Quick meal hacks (not batch cooking)

[YukoandHiro]

What are your hacks for getting a child friendly meal ready very quickly on a weeknight? I'd love some ideas.

I always have such good intentions of cooking good, fresh dinners for my kids (ages: almost 5 and 1) but after work and school/nursery it always ends up in a bit of a rush and we have fish fingers and beans far more often than I would like to admit.

The annoying thing is that batch cooking never works. Even if they loved the original meal, both kids seem to be able to tell if its reheated (especially if it's been frozen between) and refuse the batch cooked portion and it always ends up in the bin! So I've given up on that.

So... I'm after your speed cooking hacks!

I use rice pouches which are great and often use frozen veg. Both of those are quite obvious though. Do you have any other ideas?

[ShandaLear]

Pitta pizza - use a pitta bread as a pizza base - some passata, cheese (you can use supermarket ready grated for this), and some ham/chicken and veg. Pop under the grill for 5 minutes. Serve with some cherry tomatoes and salad leaves.

[gaggiagirl]

Breaded/battered chicken whichever one you like. Serve with wraps and salad.
Same chicken served with pouch rice and curry sauce for chicken katsu.
Same chicken served with new potato and veg and garlic butter.
Same chicken served with pouch rice and a jar of sweet and sour sauce.

[sunshineandsuddenshowers]

Quick start to finish, or quick prep? If quick prep look at the roasting tin books

[LondonLovie]

Frozen jacket potato (microwave in 5 mins) with tuna/ cheese/ beans/ bacon

Pancakes (shop bought) with fruit- they love this for tea

Smoked salmon bagel with cream cheese

Quick quesadillas- buy cooked chicken add what kids like in middle.. warm in a dry frying pan

[FaintlyMacabre]

Sausage pasta- cut sausages into bite size pieces, brown them in a sauté pan, add chopped garlic then tin of tomatoes. Add herbs/salt/pepper to taste. Simmer it while you cook the pasta. One of the rare ever popular meals in our house!

[Eeejjj]

Also, to cut prep time I find frozen ginger/garlic/onion/ peppers help a lot.

[UnaOfStormhold]

The roasting tin cookbook recipes aren't instant but they're so hands off (prep, pile everything into tin, stick in oven, serve) they might as well be - some really tasty flavour combinations.

Felafel with pittas, salad, houmous and yoghurt is very easy with bought felafel.

[Judystilldreamsofhorses]

A really quick easy fave here is pasta with peas, broccoli, and pesto. You can cook the veg and pasta in one pot, drain, stir through the pesto, then I crumble some feta over before serving.

[polkapip]

Place marking. Loving the quasi quesadilla idea!

[Crikeyalmighty]

My son used to love packets of ainsley Harriet couscous with some cooked chicken or ham chopped in

[Mypotatoeshavelegs]

1 Ready to throw in pan Chinese vedge packs ready done, serve with microwave rice or straight to wok noodles. Add packet sauce like blue dragon.
2 tinned tomato, lazy garlic from jar, handful fresh basil ready soft pasta, fry if the garlic for a few mins and plonk the rest into the same pan and stir.
3.Chilled ready made mashed potato pop
in microwave, grill sausages serve with frozen peas and packet gravy.
4Heat ready soft pasta, smoked salmon and frozen green beans, stir grated lemon peel and juice into. Few table spoons of natural
yogurt and combine.( doesn’t taste yogurt strangely.
5 Heat ready soft pasta chop up
some ham, or prosciutto, lazy garlic and peas, whisk 2 raw eggs and combine for speedy carbonara.
obsessed with pasta.

[Aozora13]

In my head at least, a bit of crème fraiche turns random ingredients into a legit pasta sauce! I’ll bung together eg bacon/pancetta + peas, salmon + broccoli, chicken + asparagus, courgette + peas + artichoke etc (or any combination of the above) seasoned with whatever then stir in crème fraiche and add to a pasta shape of your choice (best w spaghetti/tagliatelle though) and a load of grated cheese. This also has the advantage that you can easily serve the various parts separately for little fusspots who won’t have any foods touching never mind mixing…

[N0tfinished]

I get a bag of mixed frozen veg (the ones marked stir-fry but without bean sprouts which are vile). Dump in a frying pan and make sure to cook well enough that any residual water has gone. Season well (I use frozen garlic & ginger, whatever condiments I have that work). Add cooked chicken or prawns, maybe egg. Then dump in a packet of precooked rice or 2 depending on how many people are eating. I often make this with either Chinese, Indian or Mexican flavors, depending on mood & what I have in. Minimal prep, one pot cooking, and everyone likes it. I have to stop myself cooking it too often in case I make my family sick of it!

[declutteringmymind]

Some salmon topped with some garlic/herbs/ lemon/soy in some foil in the oven with some steamed veg/pots

Or some salmon wrapped in ready rolled pastry with some sweet veg mash.

[dropthevipers]

Pasta shells-whilst thats cooking grate some parmesan, chop some ham stir in some pesto, black pepper to taste. Delicious and done start to finish in ten minutes. Bonus is washing up is rinse out the pasta pan and seive in seconds.

[YukoandHiro]

So manny great ideas. So many recipes use egg though, it makes me realise how handicapped I am dealing with allergies which is why I still struggle so much even 5 years in. There are loads of dairy alternatives you can just substitute but egg isn't really replaceable

[Kamia]

Creamy chicken and mushroom pasta is easy to make, fajitas, stir fry, pies with chips and veggies if you use just roll, soup and crusty bread, one pot rice with everything chopped into it, fish fillets just marinade them and and a quick saute in the pan or pop in the grill, jacket potatoes you can cook the potato quickly in the microwave for 10 mins and it's done just add topping of your choice at the end, you can quickly marinade chicken and bung in the oven with some mash veggies corn on the cob that's quite easy to make, homemade burgers, grilled chicken wings, chicken and veg noodles. If you have an air fryer it can make life easier just stick your meat in there and also a slow cooker.

[SpaceOP]

We have started having more pasta again because it so often IS the easiest option for quick meals. But I like to make really chunky sauces because otherwise we all eat way too much pasta. A few we've had recently that have gone down well include:

Butternut, leak and spring onion (microwaved the butternut and slowly sautéed the leak and spring onions then added them together with a knob of butter and some water to blend) topped with sausages that had been removed from their skins and crumbled before frying with some fennel seeds.

Chopped aubergine fried until browned and soft, removed from pan then cooked chopped chorizo, returned aubergine to the pan and added tin of cherry tomatoes. Simmered while pasta cooked.

Aubergine and tomato sauce topped with feta cheese. (we add generous chilli to this one but we all like a bit of heat - it's not necessary).

My default for quick and easy used to be lamb chops or steak with new potatoes and steamed veg. Bit expensive but works as a quick meal.

[BlueBlueCowWondering]

@YukoandHiro

So manny great ideas. So many recipes use egg though, it makes me realise how handicapped I am dealing with allergies which is why I still struggle so much even 5 years in. There are loads of dairy alternatives you can just substitute but egg isn't really replaceable

I can understand completely as I have anaphylactic dc. In your situation it might be an idea to browse vegan recipes. You'll know for sure that no eggs are involved but you can add/ substitute non-vegan ingredients as you like.

Good luck 💐

[Greengr]

Just came across this hack

[Snowpaw]

Really quick curry:
Saute some frozen chopped onions with some curry paste, add chicken / chickpeas / lentils / any other veg your kids will eat, add a can of coconut milk and let it bubble away until everything cooked. Can stir through some cream at the end. Serve with micro rice or a warmed up naan bread.

[ticktickticktickBOOM]

Warm a tin of mackerel in tom sauce, add basil, serve on pasta.

I feel wrong doing this as no veg BUT oily fish! My boy loves it luckily. I'll serve a few toms on the side if i have any

[FallingLeavesAndGentleBreezes]

About the egg thing. Vegans so have tried a couple of ideas. But something the kids love is scrambled tofu. Crumble tofu and pan fry for a minute with oil, salt and turmeric. Stir through a few spoons of yogurt. You can add tomatoes or peas or anything really too. My two ask for this about 4 times a week and it can be the main thing with toast or a side thing with eg pasta or couscous. It is also tasty with chickpeas instead of tofu, but less egg like.