Tips for Preparing Quick Dinners

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I am not a good cook by any stretch of the imagination. Growing up, I somehow missed all the cooking lessons my mom shared. My grandmother, mom and sister are all amazing cooks and I am over here just getting by when it comes to food. In fact, the only real reason I can eat delicious home cooked meals is because of my husband. It turns out he loves to cook & grill. He views the process as a therapeutic science & all I see is a mundane chore that I’ve been procrastinating all day.

I am a precise person who loves to follow directions. I live for rules & do my best to make sure everything is perfect. After examining my cooking process, all Zach could do was laugh because I was the complete opposite. I didn’t follow the recipe; I didn’t read ahead which often got me in trouble because some ingredients were supposed to be split and used later etc. I literally rushed everything & at best we got a mediocre meal that we probably wouldn’t bother making again. Cooking was a hassle and if I was going to get any better, I needed to make some major changes.

Luckily, my mindset has been changing since moving into our new home, being closer to family & I am showing more interest in preparing our meals. I am starting to understand how preparing a meal can be therapeutic… I’m not quite there yet, but it’s progress. One. Step. At. A. Time. The part I am enjoying most right now is creating our dinner menu and grocery list each week.

One of the most helpful changes we have made to help with dinner prep was creating a flexible schedule. All of these are just base ideas to give you structure when weekly meal planning. I created this schedule mainly to help ease the time restriction of spending our evenings prepping dinner, eating and going to bed. I wanted more relaxation after work so this is where I started:

Sunday- We usually make a big batch of soup every Sunday and pair it with a green salad. We love throwing a large pot a soup on the stove mid-morning because you can smell it simmering all day. It’s an amazing sense of home. Since we make such large batches there are a few different things we do with the leftovers:

1. We freeze the rest to throw in the crock pot later.

2. Pack it for lunch during the week.

3. Bring it to the office to share with our co-workers.

Monday- The start of the week and first day back to work can be stressful. For me, Mondays are our busiest days, so I have made this dinner day one of the easiest to cook. We almost always make an Instant Pot recipe. If you don’t have an instant pot, just click on this icon and buy it now. You will not regret it, I promise.

An instant pot is basically a multi-cooker that can make similar meals as a slow cooker in a short period of time. It can also be used as a rice cooker, sauté pan & a warming pot. I’m sure there are more uses too! Some of our favorite meals are:

1. Instant pot ribs

2. Bow-tie chicken Alfredo

3. Taco soup

Tuesday- Anyone else celebrate Taco Tuesday? Tacos are one of the easiest meals to make but we usually mix this up between traditional tacos, taco salad, fish tacos, enchiladas, fajitas or burritos.

Wednesday- Mid-week is when I like to throw in a slow-cooker meal. I do all the prep in the morning before I head to work & by the time, we get home, dinner is ready. This is also great because we don’t have a lot of pans to clean before bed.

Thursday- If we still need something quick & easy with little thought & effort, we leave Thursday nights open for leftovers. With just two of us in the house we usually end up with a ton. We eat what we can for lunches or dinners and then freeze the rest. So, Thursday night dinners are as simple as pulling a meal out of the freezer and warming it up. Easy!

Friday- Dine -in or carry-out. We don’t eat out every week but when we do it’s almost always on a Friday or Saturday night. If we don’t go out, Zach likes to make stir-fry on Stir-Fridays. (He made me add that in here.) His stir-fry is so yummy though!

Saturday- Dine -in or carry-out. OR grill anything & everything. It’s starting to warm up outside so get those grills prepped & ready because food made outside is always better. Some of our favorites:

1. Steaks

2. Chicken

3. Burgers

4. Corn on the cob

5. Zucchini planks

6. Potatoes

Another tip for quick dinners is to always have ingredients on hand for:

1. Grilled cheese & tomato soup

2. Spaghetti

3. Sloppy Joes

These are simple, cheap, easy clean up and require minimum time. Plus, you can fancy these meals up if desired. They are great for evenings when you get home later than usual & still want to go to bed on time.

We don’t follow this schedule Sunday-Saturday or every week for that matter, but we especially take advantage of this layout during our busy spells. We also always plan our meal ideas at least the week before. It has helped me so much with showing an interest in cooking. Plus, it has relieved so much stress & worry.

Let me know if you are interested in learning how I save money at the grocery store.

Hope you found something worth keeping.

Always,

Erikka