apartment therapy changing the world, one room at a time

I recently stocked up on some vegetarian burritos at Trader Joe's for those nights when my husband is on-call at the hospital, and I simply can't stand to chop another onion. They're my emergency stash.

Peanut butter. Mmmmmm... straight from the jar, or with apples or celery. Protein shakes (almond milk, frozen banana, ice, protein powder) are also good to help me fill up when I don't have time to cook.

I too am guilty of the hummus and crackers (Triscuits!) dinner. Other meals are fried egg sandwiches, canned tuna, or for light cooking, some sort of canned beans plus frozen veggie (no chopping this way) combo like this:

http://makingitwithmeleyna.wordpress.com/2009/02/01/bow-chickpea-wow-wow/

I do the breakfast for dinner a lot too. Last night in fact. Also I have a lot of homemade canned soup that I bust out with grilled cheese or biscuits.

Were I live, we have an abundance of left overs, and I am often not the one who is cooking or responsible for it. But I do face those days when what is being offered is not pleasing, appealing, or within my food restrictions. I also sometimes just need to "get away". These are the times I hope a friend is free and we can go visit one of those local places you talked about Dana.

The convenience and ease of stopping for a fish burrito on those days I can't convince myself to "accept the offering" is actually what makes it possible for me to put away my preferences more often and just take what I am given with gratitude and humility. It's the freedom of choice which makes the choice less important.

Pasta. Brown rice macaroni butter/margarine Italian seasoning fresh parmesan. If I have any vegetables that will go with this dish (mushrooms and zucchini are a favourite) I'll saute them in a pan with some olive oil. It's quick, but not processed.

For times when I'm genuinely feeling sick (colds especially) there's a little Indian place on my street that does a chickpea curry that will knock any cold on its butt.

cold cereal!

I pretty much only know how to cook for small armies, but it works out. If I know something will freeze well (Emeril's Vegetarian Chili!!!) I'll package and freeze the extra. My freezer was getting quite full, but my fiance and I both came down with that nasty Plague that everyone seems to have lately, and I've been sick for two week now. The freezer is no longer very full, but we have only gone out to eat once, and it was because we were feeling pretty good and decided to, not because there wasn't anything to eat.

I also like quesadillas with avocado and salasa, or a quick veggie stir fry over rice. Or breakfast. Breakfast is ALWAYS a good thing.

cold cereal it is for us, too. Corn flakes mainly.

I never buy frozen meals or instant food, because I know once I have it in the house, I won't end up cooking at all. The temptation is just too much, plus convenience foods are just too damn cheap for my own good.

If I really don't feel like cooking I usually end up picking up some takeout on my way home. The expense of helps guilt me into cooking more.

When I don't want to cook, I go for: cold cereal, a fried egg sandwich, pb&j (with banana if I have it), apples with peanut butter, hard boiled eggs, or leftovers. Canned tomato soup (made with milk) and grilled cheese. Jarred pasta sauce with frozen spinach tossed in and cooked together over pasta.

Often it's a giant green salad with some toasted bread. Salad is easy and there's so many things you can toss in with the lettuce.

I have a small child, so completely bagging the cooking is no longer an option. Eggs, specifically frittatas, save me when I am in no mood, as does pasta. But more often than not I grit my teeth and just do it, like I'm about to do right now. It helps that the place is well-stocked so at least I know that whatever project I start is finishable. I'm one who tends to do a menu soup-to-nuts, so when I'm not in the mood, I scale back to the soup. Which is exactly what I'm making tonight.

Here are my standbys:

- Hummus and pita
- Quesadilla with avocado and maybe some beans
- Grilled cheese
- Scrambled eggs and english muffin or toast
- Toast topped with soft boiled eggs, salt, pepper
- Toast with avocado and salt on top
- Egg/cheese sandwich (on an english muffin)
- Steamed broccoli for veggies
- Raw red pepper (with hummus maybe)

- Huevos rancheros -- put some shredded cheese on a tortilla, pop it in the toaster oven (or microwave), fry a couple of eggs and put it on top of the tortilla/melted cheese, top that with some storebought salsa, and avocado if you have it.

- And my latest favorite: homemade pizzas. This is easy if you plan ahead and stock up. In a recent Everyday Food, Martha Stewart had a great recipe for whole wheat pizza dough. It makes 8 perfect sized individual shells for the freezer. When you want a pizza, just pull one out, top it with pasta sauce (I keep homemade pasta sauce in the freezer), shredded mozarella, a chopped up Aidells sausage, maybe some onions or red peppers or mushrooms, stick it in the oven at 450F for 18-20 mins (better if you have a pizza stone), and you've got an awesome meal that honestly did not take much time or effort. I guess it's a little more difficult than "stick it in the microwave and go" but it's totally worth it and does the trick when you really don't feel like making a full-fledged meal.

I also freeze balls of cookie dough for a much needed homemade cookie fix. Granted, I don't ever actually end up COOKING the dough because eating raw it is just too tasty.

I do sometimes eat prepared food, like Amy's frozen burritos, or Annie's mac n cheese.

We have a variety of frozen leftovers (soup, stews, lasagnas) that we can pull out and cook up. Stir fry works too, we usually have an assortment of veggies. I rarely have times when I do not want to cook though.

My go-to is pasta with jarred sauce. It's not the same as homemade sauce, obviously, but I was raised on that stuff so it has a special place in my heart, particularly a "chunky garden style."

I have also been known to just bust out a giant bowl of frozen peas. That's how much I love peas.

Here's a second on the small child situation. I can't not feed him. However, I can slide by with minimal effort for him and in a pinch the grownups get:

-Pasta carbonara (this doesn't really count as cooking, because bacon is so good and boiling water isn't cooking).

-Order out for pizza or Thai

-Grilled cheese and a bag salad

If it's just me in the house for some reason I can get by on whatever I find, but favorites are pasta with butter, or toast with a tiny bit of mayo and tomato slices.

-And of course, going out. Like we might tonight.

a favorite of mine, especially when the lack of cooking is due to time, is a bagged salad inside halved pocket pitas. Can just squirt in some dressing or dip in salsa, hummus etc and eat on the go or while doing something else - makes a salad more manageable and filling

Noodles! They're fast, easy, and you can throw in whatever you have lying around.

I always have several different dry noodles lying around (rice noodles, soba, those white Chinese noodles). I used a stock cube as a base and try to make them with some sort of meat or fishballs, tofu (frozen tofu is a really convenient and tasty thing to have around), and some green veggie. Ten minutes and its done!

I stocked up on a couple frozen boxes of vegetarian lasagnas, burritos, and enchiladas that I purchased at my local organic (My Organic Market in Alexandria) grocery store. If I'm at Trader Joe's, I like to pick up a couple of boxes of their vegetarian Indian fare (for that, I just cook up a pot of jasmine rice).

There'a a place around the corner called The Red Apron that makes tasty prepared meals that are reasonably nutritious for people who are too busy to cook (like lamb stew with creamy polenta) so I've been guilty of going there, or to my favourite Pho place a couple of blocks away.

My favourite, though, is to make a big batch of pureed soup, like carrot or broccoli, then freeze portions in ziploc bags. Pulling one out of the freezer and heating it up in a sauce pan to eat with a little bread and cheese makes for a perfect no fuss dinner.

Back home, it was take-out (Chinese, Ethiopian, Indian, Vietnamese, Thai...) or maybe partially prepared foods from our butcher (Mama Saslove's amazing perogies, salmon wellington, a steak...) or beans on toast (our fave).

But here in Switzerland, I usually have no choice but to cook -- take-out is practically non-existent, and if it exists, does not start until around 7 pm, at which time the kidlings would be hysterically hungry, and I haven't found the sort of beans that work on toast.

Fondue. It is Swiss fast food.
Mac'n'cheese, often with gruyère, as only 2 stores sell cheddar.
Pasta with --- anything!!
Puffy German Apply Pancake
Clafouti
scrambled eggs and toast
omelets

This is the best help I've found though -- 10 basics ingredients that you can usually have on hand, which will make great simple meals (I have it in plastic sleeves in the kitchen):

http://www.realsimple.com/food-recipes/recipe-collections-favorites/popular-ingredients/10-ingredients-30-meals-10000001100050/index.html

The only problem here is the cost of the protein -- a pork tenderloin costs around $25, ditto for the salmon.

Dehydrated refried beans, slasa, cheese and chips! Or apples and cheese.

Pasta too. :)

Most of mine start with toast:

Pepper toast and scrambled eggs with extra butter

Peanut butter and honey on toast

Toast and large bowl of steamed edamame

Cheese on toast

Toasted trader joe's naan bread spread with Patak's lime pickle. (If you haven't had this condiment you're missing a major treat. Its salty, sour, oily and spicy all at once. Just be sure to buy the "lime pickle" and not the "spicy lime pickle" Pataks regular lime pickle is VERY hot already. The "spicy" stuff could kill anyone but a major chili head.)

I go with frozen food from TJ's or, if that's just too much to ask (and sometimes it is, horrible, I know), I'll eat cheese and crackers. Or occasionally ice cream, but that's a special case of nothing else in the house and yes, the day was THAT bad.

For a while there, my go-to meal was pasta tossed with butter and parmasean and topped with a fried egg. It hits all my comfort buttons of warm, soft, salty and rich. Or scrambled eggs with cheese, if I have it, over rice (putting rice in a rice cooker is NOT cooking) with ketchup. Or a fried egg and cheese on toast.

I despise eating in restaurants alone and often don't want to lose my parking space for take out so that doesn't happen often unless I can get my local friend to go out with me.

for a while we were keeping Trader Joe's focaccia or their herb pizza dough (to make focaccia with, that's not really cooking!) around every week, and eating it with tomatoes and fresh mozz. and maybe some balsamic vinegar.

back when i lived with roommates and only cooked for myself, i sometimes used to make boxed white cheddar macaroni and cheese and sprinkle a bunch of italian pizza seasoning on it after cooking. the seasoning really makes it a whole different dish. i used snooty organic boxed mac and cheese to make myself feel better about it.

At our house we have "Tapas" = crackers, cheese, olives, cherry tomatoes...wine... whatever else is lying around.

Also: Individually-frozen boneless chicken breasts cook really fast on the stovetop. You don't even have to thaw them - just place a couple in the pan, turn on the heat, throw in whatever else you have on hand (olives, lemon, tomatoes, green beans...) and call it dinner. (Couscous is a side we add sometimes - boil water & let sit 5 mins.) Trader's sells individually frozen breasts, but we don't have a Trader's where we are - so generally buy raw, then wrap&freeze them ourselves to keep on hand...

pasta with pesto. and I also always have those individually frozen tj's chicken brests on hand, as well as some frozen spinach to add to dishes when veggies are lacking.

Like many others out there we also have a supply of leftovers in the freezer to fall back on that is my first line of defense. Now that my one-year old is eating solid food almost exclusively, I can't ever not feed her so must keep her needs in mind. But if I am on my own then it could be
cereal,
canned beans warmed with salsa and spooned into a tortilla,
or homemade popcorn (not microwaved and not air popped).

this is a great post, but i'd just like to point out that taqueria is not a plural! it's spanish, not latin.

I like hummus with crackers, sliced raw turnips, and sugar snap peas to dip in it. Cherry tomatoes and sliced cucumbers are also good.

Air-popped popcorn with nutritional yeast, tamari, and granulated garlic is a healthful and incredibly filling meal.

Shredded wheat (not frosted ones) with honey and milk are delish!

And there's always the option of pizza from across the street (yay carryout special!).