Can we have a quick dinner thread?

[Feckinlego]

Not just a pizza in the oven, Ido that often enough, more like quick dinners using I dunno, microwave rice, frozen veg etc.

Mine is stir fry veg, whatever protein u have, in a pot with chicken stock soy and hoisin sauce, maybe noodles too, to make a healthy quick broth.

Any other ideas?

Birdseye frozen BBQ chicken with a bag of steam fresh microwave veg and a microwave rice

Veggie omelette with beans

Chicken fried rice, I always make this on a Monday with the leftover chicken, cook the rice while you cook the roast so it's cold for the next day, fry in hot vegetable oil add the chicken and whatever veggies you have with soy sauce it's so yummy!

Spag bol in the slow cooker (I just use a jar) - takes all of five mins to prep just dump in the mince and sauce and leave for 4 hours on high then cook your pasta and garlic bread when ready to eat. The meat is so tender.

Fajitas are always quick 😃😃

Lidl chimichurri marinated minute steak cooked for 90 seconds on each side - rest for 5 mins and cut into strips

Merchant gourmet Spanish style grains - microwave pouch 2 mins.

done - easy 10 ( could be 5 mins) and absolutely delicious

Nasi goreng made with a pack of microwave rice (it uses tinned tuna and tinned corn, curry powder, an onion and garlic, all always in the house, and then handfuls of whatever veg used in stir fried in the end of the fridge).

Fresh pasta, bacon lardons fried in a fry pan, mushrooms fried in the bacon fat, and a jar of Barilla pesto rossa all tossed together.

M&S Welsh rarebit baked with part baked bread rolls and served with glass of wine.

I’m doing a shop soon, I’ll post a pic of the recipes/receipt, it ALWAYS comes to a lot less. I grow my own herbs and a lot of the seasonings and stuff come out of my pantry which I only have to buy very occasionally so that cuts the costs down again. I had non stop issues with gousto, constant missing ingredients, chicken/fish constantly turning up warm and slimy, veg rotten. 2x I’ve had to have the whole box refunded as they’ve dumped it in my garden without knocking the door, cats and birds got into one and the other time it was left in 29 degree heat all day. My 13yo was upset a couple times as she’d cooked dinner for me for when I got home from work not realising that the meat was bad and the whole lot had to go in the bin. We had 2 weeks in a row where every single herb was substituted with coriander which I fucking hate 🤢 I’d rather just do an Asda order than constantly have to go to the shop after work and buy whatever had gone wrong with it that day 🙄

Ok I’ve just looked at my shop out of interest, for arguments sake I’ll just pick the first recipe I listed in my post, the creamy chicken and spinach pesto spaghetti. Baring in mind gousto for me comes to £57.83 for the 4 recipes and delivery, so £14.45 for each daily dinner.
Spaghett I bought for 75p, I could have bought Asdas basic one for 28p and saved even more.
1 kilo of fresh chicken for £6.29 but I’ll only need half a kilo and the rest is being used for another recipe, so £3.15
Spinach £1 and again more is being used in another recipe
Philly cream cheese on offer for £1.25 and again only need half, half for another recipe so say 62p (could have bought a cheaper brand again).
Ive already got the hard cheese and pesto but I’ll add the entire £1.10 and £1.15 anyway for a new jar and pack even though both will do me 3 lots of meals.

So that comes to £7.77 compared to goustos £14.45, baring in mind I’ve bought expensive brands and could easily knock a couple quid off buying own brands, I could have taken off the pesto and cream cheese I can use for multiple other recipes, and I could have chosen a different example with far cheaper ingredients than fresh chicken/pesto/multiple cheeses etc

There's a really good book called the Quick Roasting Tin, which is basically loads of traybakes.

I love traybakes as you can chuck everything in one go and then forget about it till it's done, and it's easy to make healthy nutritious dinners without any processed stuff.

Recent examples:
Salmon fillets with sesame oil, light soy sauce, garlic, chilli, broccoli and sweet potatoes

Assorted wild and chestnut mushrooms, pancetta, red onions, garlic, rosemary, potatoes olive oil, cannellini beans

Cod, chorizo, asparagus and green beans and parsley

Agree about gusto - I used it once on a trial offer. I'd rather use meat that I have bought myself, choose my own veg etc. And it seemed expensive for what it was. But I've got a reasonable store cupboard built up of spices etc that I use pretty regularly.

My easy one is fry an onion or some shallots, add garlic, add a good tbsp of nduja, splash of sherry, tin of toms/passata, pack of Philadelphia (Lidl's version thereof) and serve with pasta and tenderstem. Fresh parsley and parmesan grated over the top and we all feel better after a crap day.

My other east but not fast is cut baby potatoes into even-sized pieces (can be whole if small but cut into large chunks of large). Mix with a sliced chorizo, (pack of bacon lardons) and jar tomato and chilli sauce in ovenproof dish. Bake for an hour. Serve with cream fraiche/sour cream on side.

Roast some seasoned chicken thighs (with bacon if you like). Make a cold dressing of Greek yoghurt, garlic, lemon and parmesan. Chop up the meat and mix it all together in a big bowl with some lettuce and rocket. Add extra Parmesan on top, and pine nuts if you have any. Makes a really delicious salad, very easy and takes no time.

Traybake Chow Mein-style noodles. Put some chopped up cooked meat (leftovers, usually) into a large roasting tin and mix with a supermarket sachet of stir-fry sauce. Add a splash of boiling water from the kettle and cook at 180ºc for 10 minutes. Mix through a pack of 'fresh' noodles and a bag of stir-fry vegetables. Another splash of water from the kettle and a good dash of soy. Another 10 minutes in the oven and serve straight out of the tin.

I also do the gousto cheat! My husbands Muslim so we tend to go for the veggie/fish options. This weeks Chinese fried rice with veggies and egg, squash and pistachio curry, Santorini tomato fritters with herby fries, pad Thai, mackerel and potato salad and saag aloo with peas and pitta. So that was 6 days worth of dinners instead of 4 and serving 5 people and under £25 for the lot. Gousto can 🖕 with their £52 for 4 days! That’s £25 for 25 dinners rather than 16 dinners for £52, gousto charges a lot for the convenience of having the food delivered in (wasteful) packaging to your door. I don’t know anyone who thinks it’s cheap!