly]

I've said it before - I'd rather clean a toilet or rehab a room then prepare a meal. Yet for 10 years I was a stay at home mom and my husband and kids needed to be fed. I cooked basic American dinners including pork chops/roasts, beef roasts, lasagna, meatloaf, chicken, Shepard's Pie, baked mac & cheese, homemade spaghetti sauce, ham, beef stew, etc and the even more dreaded Thanksgiving turkey, and all with sides of veggies and starches. I also made breakfast and lunches. I strongly disliked every moment preparing food and did not have Google or Pinterest to help me learn to cook. My mom was a phone call away though.

I'm not impressed with Jessa. Roast or no roast, parents are kind of required to prepare food for their kids. Most strive for the healthiest and most well balanced meals they can afford. What's standing in Jessa's way? A job? Housekeeping? Money?

She spent her childhood preparing to become a wife and mother. Having a mom who sucks at it is no excuse, nor is Jesus.

[Loves2Dance]

1 hour ago, Arwen Evenstar said:

The French seem to be masters at taking humble, simple, ingredients, and turning them into the most delicious things.

I wouldn’t mind roast every week now.  I’d welcome a crockpot cooked meal that lasts for days. I wouldn’t have to do anything but put everything in a crockpot and switch it on. 

When the kiddos are in sports a few nights a week I survive on crockpot meals and Hello Fresh! 

[Churchhoney]

Freezer bags are my religion. 

.... and not just because I usually fill them on Sundays.

Edited February 6, 2018 by Churchhoney

[Wishing Well]

Guys - I did the onion soup method for years until I discovered how easy it was to make it from scratch---holy balls was it a world of difference.

Cast iron pot - sear the roast and pull it out, brown big chunks of carrots and celery and the remove. Slow cook onions with a bit of sugar and salt for 20 minutes until caramelized.  Add in the veggies, lots of crushed garlic cloves, and a squeeze of tomato paste.  Tie a bouquet of thyme, rosemary, and perhaps some other herbs if you like.  Pour in a glass of red wine, top with beef broth after adding the beef.  Seal the cast iron pot and put it in the oven for 2 hours.  AMAZING. 

I had a 20 year old coworker who cooked like the Duggars did, since he and his wife were sheltered and always taken care of by their wealthy families.  He married her two weeks out of high school and they were very religious.  I'll never forget the day I walked in on him eating a literal Tupperware full of just ground beef.  Nothing else but ground beef with salt, pepper, and ketchup. 

[Jynnan tonnix]

8 hours ago, Wishing Well said:

Guys - I did the onion soup method for years until I discovered how easy it was to make it from scratch---holy balls was it a world of difference.

Cast iron pot - sear the roast and pull it out, brown big chunks of carrots and celery and the remove. Slow cook onions with a bit of sugar and salt for 20 minutes until caramelized.  Add in the veggies, lots of crushed garlic cloves, and a squeeze of tomato paste.  Tie a bouquet of thyme, rosemary, and perhaps some other herbs if you like.  Pour in a glass of red wine, top with beef broth after adding the beef.  Seal the cast iron pot and put it in the oven for 2 hours.  AMAZING. 

 

That sounds great - will have to try it. The one sort of "staple" thing I've never really cooked is a pot roast since my husband always claimed he really didn't like them (apparently his mom always made them in a pressure cooker, and they came out on the dry and stringy side), but he says he might be willing to try one again. He has learned to tolerate meatloaf which was another of his dreaded meals growing up, so we'll see. I've made maybe two stabs at pot roast over the past 33 years, and he didn't care for either. He's a pretty picky eater, though, and has a lot of food hangups that I don't get. He doesn't like stews (or most one-pot meals and casseroles) as he says he likes differentiated flavors on his plate, yet he loves soup, especially when it's almost as chunky as a stew. He loves a plate of spaghetti as well, which seems to me about as homogeneous mass of flavor as you can get. Recoils from peas in pretty much any form yet loves pea soup. The list can go on...

Anyway...couple of questions- Do you use oil in searing the meat, and how much, and do you add more for the vegetables and onions? What temperature should the oven be at? And do you have another bottle of wine, since you know that open one is going to be GONE once those two hours are up! LOL

I've never gotten the hang of cooking meals for the freezer...Ever since we were stationed in Scotland in the early years of our marriage, where the refrigerators were under-the-counter size and you went out food shopping almost every day to hit up the butcher's the greengrocer, the bakery all separately and looked to see what was particularly appealing that day. I still prefer to cook that way and it's not unusual for me to not know what's for dinner at 2:00 or 3:00 in the afternoon if I haven't gone shopping in the morning. Not the most economical method, I'll grant, but just seems to work for me.

Edited February 6, 2018 by Jynnan tonnix

[floridamom]

The married Duggar daughters' inability to perform well as homemakers lies directly in the rotten example and/or training Michelle has given them. It's her fault they stink at being homemakers, which was supposed to be their God-ordained life's calling. Another thing, Jessa and Jill have been married long enough to have realized this and should have pursued things like cooking, cleaning, sewing and proper child rearing. Michelle is in NO position to give talks to groups about anything regarding her daily life and her performance as a housewife and mother. She needs to shut up and take a seat from those who know how to do these things and actually DO THEM DAILY.

[Lunera]

Jessa is just lazy and following well in Michelle's footsteps. She loves being the fun mom on social media but cannot handle them 24/7 that's why she's at the TTH all the time. Nothing wrong with that but it's not like shevery drops them off to get some time alone at home to cook and clean up, she just lazing around the compound until Ben gets home. 

They all made fun of Erin for not knowing how to cook but after she got married but she managed to learn on her own. In the episode where Carlin started courting she made a whole spread of homemade goods and was praised for the great cook she has become. Like people have mentioned before the Bates girls were not raised any different but manage to care for their children and keep a clean house with no help. It's the least they can do after their husbands are at work all day. But maybe that's it, Bin and Derp don't work for their livelihood and Jill and Jessa just wait for their daddy's allowance check.

[Natalie68]

On 2/2/2018 at 8:58 PM, Portia said:

Okay, I'm a snot, but I've got to say it: some people around here who are alarmed about children who can't address envelopes or write in cursive need to master their basic apostrophe skills. 

This kind of stuff doesn't bug me on a message board.  I see these places as somewhat casual but do it in a professional environment!  

[Natalie68]

On 2/5/2018 at 8:19 AM, SMama said:

I’m offended on behalf of all ten year olds, and highly offended on behalf on my 10 year old. SGirl can cook a meal and that means stove top, she hates using the microwave oven. It’s far higher than the stove. All true but said in jest. My baby out cooks the hell out of Jessa Blessa.

Out of sheer boredom as a kid I was making dinner for the family by the age of 10.  Latchkey kid here.  I was able to do it because I could read and had watched my mom over the years.  I also started baking pretty early.  Being in 4-H also helped some.

[kokapetl]

On 03/02/2018 at 12:58 PM, Portia said:

Okay, I'm a snot, but I've got to say it: some people around here who are alarmed about children who can't address envelopes or write in cursive need to master their basic apostrophe skills. 

Also, the post office computers don’t like addresses written in cursive. 

Cursive: For 19th century censuses.