Help! Your best simple or make-ahead recipes?

[viennesewhirl]

I've got a 3 month old and a 4 year old, and dh usually works until very late in the evenings, so I have to cook supper for the 4yo while dealing with the often-screaming 3 month old.

I've found the best way to do this is to either cook (or prepare) as much as possible beforehand - i.e. bolognese sauce, tomato/veg sauce, or pesto for pasta; or soup - or make something that I can cook really fast in the evening - poached chicken breast with rice for example.

But I'm stuck every day for ideas and want to get more organised and start planning ahead for the week. I'd be v. grateful for any good recipes (or ideas) you'd care to share with me.

Thank you!

If you have the space, almost anything can be made in advance and frozen.

Then what you do is set aside a day to stock your freezer, and make a whole load of meals that reuire the same base ingredients, for example, cook up a big batch of bolognese, then freeze some for spaghetti, make some into lasagne, make some into chilli.

Shepherd's pie and Fish Pie are great made in advance and can be make relatively quickly in the morning or the night before or in stages.

Pizza is always a good one. I make the dough up in the morning, while making breakfast, have a stock of tomato sauce in the freezer in cubes so I just need to defrost what I need, and then just whack the toppings and cheese on and put in the oven for ten minutes.

Couscous is very very very speedy to prepare, my DS loves it with raw stuff chucked in like olives, cherry tomatoes, chick peas, tinned tuna or mackrel, cold left-over chicken, anything really.

Would your DS eat wraps? DS has always loved these, and anything can be added. I tend to just put a whole load of fillings on the table and he makes his own. Salad stuff, grated carrot, any beans or pulses, chickpeas, cream cheese (helps everything stick together), tuna, humous, lives, flafel,grated cheese, ham, fish, left over bolognese, endless posibilities rally.

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