When you plan your own menus, plan to eat the more perishable vegetables early in the week such as tomatoes and tender greens, with heartier vegetables like potatoes, carrots, broccoli and cauliflower later in the week.

When you come home from the grocery store, freeze any meat, fish or poultry that is not for tonight or tomorrow. Food safety is really important.

Cook Once, Eat Twice (or More)

This is simply cooking more of a protein item that I need for one meal and reusing that item to make more meals later in the week. A ham is a great example. I cook a ham on Sunday and make a ham frittata, put ham in quesadillas and serve meal size potatoes stuffed with ham, cheese and butter.

Another great option is a turkey. I cook a turkey on Sunday; it makes the house smell wonderful. I’ll whip up a batch of bread dough in the bread machine and serve sliced turkey breast with fresh hot rolls and vegetables on Sunday. Turkey slices make great sandwiches for the week and I make a double batch of a turkey casserole and serve half and freeze half for another week.

I also love to roast a big chicken for Sunday dinner. Leftovers can become sour cream chicken enchiladas or chicken and dumplings, chicken pot pie (with puff pastry or biscuit crust. In the summer, leftover chicken can become chicken salad sandwiches, possibly curried with nuts and raisons or it can become an Asian chicken salad with crunchy almonds and mandarin oranges. Shredded leftover chicken is awesome in a soup with summer vegetables, on top of tortillas in a tostada, taco or burrito or on top of a crisp and cool Caesar salad.

To search for ham dishes on Dinners In a Flash, search for key word ham. To find uses for chicken or turkey, check main ingredient poultry and use the keyword cooked. Be sure to choose a main meal that creates more servings than you need.

Cooking Ahead

On a Saturday, I like to take an hour or so and make casseroles to go into the freezer. I will choose a protein, like chicken and make two different casseroles like chicken enchiladas and chicken divan. Or I might make a beef stew, beef pot pies and shepherds pie. I make a double portion of each, and freeze all except one to serve that night.

To search for freeze ahead recipes, search on keyword freeze or casserole. Be sure to try the ultra creamy macaroni and cheese. I’ve got it in the oven right now and it smells to awesome you won’t believe it. It comes out of the pan still creamy, then nestles into a fluffy puddle on your plate. It has a crispy, buttered crumb topping and tangy, rich cheddar flavor.

Even if you don’t choose to cook ahead and freeze; you can still cook ahead for tomorrow night. Roast some potatoes, sweet potatoes, acorn or butternut squash for an easy reheat tomorrow. It takes nothing to do while you are eating dinner tonight or cleaning up the kitchen, and tomorrow you can come home, stuff and reheat those potatoes for twice baked potatoes. You’ll be glad you did. What an economical meal too.

Fast Cooking Food

Frozen shrimp, frozen tilapia, chicken cutlets, turkey cutlets, pork cutlets, steaks, salmon, ham steaks all cook in minutes. I have about a half dozen go-to sauces that I make in the pan when the protein has finished cooking or they are all fabulous on the grill in the summertime.

Also pasta; spaghetti, angel hair, linguine, ravioli or polenta cook in minutes are wonderful in a prepared pasta sauces, either tomato style dressed up with salt, garlic and pepper or pesto or alfredo make with milk, butter and cream cheese.

Another go-to meal for us is breakfast for dinner. An omelet, pancakes, sausages all somehow taste better at dinnertime and are an unexpected treat.

Most of the recipes on Dinners In A Flash cook in under 30 minutes. Longer cooking meals are indicated as Sunday meals or casseroles intended to make double and freeze half.

Slow Cooking Food

Slow Cooking Foods The slow cooker is your friend. There are hundreds of crockpot recipes on Dinners In A Flash. My suggestion is to assemble the crockpot the night before. While you are cleaning the kitchen from tonight’s supper, brown the meat and chop the vegetables for tomorrow’s crockpot. Then in the morning, just pop crock into the base and start the crockpot. When you walk in the door tomorrow night, dinner is ready and waiting for you with lovely aromas filling the house.

To search for crockpot recipes, click crockpot as the cooking method and click search. Or click browse and choose crockpot recipes.

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