Ideas for ultra-easy meals for first weeks with a newborn

[Daffodilly]

I'd rather not rely on ready meals and takeaways more than we have to so I am looking for seriously quick things to make in those early weeks - 10 mins prepartion, minimal chopping and ingredients, stuff I can do one handed, or that even non-cooking DH can't mess up!

So far I have come up with:

• Pasta twirls with shop bought sauce and add some veg
• Smoked mackerel fillets with jacket potatoes and salad
• Salmon fillets smeared with pesto and baked in oven, with couscous and peas

Any other ideas? Ideally stuff that DD (2 yrs) can eat too to save me cooking twice!

can you (or DH) make a stack of things like cottage pie or soup or something and freeze it before the baby is born? Actually, remembering my last pregnancy, this is possibly a stupid idea, but if you're not feeling too enormous and uncomfortable it could be a plan.

Can you not throw a few things in the freezer ahead of time?
Vegetable chilli - onions, chillies, peppers, mushrooms and courgettes, kidney beans & tinned tomatoes. Make a huge vat as it freezes well.

Quick things

• couscous with roasted veg Baked potatoes with anything to hand chicken thighs roasted with lemon and garlic, served with mash

Soup! Soup can be really quick and easy, or can be bunged in a slowcooker in the morning and then ignored all day.

Before my babies, I filled the freezer with macaroni / cauliflower cheese, chicken supreme, pasta sauce and shepherd's pie. I thought they'd be easy meals to fall back on a couple of times per week.
What I didn't realise was that we'd exist on these four meals in rotation, for a month!!
With occasional fish and chips for variety .

make a meat bolognese/chilli for freezer - iron will be good for both of you

definitely try to freeze up loads of chilli's, bolognese sauce, curry etc, and if any friends ask if they can bring anything, ask them to bring your dinner! Much quicker than cooking anything!

my quickest meal ever - pack of stir fried veg with beansprouts, noodles, chinese 5 spice paste. Add chicken or prawns if you want. We just do a veggie dish. Meal ready in about 5 mins.

Also, how about a tortilla with onions and potatoes. Takes about 30 mins to cook but you can have it hot or cold with salad.

The other thing my non cooking DH can do fairly easily is chicken fahitas with the discovery fahitas spice mix. For a packet, its really nice.

Pasta with pesto and cream cheese

Chop some smoked salmon and fry in a little olive oil couple of mins, add grated courgette and cook some more. Meanwhile cook pasta. Add creme fraiche and soft cheese to salmon to make a suace, stir into pasta with a little parmesan. 10 mins start to finish.

Would also second freezer suggestion - make a big batch of home made tomato sauce to go on pasta . Also good mixed with marscepone and served with gnocchi(supermarket bag cooks in about 2 mins). can add bacon or some ham and wilted spinach for a bit of vit c and yet more parmesan (i add parmesan to everything!)

Omelettes - we have about one a week on work nights, try to vary fillings to keep variety up.

Excuse spelling!

Omelettes with roasted asparagus and melted gouda, with good bread. DD could have cherry tomatoes and carrot sticks instead of the asparagus if needsbe.

Great ideas - thank you.

Agree with the freezer thing in principle. I did this before DD1 and it was great. But this time I am struggling to find energy to cook our daily meals let alone do extra. Plus we have limited freezer space. I hope to at least do some meals for DD so that when we cave in and have a take away there is something suitable for her.

Soup is a good idea and omlettes too.

Def best bet is to rope some friends into providing meals in lieu of baby gifts!

No original ideas but a warning....
when expecting dts (we already had a toddler) we anticipated lack of time to cook ect (correctly) so in a fit of forward thinking we made HUNDREDS and I mean hundreds of veggie burgers, really, so many they wouldn't fit in our freezer and we had to ferry them round friends houses in a buggy (there were too many to carry in a shopping bag)....
and how many do you think we ate?
er....about a dozen.
You CAN get bored with veggie burgers, even if you have 3 under 3s.
One of the Dts has just asked if there are still some somewhere....I sincerely hope not, they would be about 18 yrs old now

when DD was born the BEST gift was from my brother who turned up with two plated up roast dinners. Bliss!

I think food is always the best thing to take in any situation. I broke my leg over christmas and my favourite visitors have been those who have turned up with dinners ready to pop in the oven. Better for you than a few more babygros any day

Mince 'thing' - my mum called it modge.

fry onions and mince together, add various chopped veg, cans of beans, tomatoes (or a can of vegetable soup will do) etc. plus gravy. make enough of it, freeze it in double portion bags and then it is usable for:
pasta sauce
cottage pie (under mashed potato)
mince 'thing' with baked potato

It is amazingly versatile!

oh yes, and another quick tip - those tubs of salsa dip make great pasta sauce.

Goats cheese and spring onion omlette is really lovely with a salad. Just fry spring onions in butter, add egg, when nearly done add slices of goats cheese and put under grill. Serve with salad.

Chops are good too. Pound together garlic/rosemary/sea salt/olive oil, smear on pork chops, then griddle or grill.

Nigel Slater's Fast Food is a great recipe book for this sort of thing

thumbwitch the fridge pots? or jars?

IMO the slowcooker is the best invention ever, I don't know how I would have coped without mine.
Just put your ingriedients in and forget about it. Great for soups and stew and I've even done curry in mine.
I still use mine about 3 times a week it gives me extra time to spend with the DC's or Mnetting

um, the plastic dip pots that you are supposed to dunk cornchips in, or put out at a party with a spoon in alongside the coleslaw, that sort. That's the sort I've used anyway - don't know if the glass jar ones would work as well.
(does that help?)

Chicken Fajitas is about my fastest dinner ever.

Baked potatoe with beans and cheese, salad on side.

Prawns and mushrooms fried in wok with small amount of butter and loads of Garlic. Throw in some noodles for a minute before serving. Yum!

Home made soup with crusty bread and butter. Make before hand and freeze in portions.

I don't have a slow cooker and our kitchen is too small for another gadget unless I was 100% sure if would be used. Is a crockpot similar? Would be interested in stew recipes that don't involve too much chopping and preparing veggies - that always seems to take longer than I expect. Like the idea of making double portions and then having some for next day or to freeze.

Hotpot, casseroles, macaroni cheese, pasta with sauce/veg, toad in the hole with veg, jacket potatoes with tuna/cheese/beans/veg etc, pasta with tuna, shepards pie, stir fry, veg soup, beans on toast with cheese, spag bol, pasta bake, potato bake both with veg or alone, toasted sandwiches, scrambled eggs with beans, toast and sausages etc. Hope some of those help.

You can even buy packs of veg that are ready to add to stews etc or just the ready peeled/chopped ones to save more time for a while.

Try this:
Cut 2 onions into quarters lengthways. Fry gently for a couple of minutes. Add thyme and lardons. Fry some more. Add 2 tins haricot beans, tub of creme fraiche. Get to bubbling point. Put in dish, grate parmesan over top, pop in oven for half an hour. DD (3) loves it. Nothing really needs chopping, and the frying bit takes about 10 mins. I bung a couple of halved courgettes in the oven at the same time.