Quick, easy and preferably cheap suppers - any ideas please?

[minesapackofminstrels]

I would like some more really quick and easy suppers that can be thrown together and on the table in less than 30 mins. Macaroni cheese ticks both the boxes and is cheap so an added bonus.

Another one is microwave a salmon fillet, cook spaghetti and warm through some cream with pesto added. Once salmon cooked break into small bits then add to pesto and cream. Serve with spaghetti. Salmon can also be baked in oven but takes longer. Not too expensive as I can use far less salmon than if we all had a piece each.
Any other ideas?

Minimal prep is a big part of quick suppers in my house as with 3 hungry and tired kids combined with my lack of culinary finesse I find just getting food to the stage it is ready to be cooked takes forever: find onion, knife and chopping board, stop fight between dc1 and dc2, peel onion, stop fight between dc2 and dc3, chop quarter of onion, fight now between dc1 and dc3, manage to chop half of onion, mop up drink spilt by one of decidedly less darling children then finally manage to chop last quarter of said onion.

watching with interest...

Jacket potatoes in microwave. Then strip a packet of smoked mackerel into a box and microwave with frozen peas, spinach, other greens for about three minutes.

You can add butter but the fish is already oily (and cheap).

Some quick suppers I do are:

• fish curry,fish cooks very quickly, just remember to defrost first
• chicken curry which takes 20 minutes
• one pot vegetable basmati rice
• pasta bake
• homemade pizza on naan bread using ready made sauce

I use this site for a lot of quick healthy recipes:
www.healthyindianrecipes.co.uk/

I know how you feel. I've just ordered myself a slow cooker. hopefully I can prep dinner when the girls are having breakfast then enjoy dinner with no hassle.

Is there anyone who can take the kids of your hands for a morning every now and again so you can do some batch baking? Do you have the freezer space?

Scrambled eggs in toast

With mushrooms and or bacon or just with a bit of butter on top.

Cheese toasties-sometimes with ham, onion or tomato

Beans on toast with cheese on top

Über basic suppers, quick, cheap.

I have to say puddings are usually eaten if we have one of these for tea. But not if its supper.

This time of year it's bananas and custard (maybe with digestives crumbs in top), rice pudding with jam, slice of cake, a mr Kipling wonder, just something comforting

Make spaghetti. While it's cooking, fry frozen peas in butter. Add flakes of cooked salmon - one fillet does at least two people but will easily stretch, depending on how greedy you are - and stir in cream or creme fraiche. Stir into spaghetti to coat; sprinkle with nutmeg and salt if wanted.

Make spaghetti. While the water is boiling, chop up a red chilli. Heat loads of olive oil - about 5 tablespoons or even more. Fry the chilli. Add a tin or two of crab meat and stir to break up and combine with the chilli. Add the juice of a lemon. Stir into spaghetti. This is also nice with less oil but pieces of chorizo fried at the beginning.

Spaghetti carbonara suits my DD. It isn't a real one, it's just cooked pasta with a beaten egg and some ham or bacon or prawns or sausage or corned beef.

Chop up small and thin whatever veg in fridge - garlic, courgette, carrot, leek, spring onions, mushroom - and stir fry. Add frozen value prawns and also stir fry. Add sachet of chow menu sauce or teaspoon of dark brown sugar, tablespoon of fish sauce and tablespoon of dark soy sauce. Fry until disgusting smell has gone off, then eat. Goes further stirred into noodles but I prefer without.

Less cheap but delicious: chop up chilli, piece of ginger the size of your thumb, 2 shallots/1 onion, 2-3 garlic cloves. You can do this in the food processor, which makes it wetter but still tastes nice. Chop up chicken breasts into very small pieces (about 1.5cm cubed). Pull all the leaves off a pot of basil. Once everything is chopped, boil water for noodles or make rice. Heat 1tbsp of sunflower/veg oil (not olive; doesn't get hot enough) until properly hot then fry chicken pieces until they look just cooked ie opaque but still a bit grey. Remove the chicken and put aside. Add more oil if it looks a bit depleted and fry the onion/shallot for about 30 secs. Add the garlic for 30 secs, then add chilli and ginger. Stir and fry for about 1 min more, then put the chicken and any juices back in. Add 1-2 teaspoons dark muscovado sugar and 1-2 tablespoons Thai fish sauce and fry off, stirring to coat. Add basil leaves and stir in at the last moment so they are coated. This one doesn't stretch very far and you need quite a lot of chicken so it's expensive but is a treat dinner in our house.

Proper carbonara is nice, quick and easy. Put spaghetti/linguine to boil. Break I egg and one yolk not a bowl, add 4 tbsp of grated Parmesan, pepper and nutmeg, beat and set aside. Fry off pancetta or bacon or bits of sausage, when brown add a bit of vermouth or white wine if you want, and reduce down a bit, add drained cooked pasta to meat, and toss so it is coated in the pan juices. Turn the heat off, and add the egg and cheese mixture to the pan and turn until evenly coated and serve, yum!

Frittata: whisk up a few eggs, grate into the egg, courgette, potato, add peas, or other veg your DC's like, and season. Heat frying pan that will go into oven/grill, add oil and pour in egg, cook on one side, and pop into the grill to finish off the top, serve with bread and butter, and more salad.

Noodles: cook packet of flavoured noodles - I use the Chinese brand ones, add in chopped up leftover meat while it is cookingI.e. chicken, bits from roast, ham etc, add in some green veg like green beans, mange tout, peas etc, and serve.

Couple of wraps/ tortillas warm one in the bottom of a cry frying pan, top with grated cheese, bits of spring onion, a bit of chopped up cooked veg, top with other tortilla and cook through until cheese has melted a bit, flip over, toast other side and then slice into wedges, serve with salad or veg

Dice a couple of potatoes, chop an onion, get a mug each of frozen peas and sweet corn. Wash a couple of mugfuls of basmati rice, set aside. Heat a pan with a couple of tbsp of veg oil, not olive, when warm, add level tsp of cumin seeds, add onion and soften, then add pots and other veg, soften for 5 mins or so, add 2 cloves crushed garlic, inch of grated ginger, and a minced green chilli some salt, 1/2 tsp turmeric, add rice and turn until all mixed. Add 4 mugfuls of cold water, cover and cook until rice is done, and water absorbed, top up with hot water from kettle if you need to, serve with plain yoghurt.

These all go down well with kids and grown ups alike.

HTH

I second/third eggs as an option- frittata, omelette etc quick and easy. Jacket potatoes in microwave.

We often eat diced fried potatoes with cubed chorizo and sliced red onion, with a poached egg on top. Takes about twenty minutes and is delicious.

Homemade pizza and calzone are fast, but you have to allow for dough to rise, perhaps you could make a batch of dough, half in fridge, and half in freezer?

Chicken/ beef fried rice, I fry strips of meat with frozen peas, spring onions and a pepper if I have one, add soy, fish sauce, a spoon of Brown sugar and a squeeze of lime, microwave a packet of rice, mix together and dinner is ready in five minutes.

If you have a slow cooker all manner of stews/soups and dinners can be prepped in the morning to eat in the evening- yesterday I did a chorizo and lentil stew in mine that was delicious and took all of ten minutes in the morning.

Stir fry-chicken,beef,prawns,pork or veg,add a pack of stir fry veg and/or beam sprouts/mushrooms/peppers. Cook with garlic,soy,ginger-dried stuff is good! Add cooked noodles-cheap ones fine x

Jacket potatoes,pasta,risotto. . Can all be done nicely on a budget-with store cupboard bits. Sausage and mixed beans with a tin of toms and herbs is tasty and easy,too. Good luck!