In one way, this is a quick meal…that is, if you plan ahead. I make this easy cabbage rolls casserole the night before, and cook them when I get home. You can also leave them in a slow cooker, or on a timer. Preparation takes me about 30-45 minutes.
I love pasta, and my husband makes THE best spaghetti sauce I have ever tasted. Â It makes quite a large batch, and takes a while to prepare, so he makes it on the weekend, and I put it up in smaller portions and freeze them for quick ground beef meals during the week. Making food in quantity and freezing it, or prepping batches of vegetables for use during the week, can save you a lot of time when you are in a rush.
One of the nice things about cooking a whole chicken is that it provides leftovers that can be turned into sandwiches, soup, casseroles, curries…or just have cold chicken and salad. There are many recipes using leftover chicken, and today I decided to make a chicken pot pie.
There is always a lot of talk, and controversy, about school lunches. Â There is far less talk about lunches for adults. I don’t know why people seem to avoid this topic, nor do I understand why some people feel embarrassed about bringing a lunch to work. There appears to be a stigma attached to the concept of brown bag lunches for adults. Why? It can save you a lot of money, and you have control over what you are eating.
Most lunches from a fast food place cost between $5-$10 on average. At $5 per day, 20 working days per month, that is $1200.00 a year.If you pay closer to $10 for lunch, you are looking at double that amount.
Flattened chicken, aka spatchcocked chicken is a great way to cook a chicken in a hurry. Using a cleaver, or kitchen shears, cut the backbone apart, and spread the chicken on a cutting board.Press down on the breast to flatten it, or cut the breastbone, whichever is easiest. The chicken in the picture is not huge (about 2.5 pounds) and took about 45 minutes to cook on the barbecue.
One of the quickest meals in a hurry is steak, especially if you have a barbeque.
We usually use top sirloin, but occasionally we get a small prime rib roast and take steaks off of it:)
Steak is best if brought to room temperature before grilling on a hot grill (as hot as it goes). Season with salt and fresh pepper. Cooking time is determined by the thickness of the steak and the temperature of the grill.
I purchased a pint of whipping  cream last week, with the intention of making a fennel and parmesan dish with ham. Still haven’t done that, but I saw the cream this morning and it made me think of clam chowder and linguine with white clam sauce and creamy seafood chowder.
There are several quick chicken drumstick recipes, so I thought I would make one of them for supper tonight. Drumsticks are dark meat, so they are a little more
moist and flavourful than the breast. They are also, usually, quite a bit less expensive than other parts of a chicken…so meals made with them tend to be more economical.
Shepherd’s pie is a relatively quick meal made with ground beef or lamb (if you want to be traditional, or you happen to have leftover roast lamb). It is easy to assemble, and takes about half an hour to cook.
On a cold, yucky day when it’s snowing, or the rain is chucking it down like no-one’s business, I like comfort food.  Roast, stew, lasagne, cabbage rolls, shepherd’s pie…all the old standbys.
Looking at the contents of my freezer, today seems like a day that calls for a quick meal with ground beef. It would have been even quicker if I had some frozen pasta sauce on hand. Â Oh, well…