I am not one of those super parents (or super people who aren't parents) who meal preps and plans meals for the entire week in advance or spends large amounts of times preparing dinners. Those people are amazing. But I am not in their club. When my husband is home, he does the majority of the cooking, but he is the same way. We usually remember around 5 PM on any given night that we need to figure out dinner for ourselves and our kids, and than frantically throw some ingredients together, do a last minute store run, or order take out. We non-planners when it comes to food.
And that is why I love quick dinner recipes that are easy to put together but still delicious and at least non completely unhealthy. I'm not talking about frozen meals here (although some of those are pretty freaking good too); I'm talking about real meals that aren't super processed, but aren't from scratch either. The other day I was in one of my frantic last minute meal frenzies and I decided to look right here - at the Bubby and Bean blog - for answers. Going through the food tab up top led me to some of my favorites recipes I'd forgotten about, so I thought I'd share them in a post for those of you who missed them the first time or could use a refresher. I hope they help those of you who are fellow meal non-planners the next time you're in need of something to throw together for dinner! Just click on the image or link below it for the full recipe.
(Also seen in the top image.) These take about 10 minutes, only require a handful of ingredients, and everyone in our family loves them. They're also perfect for St. Patrick's Day, which is this Saturday!
This soup only needs 5 ingredients and some spices, and the hardest part is sautéing the garlic (which could easily be left out if you're in a real rush). The rest just involved turning on a stove burner for a few minutes. It tastes like it took all day. The best.
These recipes actually call for vegan cheese slices, but you can absolutely use regular cheese slices as well. Both only take a few minutes to make, and they take plain grilled cheese up about ten notches. My kids loves them. (The adults in the house do too.)
Pick up a precooked refrigerated mac and cheese kit like Three Bridges and this will take you 5 minutes. For real. Use frozen or boxed mac and cheese and it will take slightly longer, but still amazingly fast for how delicious it is.
These look and sound time consuming, I know, but they use a quinoa/rice/lentil blend you can buy all together (or if you only have one of two of those items on hand, you can use them instead), which makes them incredibly quick. They can be ready in less than a half hour from start to finish, including cooking time, and they're so, so good.
I just realized 4 out of 5 of these recipes involve avocados on some level. Most are also some version of southwestern or Mexican food. Hey, I like what I like, man.
What is your favorite last minute dinner to make? (I'll take all the ideas I can get!)
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I am, admittedly, a meal prepper. But that's mostly because of the labour division in our home. I plan meals and my husband prepares them. If he doesn't know what he has to do, the whole system kind of falls apart ;) It took us a lot of years to get here, mind you, but we found that we tend to indulge in way less healthy things/order way more take out if we aren't prepared ahead of time. And with no kids or pets, we don't really feel like we have an excuse for that ;)
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Cee
I am terrible at knowing what to do for dinner until the last minute so this is awesomE!
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