very easy recipes to cokk while on crutches please

[1leggedwobbler]

I am fairly often on MN but have NC so I dont out myself. I fell off a kerb at the weekend & now have my left ankle / part of lower leg bone held together with screws & metal plates. I am on crutches but find moving around v v difficult. I have help at the moment but my mum goes away on holiday next week so I need some easy family recipies that i can cook one handed whilst putting no weight on my left leg!!! All I can think of is pre-made pizzas! Anyone got any ideas??

I tried doing a pasta bake with a jar of dolmio carbonara sauce & we all hated it, I normally cook from scratch but obviously i cant do that now :(

excuse typo in title, sorry

If you can sit at a table and chop veg and carry a dish then just do some casseroles or stews.

Sorry about your leg btw hope you recover soon!
Here's a link to some one pot. Hopefully you'll find some thing suitable.
www.bbcgoodfood.com/search/recipes?query=one+pot&=Search

Can you batch cook some tomato sauce at the weekend whilst you have some available assistants and then use it for pasta bake/bolognaise/home made pizza sauce in the week?

I found the carrying part an issue when on crutches (I lived alone so lived off toast and yoghurt for 6 weeks).

Maybe roasts are also an answer - chuck in oven, leave, serve with salad?

Oh yike, my sympathies. This happened to me in 2010 when I was heavily pg. Screws and plates, the lot.

I remember doing a lot of things in the oven like roast chicken or gammon and baked potatoes because they were fairly easy. Soup and sandwiches as well - just chuck the bread and fillings on the table for people to make their own. I think I did some slow cooking as well. I have a feeling there might have been ready meals involved too, out of desperation!

I got round the carrying difficulty by sliding things along the worktop from one side of the kitchen to the other. I put a chair between the dishwasher and the cupboard and transferred things by laying them down on the chair while I moved myself over to the cupboard. Dirty washing went into a rucksack to transport it to the washing machine.

I can recommend a Limbo waterproof cover btw and it might help to hear that things became much, much easier when I was allowed to put weight on the broken side - around 3 weeks after the surgery I think.

Thanks for all the helpful replies, esp Mawbroom. I have a limbo cover, my Dsis broke her ankle earlier this year so she sent me one straight away. I love the practical tips for moving around the kitchen & doing the washing, thank you so so much!

I broke my foot a few years ago and found it really easy to do things mawbroon mentioned: baked potatoes, roasts. Also slow cooker meals worked with pre cut veg.

I also found it really helped to make tea/coffee in a flask and then transport in a rucksack to the living room.

Grab a chair. Standing on your good leg, put chair behind and rest broken leg on it, so that you are almost kneeling on it (if that makes sense!)
That's how I managed to do my makeup whilst on crutches! As you can sort of hang the leg off and put weight on the knee

Recipe wise - pasta. Fry some pancetta/chopped bacon, add some chopped courgettes or whatever veg you want. When bacon is crispy, add grated cheese and tub creme fraiche and stir until it makes a sauce. Tip over cooked pasta

How about roasted veg and fish? You can just shove that in oven

Slow cooker risotto, sausage casserole, soup-can someone leave everything out with knife & chopping board on table in morn for you to sort?

Please lower your standards & concentrate on getting better. Worry less about taste & healthiness & just filling up on something for a few weeks. Explain to rest of house that this is how it is!

Get well soon!

Stir fry? Sit to prep the veg, fry it really quickly and add straight-to-wok noodles.
And also what Evelyn said!

thanks everyone - asgoodasitgets, that chair tip is brilliant!! thank you so much

No problem (I broke both ankles in the space of a year)
It was a revelation when I realised I could stand without crutches!!

Urgh, how on earth did you manage that asgoodasitgets?

I took a long time to get back to normal after mine, with a newborn thrown into the mix, but holy moley to break both in the same year

First one - fell down a flight of 40 stairs top to bottom, landed on edge of stair with leg under me. Displaced open fracture of foot and ankle and torn ligaments. Under arm crutches, then normal ones then a walking cast

Second one. Woke up, ankle hurt. Carried on for a week, went to a&e. doctor said not broken. X ray came back, doctor went pale and I had 3 fractures in my foot and ankle. No idea how

Hope you heal and recover quickly!
While your mum is still there, perhaps you could cook some dishes together that you could freeze.
Chop vegetables and keep handy in fridge. Fry chopped onions, make small flat rounds and freeze on a tray, then store in ziplock bag in freezer for later use.
Try cooking twice the amount of the dishes you enjoy, and freezing half for later.
Cooked dhal keeps well in the fridge for four days, and is yummy in soups and over rice. You can add vegetables to it, squeeze lemon over it, have pickle with it.
Cooked rice also keeps well, can be reheated with a little water in the microwave or on stovetop, made into fried rice, or kedgeree, or pilafs, or in soup with dal+spinach+yogurt.
Sandwiches are good standbys, and you can put anything on a pizza crust and bake it!

Salads are simple to do, and leftovers can be cooked in hot water with a bouillon cube to make a tasty soup!
Pastas are great with some chopped tomato and gently fried garlic. Sprinkle basil and grated cheese, and hey presto!
Keep ziplock of grated cheese handy in freezer door. Frozen green peas, edamame, spinach, are mot useful.
Also fried garlic in a jar in the fridge. Good luck! you'll be fine!

Thanks for the tips ushaiza. OMG Asgoodasitgets.. twice in one year :( no wonder you know so many tips. Was it the same ankle you broke twice? Do you think it hadnt healed properly? My ankle was displaced fracture, not quite open, and lower fibula broken. Foot bones are fine. I'm worried that it is going to be very weak after though & I'm going to have to do this all again.

Not the same one! The one I broke falling down the stairs plays up occasionally in cold weather, just gets a bit stiff and sore but I do a lot of exercise and its held up fine
I had physio after the cast came off which probably helped

Mine plays up in the damp goodasitgets. I thought it was an old wives tales LOL

Definitely not! Damp + cold does not make for a happy ankle