One-pot veggie meals - please save me from endless chili!

[Secretlifeofme]

DH is veggie, I'm not but have no objection to eating vegetarian food every night. I'm a confident cook but have very limited time to cook in the evenings between work and baby's bedtime. So we try to batch cook as much as possible, but I seem to have got stuck in a rut of veggie bolognese and veggie chili. Does anyone have any ideas for meals that can be batch cooked, frozen and reheated? Nothing that requires last minute prep apart from bunging on some rice or couscous. Thanks

Soup
Lasagne of various types
Frittata/quiche
Pies/stews
Curry

food52.com/recipes/19536-deb-perelman-s-mushroom-bourguignon
Good when the evenings are colder

Daal is great for batch cooking and freezing.

Chickpea and coconut curry. Mmmmm!

Oh sorry, I forgot to mention that I am also dairy-free due to baby's allergies.
@elaeocarpus, thank you.. I didn't know you could reheat pies from frozen successfully? Also not sure I want to be bothered making a pie if I'm honest! We do have curry sometimes, so thanks for that. I don't often make soup because it doesn't seem all that filling.

When short of time I make 3 curry bases in advance and freeze them - cashew curry sauce, a normal tomato/onion based sauce, and a fenugreek / coriander / ginger one. Between them they can be used in 90% of Indian and Sri Lankan cooking - just vary the meat and veg to keep things fresh.

Moroccan veg tagine - I do a variation on the BBC Good Food recipe and have found that sweet potato, red onion and courgette is a really good combination. Delicious served with couscous and houmous

Roast veg, falafel and rice/wraps
Jackfruit fajitas

Butternut squash risotto

I've not read it and am not veggie but I've seen The Green Roasting Tin cookbook mentioned on here loads.

I do have the original Roasting tin cookbook and I love how straightforward most of the recipes are. No help for batch cooking though...

Ratatouille
Jacket pots
Quiche - use ready made pastry
Lasagne
Paella
Risotto
Soup
Lentil bolognese
Mushroom stroganoff
Curry
Aubergine Parmegiano
Roast veg / veggie sausages
Dauphinois & veggie sausages
Pizza

This book is what you need: thehappyfoodie.co.uk/books/the-green-roasting-tin

You could make pasta sauces ahead of time to reheat?

We love
Anchovies pasta- mince up a time of anchovies with 3 cloves of garlic and 1/4 a teaspoon of chilli flakes. Sautée in a pan with lots of olive oil, add in pasata and cook down for 10 mins. We have this with spaghetti and steamed green veg.

Do you use dairy free subs?

I also like roasted up Mediterranean veg with cous cous. The veg you can make ahead of time and then portion it out as you need.

Stir fry with noodles? You can just use the bags of prepped veg and sling it in a pan with garlic, ginger, honey and chilli and soy sauce or oyster sauce.

Eggs?

Daal! Just serve with rice or naans or chuck some onion bahjis in the oven. Freezes well too. Coconut cream keeps it dairy free for you

Big flat mushrooms roasted with cherry tomatoes and garlic inside then serve over couscous with a green salad. I would crack an egg in last minute too.

Potato roasties with various toppings? You can make them ahead of time and freeze with some grewadeproof paper in between. I like mine with wilted spinach and mushrooms.

Roasted cauliflower with cumin and chilli. Serve with a big green salad and fresh lime juice over the top. Yum!

Daal
Root veg stew
Irish stew with quorn mince
Chickpea Biryani
Tagine

Roast dinner without the chicken for DH....I make up a packet of sage and onion stuffing in a ‘nut loaf’ shape as a substitute: sliced with lots of veggie gravy, delicious.

Good old egg, chips and for you ham, for him veggie sausages.

Linda McCartney pies are good, with mash.

Jacket potato, salad and roasted veggies.

Spanish tortilla and salad.

Laksa or green thai based dish with rice.

All easy and get you away from the veg mince/lentil/soft textured meals.

Batch cooking is great, but imo only part of the solution. Say on the day you have more time you make a lasagne plus one for the freezer, then you have a few 'quick' roasting tin options (I do roasted chickpeas, peppers, onions etc with spices and olive oil, or diced potatoes, peppers, mushrooms, onions and then add an egg or two on top to bake). Plus a quick heat up option (pasta and sauce/pesto), a baked potato night and a chips and something night (homemade wedges are not too fiddly). Then you have great variety but also easy.

Curries are hugely variable. Shepherds pies made with lentils and chopped mushrooms instead of mince, enchiladas (I use 300g quorn "chicken" pieces and a can of red kidney beans for 8 portions/4 large portions)

I was watching an old Nadiya Hussein programme called Time to Eat the other day. It's all about cooking decent food when you don't have much time, making use of shortcuts and suggesting how you can bulk cook, eat some, freeze some or store in fridge, etc etc. I thought these looked really good, quick, easy, and as far as I can see both veggie and dairy-free. I'm going to try them soon. The programme is in iplayer at the moment if you want to see how to make them. Episode 1 or 2. I expect a lot of her recipes could be adapted to being veggie. thehappyfoodie.co.uk/recipes/nadiya-hussains-egg-rolls

Not necessarily reheat a cooked pie. I make the filing, divide into dishes and top with pastry and freeze ready to cook . Defrost that day and Pop in oven when get home. Its easy to make meat/veggie versions too from same sauce

Anchovies pasta- mince up a time of anchovies with 3 cloves of garlic and 1/4 a teaspoon of chilli flakes. Sautée in a pan with lots of olive oil, add in pasata and cook down for 10 mins. We have this with spaghetti and steamed green veg.

Not being funny as this sounds delish but🐟🐟🐟🐟🐟😄

Another vote for curries. They can be made so many different ways.

Jacket potatoes can be frozen and reheated in the microwave.

Quick and easy is gnocchi with a tomato sauce. I put lots of cheese in as well but that’s not necessary. Or gnocchi with green pesto, peas and Parmesan. You can add ham/salmon to yours for some added protein.

Agree with PP that the trick is to mix up easy to cook meals with batch cooking.

Our go to super easy vegetarian dinner that involves almost zero preparation and is made while I'm getting kids to bed etc and DH is working is roasted tomatoes on spaghetti. I stick cherry tomatoes in a large dish with olive oil, garlic cloves, chilli flakes (optional) and a dash of balsamic vinegar and shove in the oven. I don't even bother to pre-heat it. It sits there for between 45mins-an hour. Prep time - 2 minutes.

Then usually between DD's bath and actual bed, I pop downstairs, boil the spaghetti and we eat it with avocado and mozzarella /burrata.

Our other similar easy, low maintenance veggie dish is roasted cauliflower with cumin, olive oil and salt. While it's cooking I stick a pot of pilaf on. It involves very little effort - 10 minutes to sautés the onions and spices for the rice and get the cauliflower ready. Then turning the veg after 15 minutes or so and possibly stirring in some peas to the pilaf.

I never make fajitas for reasons I don't understand but I think they can be prepared from scratch in about 15 minutes.