Get a wok! Everything here can be cooked in a wok without any problems.
If you can, go to a farberware outlet store and pick up one of their nonstick woks (you can get one for under 30$)
Woks are great, they can double for a fryer, you can boil ANYTHING that doesn’t need a lid to cook or you can use them as a frying pan.
Here’s a few easy things:
Beef Stroganoff
Chop 1 cup onions
Slice mushrooms
2 cloves garlic
1 lb beef (thin sliced)
Cook the onions and garlic in maybe 1 Tbs butter, add the meat then add the onions
Add in flour to absorb the juice and cook for 2 min.
Mix up 2 cups beef bullion add to the pan over medium to low heat, raise the heat then cook until thick.
Now add sour cream and mustard (a fair amount) to taste.
serve over rice or noodles.
Stuffed peppers:
1 lb ground beef
1-1.5 cups onion
Add salt and pepper and cook the beef and onion.
Make 2-3 cups of rice however you want.
After the beef and onion is cooked, add 1 small can (8 or 12 oz) of tomato sause (unseasoned)
Add maybe 4 - 6 oz sherry and maybe 10 oz of apple sause!
(optional: add ground cinna… cinn… arrg ya know it’s in apple sause!)
Now mix the rice in with the meat, onions and sause.
Now take green and red peppers, chop em in half scooping out the innards and pack em full of your rice mixture. Put that in an oven safe pan, adding the rest of the rice mixture around them add some cheese and bake until the cheese is golden brown.
On the other hand you can dice the peppers and cook them with the beef and onion saving another dish and a lot of time.
Hamburger gravy (think instant chili!)
Cook hamburger with onions (yeah yeah) with salt and pepper.
after it’s cooked add some paprika, chili powder and cumin. Cook that for another min, then add flour to absorb the juice and cook for 2 min.
Turn down the heat, add skim milk (or whatever milk you drink) and turn up the heat and thicken. Now add chili sauce and more cumin, paprika and chili powder to taste, add more milk to adjust the consistancy.
Serve over bread, rice, potatoes or whatever.
Instant curry 
(it’s yellow and kinda tastes indian… that’s about it)
Chicken breasts (2 to 3 depending on volume you want to make)
1 large onion
1 large or 2 medium apples.
In a pan add 1-2 inches of water, 1 tsp of curry powder (in the spice aisle) and the chicken breasts (trim the fat off first) put on medium heat until simmering then turn down.
Dice the onion and apples.
by now you should turn over the chicken and finish it off
In your wok add 2-3 Tbs butter, apples and onion cook until tender.
Add 1-2 tsp of curry powder and enough flour to absorb the butter (at least 3 Tbs, if there is unmoistened flour add a bit more butter or some olive oil) cook 2 min.
Turn down the heat and add 2 cups of milk, cook until thick.
Shred the chicken into bite sized pieces and add to the onion and apple. Stir to warm the chicken (test it now to see if it needs more curry powder).
Serve with rice.
*Note: If you make this with say shrimp you’ll need to add 1 cup milk and 1 cup of chicken broth, other wise it tastes kinda funny.
A really easy one:
Take sausage you like (I use polish!) Slice it up and add it to a pan of yummy pasta sause and heat that up (USE PRECOOKED SAUSAGE!)
Boil pasta and heat some bread in the oven. (always add a little bit of salt and oil to the water)
(If you wrap foil around the bread the outside will get crusty and the inside nice and moist)
Also:
If you take the ‘fresh’ pasta from the deli section, like the 3 cheese tortilini (spelling!?) boil that in water with some basil and oregano and olive oil.
Cook a small amount of garlic and basil in a small amount of olive oil and set aside to cool.
Drain the pasta, drizzle with olive oil/garlic/basil.
serve with bread.
Also, with salads, you can vary them so that they remain interesting.