Cooking is not my favourite thing to do, but it’s a necessary thing (especially if you are trying to keep that grocery bill down!)
Some of our quick meals include:
Caesar salad with grilled chicken. Well, actually I just cook the chicken in the frying pan, cut it up into small pieces and cover it with some store bought BBQ sauce. While it’s cooking I cut up Romaine lettuce, put parmesan cheese and caesar dressing on it, and some simulated bacon bits. Healthy and quick and all my kids like it.
Sometimes I make a big Greek pasta salad… vegetable rotini is nice, tomatoes chopped into pieces, feta cheese, a can of drained black olives, sometimes some chopped cucumber and/or red pepper and/or little red onion slices (little people are permitted to pick these out). For the dressing I use about 3 parts cold-pressed olive oil, one part balsamic vinegar, a fairly generous amount of dried dill (tablespoonful to make enough to serve 6), a little salt, a little honey (or sugar)… this is strange, but sometimes I add some Italian seasoning too–I just love the flavour of it… then I shake it up and pour it on. (And they’re eating their veggies!)
Burgers on the BBQ is a simple meal for me (because my man does the BBQing!)… there are some great veggie burgers available in the freezer section at the grocery store – (I think that’s more heart-healthy… I only mention this because last week I was SO surprised when some guests we had had no idea that there was any such thing as veggie burgers).
My other tip is planned leftovers… making extra and then lunch is taken care of the next day, or making a double batch when it’s something that freezes nicely (eg mac 'n cheese or meatballs or pancakes) and then you have a ready made entree for another day that you can just add a salad or some corn or something to.
We all get into a ‘meal rut’ from time to time… I’d love to hear more ideas of how people get some simple/nutritious meals on the table with less effort. (I have this theory… being a person who hates to cook… that if you spend more time making it than you do eating it, you’ve spent too long in the kitchen!)