Quick Fix Meals By Chefmom on Sep 30, 2007 - Updated Oct 15, 2011

When Food Network debuted Quick Fix Meals with host Robin Miller, I thought this at last might solve my cooking problems. Not enough time, picky eaters (and there are no longer small children in my household), varying schedules for everybody and too many last minute trips to the grocery store. Rachael Ray and her 30 Minute Meals hadn't done it for me. Freezer cooking websites were no answer, either. My family hates food from the freezer. I'm a really good cook. I love to cook. It's just the planning that seems to be the issue for me.

But then, I didn't like the Quick Cooking show so much either. The hostess' personality just didn't sit with me. Everything went too easily. Still, when the book, Quick Fix Meals: 200 Simple, Delicious Recipes To Make Mealtime Easy, hit the grocery store shelves, I decided to pony up $18.95 and give it a try.

Mistake.

Robin Miller does have a good idea. She preps meals in advance and puts everything in ziploc bags. I do that every now and then as well. For example, she'll make a marinara sauce on the weekend and use it three times during the week for different meals. Well, that's okay if your family will eat marinara sauce three times in one week. She also chops up onions, carrots, celery and the like, puts them in the freezer and then pulls them out as beed. In principle, that's great. Doesn't work for my crowd. Onions that have been frozen get watery and celery gets limp.

Her recipes didn't really help me either. About half of them center around fish (which my kids and their hungry friends won't eat), or they're "Eggplant Mozarella Melts." Try serving that to the football team.

Quick Fix isn't a complete waste. She does have some good tips; she just didn't solve my particular problems. I guess it's back to Rachael Ray.