Food Fast Without Fast Food
I have to think about dinner the night before. I look at my menu and soak beans, soak wheat, lay out meat to defrost in the fridge, confirm fresh vegetable supplies – whatever I need to do for the next day’s meals, I prep the night before.
When you eat the way my family eats, and when you cook the way I cook, you will occasionally face the same dilemma I have faced: Something has interrupted my schedule/planning/coordinating or I’m sick. I haven’t prepped a thing, nothing is defrosted, soaked, steamed — what in the world can I cook for dinner?
In too many households across America, that answer will be, “Call Dominoes.”
I try VERY hard not to have that be my answer. I’m not going to pretend that I don’t order pizza, but I don’t like to. I prefer to feed my family food I’ve prepared. So – what is there that I can do for dinner that doesn’t require a fast-food answer?
I’ve been paying attention to myself for the last several months so that I can answer this question honestly. This is what I’ve discovered about what I will do and have recently done in that situation:
- Make breakfast. I have done this twice in my kids’ lifetime, so it’s an extra-special treat. Turkey bacon defrosts very quickly. Beef sausage links can start off frozen in the pan. Blueberry pancakes and cheese grits hit the spot on a day when everything else seems haywire.
- Have a freezer stash. In my freezer, I have the base for turkey soup — all that needs to be added is rice or noodles. I also have two pizza’s worth of dough and sauce frozen, ready to be thawed out in warm water. You just need about an hour of notice time. I have a freezer bag full of spaghetti sauce – ready for noodles.
- Make a chef’s salad. It takes 10 minutes to hard boil eggs. Add some cheese with your veggies, some homemade ranch dressing, and you’ll never notice the lack of meat.
- I have one can each of organic black beans, garbanzo beans, and pinto beans. I can make a quick soup, salad, hummus, or make some rice and open a can of beans.
- Utilize canned fish. Salmon patties or tuna casserole are quick, healthy meals.
What are some quick, low-prep fixes that you use on those nights when your plans just go out the window?
Hallee
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We usually make pizza on nights I don’t want to cook.
At least two nights a week since David is deployed, we’ll eat what we’d normally eat for lunch- tortilla & cheese roll-ups, fresh veggies, hummus, quesadillas with leftover meat/chicken, or the like.
Especially now that it’s just me & the boys, I feel like it’s ok to have “snacky” or “lunch style” dinners. It’s better than fast food, they’re still getting veggies, and since it’s usually finger food style, they chow down.
I usually have a bucket of dough in the fridge, so my go-to “when all else fails” dinner usually revolves around that. I use the dough for pizza, pita, bread, breadsticks, you name it. I can even make pizza and pita on the grill, for when I don’t want to heat up the oven (it’s been so hot here lately!) (more about my bucket of dough – http://www.artisanbreadinfive.com )
I also keep some stuff in the freezer – soups are especially good because I can make some biscuits and do a salad and nobody even notices that it wasn’t a planned dinner.
All kinds of sausages thaw quickly, so turkey brats, Italian sausages, and breakfast sausages all thaw quickly and then can grill up easily. I can even use that “bucket of dough” that I mentioned earlier for homemade hotdog buns.
Even though I have a lot of go-to meals, though, days happen like yesterday. I got home from a friend’s house, and had no water in our house. I arrived home around 5, and I didn’t get the reason for no water figured out until 6:30. (reason – my neighbor hasn’t paid their water bill in I don’t know how long. My water cut-off is in-between our houses. The water company took a guess, and guessed wrong – so they shut off my water instead of his water.) By the time I figured it out, I had spent all of my dinner-prep time on the phone with the water co, talking to neighbors to see if they had water, and looking all over for a leak. So we went to Bob Evans for dinner. By the time we came home, the water was restored.
There is *definitely* a time and a place for eating out! :)
I roast 3 chickens with herbs at a time. We have one meal and I freeze the left overs into 3-4 portions – enough for a meal each. It’s easy to heat up in a pan by itself or some bbq sauce and add to pasta, wraps, etc. When I make meatballs, I make enough to freeze some for another meal or a batch of soup. When I make lasagna, I make 3-4 pans and freeze them for zero prep meals. I have a huge slow cooker so when I use it, I make enough for several meals. Delivery isn’t an option where we live so that makes it a little easier to resist fast food. Fast food costs only a little less than a restaurant so I’d rather spend the extra if I cant cook a meal
I think that’s a great idea! Deployment = survival mode in a lot of ways. You’re absolutely right that snacky and lunchy foods are better than fast food!
I always have sandwich stuff – cold cuts, cheese, PB&J. Sometimes we just have cheese and crackers with fruit (that particular combo is my son’s favorite!).
Breakfast is a staple on our dinner menu! Everyone looks forward to it. :)
You are so right. So many times we just call out instead of cooking our children home cooked meals. My family has gotten down to we only eat out once a week and have found we not only feel better but our wallet really loves it too.