I usually cook on my days off (hey, it’s better than waiting till seven to have the “I don’t know, what do you want” argument and not eating till 9 or 10), he tends to cook on the weekends, and we’re both on our own for meals where the other isn’t home. Sometimes we’ll cook, sometimes we’ll order out, sometimes we’ll scrounge.
The biggest thing for me is having a perpetual pantry. There’s a number of recipes that are easy enough I’m willing to make them (I am ahem not a kitchen-geared sort of woman) and that we both like, and I try to keep the stuff for those dishes on hand all the time. That way, I’ve always got something I can make without too much fuss or a trip to the store. It saves us a buttload of hunger-induced carping and bad temper, trust me. In addition to that stuff, I try to make sure we’ve always got stuff for snacks and scroungy throw-together meals.
Speaking of scroungy, throw-together meals, the more stuff you keep on hand, the more stuff you can just throw together. I’ve learned this through experience. There’s a lot of stuff my mother never had in her kitchen that I now consider staples. Before living with a foodie, it would simply never have occurred to me to keep fresh garlic, lemon juice, olive oil, or balsamic vinegar on hand, much less to keep a big bowl of salad chopped and ready to go and a bag of chicken breasts in the freezer. But having that stuff handy all the time really opens up the possibilities for fast, easy, healthy meals. I can walk into my kitchen right now and make you three different meals within the next 45 minutes, and they’re all tasty and healthy.
The other big thing is to think about your grocery shopping in terms of whole meals and leftovers. If I’m making one of my not-quite-stock recipes or trying out something new, I make sure I’ve got stuff to make the main course, side dishes, condiments, etc. I have a specific meal in mind before I put anything in my cart, so I’m not standing in the kitchen thinking, “Well, we could have burgers and fries, but we don’t have buns or potatoes. We could have meatloaf, but we don’t have any crackers or ketchup. Hmm, and we’re out of eggs, too. There goes making omelettes. I could make…aw shit, I’d have to go to the store for that, too. Screw it, I’m ordering a pizza.”
My personal favorite work-buster in the kitchen is the whole roast chicken. I get a pretty big chicken just about every week and roast it. It takes a long time to cook, but the prep work is practically non-existant. Out of that, we’ve got dinner that night, I’ve got lunch for a couple of days, and we’ve got meat to shred up and put on salads for at least one meal. (Some salad from the big bowl, a little leftover chicken, some almonds from the bag, some Craisins from the cabinet, and a little shredded cheese…you’ve got a healthy, damn tasty meal in about two minutes, right there.) All I do is rinse the chicken, use a pair of shears to cut out the backbone and the keelbone, rub it with a little mayo, sprinkle on some seasonings, and pop that bad boy in the oven. That’s the core of at least 3 meals for about 10 minutes of work.
Something else I’ve had a fair bit of success with is doing prep work for tomorrow’s dinner while you’re cooking today’s. This is especially great for long-cooking things like soups and stews or crockpot recipes. Then you can just toss it all together when you come in the next day.
You might also check out Rachel Ray’s 30-minute recipes. She’s got two books of complete meals laid out for you, and they’re all roughly 30 minutes to cook. (No, really, even I can manage them in about half an hour.) Some of them call for some non-staple ingredients, but if you go through and pick out 3 or 4 of those to make before you go grocery shopping, you’re all set for a tasty, healthy, fast dinner several nights a week. And then, of course, you’ve got some new ingredients on hand to work with for later meals.
