probably one of the All Time Greats when it comes to “i must be out of my mind doing this”:
Sauerbraten
which is currently marinating in my 'frig as we speak. ANYone who doesn’t pause, at least momentarily, at cookbook recipies that say “Prep time: 3 days” is obviously a more virtuous, self-sacrificing Donna Reed than i will ever be. 
but my husband loves it, and i’ll admit that it’s pretty darn good, if i do say so myself. but it’s definitely not on the Standard Rotating Menu Schedule.
My sister makes amazing croissants. They seem to take forever.
Nothing I do is that labor intensive.
Not one food, but I used to regularly make Indian meals with several different curries and dals, plus raita, homemade bread and sometimes even a homemade chutney of some kind.
Now I’m lucky if I have the time and energy to do one curry with rice.
Not to put down a well-made sauerbraten, but almost all of that prep time is just waiting; it’s not like it’s actually 3 days of work. Otherwise, the 8-day old sourdough starter that’s been currently sitting in my kitchen, developing yeast and bacteria would qualify. Or homemade corned-beef, which you basically leave in a bucket of brine for a month.
For me, I would also put lasagna up there, if you’re making the noodles yourself. Tamales, too. I made tamales exactly once. Never again. It is just too time-consuming for me. However, the lasagna is worth it every time. Pierogi are also a PITA, especially since so many good homemade frozen varieties are available where I live.
Stuffed Cabbage (pigs in the blanket) and Dirty Rice are two that I will block off an entire day for. This covers prep work, cooking, and clean up, as well as time to sit and enjoy the finished product.
The oil probably isn’t hot enough. Use an extra-heavy pan, like cast iron (retains heat better than ordinary material), use more oil (so the temp recovers faster after the cold food is added), and make sure the oil is heated all the way before starting.
There is this Indian potato dish I make. It’s a pain in the ass. You have to use three different methods to cook the potatoes alone- much less the sauce and spices and god forbid you want some rice or bread to go with it. It takes literally hours and dirties up every dish in the house.
And yet every time we go to the store, I come home and make it. It’s one of the best things I’ve ever eaten.
I second Lumpia. A huge pain in the butt to make but damn those things are delicious!
Oddly, I find lasagna to be pretty easy to make. Just layer sauce, noodles, cheese, sauce, noodles, cheese, sauce, noodles, cheese. Bake.
A German cookie, traditional at Christmastime, known as springerle is a pain - the little buggers take three days. Day one is dough-mixing. Prepare to have flour hither and yon. Let the dough do its thing overnight. Day two is rolling. First, roll it flat, then make the impressions with a springerle pin or board. Cut the cookies apart and let dry overnight. This usually means the dining room table is covered in dough for the night. Day three: bake.
Honey-glazed walnut prawns are a challenge to prepare the walnuts, make the glaze, bread and cook the prawns and have it all come together at the same time so the prawns don’t go cold and soggy while you realize you don’t have the glaze ready.
A Polish stuffed cabbage dish called golabki (but pronounced gawumpkey) is a pain for preparing the stuffing, boiling the cabbage leaves, stuffing the leaves, rolling them up, etc. My Polish MIL makes these on special occasion, and for non-special occasions, she’ll sometimes knock out a “cheater” version that’s just layered like lasagna, rather than stuffed and rolled.
I don’t recall what it was, but about a year ago, I got brave and decided to make some classic French dish (might have been coq au vin) that reached out with its tentacles to touch every utensil and dish in the house. Once it was done, we were “Yeah, it’s nice, but not again!”
Me too.
I will share my easier versions of some of the dishes mentioned in this thread, as a service to lazy people like myself.
I do boeuf bourguignonne in the crockpot. Basically, you put all the ingredients in the crockpot (you can brown the meat first, if you like, but I don’t think it adds that much), turn it to Auto (making sure to plug the crockpot in first, if you are absent-minded like me), and wait a day or so.
I have a 30-minute one-pot and one-bowl version, if you don’t mind using pre-made chicken stock, frozen vegetables, and drop dumplins instead of rolled. This recipe makes enough for 2:
1 package skinless boneless chicken breasts (however much you’d make for 2 people). You can use frozen chicken breasts.
Enough chicken stock to fill your large Dutch oven to about 2/3 to 3/4 full, once the chicken is added
1 package frozen vegetables (I like peas and carrots, but mixed vegetables works, too)
1 cup all-purpose flour
1 1/2 teaspoons baking powder
1 teaspoon salt
1/2 cup water
Bring the chicken stock to a boil, and turn it down to a simmer.
Put in the chicken breasts. Cook them till they’re cooked through.
Put the vegetables in the stock.
Mix together the flour, baking powder, salt, and water in a bowl.
Drop tablespoons of the dough into the chicken stock.
It’s ready when the dumplins are cooked, but it won’t hurt it to cook longer.
I make these with refrigerated pizza crusts for the dough.
[hijack]Doesn’t sound like you’re necessarily looking for shortcuts, but have you looked into:
http://www.bradleysmoker.com/index.htm
It’s great – you add additional wood bricks about every 2.5 hrs., and that’s it. Also, because you’re not opening the smoker to add wood, the temp. stays higher and the cooking goes faster[/hijack]
We make a homemade Italian red sauce, known as “meat gravy” to the truly Italian set. It requires nearly constant attendance and stirring. Cooking different kinds of meat down until they shred (veal shoulder, pork ribs, steak, etc.), combining the tomatoes, basil, and garlic at the right time. It’s an all day affair that is WELL worth it, but sometimes it’s not how I want to use my Sunday.
As someone who’s unempl…er, a freelance writer with plenty of time on his hands, could I humbly request the recipes for both pierogies and grape pie?
The layering’s the easy part. The “pain to make” is: cooking the noodles, making the meat sauce, and mixing up the filling. If I had those sitting around the house, I’d make lasagna every week.
Lasagna and shrimp creole, I don’t mind making those at all (a food processor helps a lot). Cassata cake, though, is a pain. You can’t buy cassatta cake here, so I have to make it, and it takes either 1) an entire day, on and off, or 2) two half days. It also has about a grillion calories and 456,789 grams of fat, but man, it’s awesome.
How much of the marinating liquid do you put in the crockpot? When I’m doing it in my cast iron Dutch oven, I use it all, and let it reduce for several hours, then I thicken it.
If you have all your ingredients at the ready, sure, it’s easy. But if you make it completely from scratch, it takes up quite a bit of time:
Dough - 10-15 minutes mixing ingredients together & kneading, 30-60 minutes rest time, 15+ minutes rolling out (or through a pasta machine) and layering
Bolognese sauce - 3-4 hours cooking time (20-30 minutes active work)
Besciamella suace - 15+ minutes cooking
Assembly: 10-15 minutes
Plus you have your prep time and all that. It’s certainly a bit of work.
Most of the recipe is the same as you’ll find for most fruit pies, but you have to do special things with grapes. I’ll write later on.
This recipe is pretty close to what I use (I hate people who thicken with corn starch or tapioca):
I don’t generally marinate the beef- I figure it’s going to be in the liquid in the crockpot for a day, so marinating in addition to that probably isn’t necessary.
I don’t like it super-soupy, so I usually put in enough liquid to cover everything.
Here’s for yer Perogies:
5 cups FLOUR
1 tsp SALT
2 EGGS
1 3/4 Cup WARM WATER
Mix all in food processor (or by hand if masochist). Rest 1/2 an hour. Roll out to 1/8 inch thickness, cut with biscuit cutter, put a blob of stuffing on one side, fold, pinch well, place in boiling salted water for 5 minutes.
Stuffing: I go with mashed potatoes and cheddar. Cottage cheese is nice-use dry curd (aka 'baking cottage cheese). If including onions in the stuffings, cook to soft before incorporating. Be cautious of using cooked bacon/ham in the stuffings because I find it can tear the dough from the inside out.
Yeah, this is a only-on-vacation, once a year enterprise for me. Cabbage rolls are another PITA, so I have modifed my Grandma’s recipe to something I call Cabbage Splat. Chuck all ingredients into a casserole dish, bake, serve in the stew bowls.
Now, I’m one of those weirdos who will make a bunch of ingredients and freeze them, so when I want to make lasagna, I pull out some balls of pasta dough, run it through the machine, get out some sauce, pull some pregrated cheese from the freezer, etc. I make little lasagnas sometimes- in a bread pan. Less dough to fuck with 
I should make clear, I really love the homemade pasta dough. Not everyone is the carboslut I am.