Sunday Night: The perfect time to cook for the week
By the middle of December i usually find myself in trouble - and by that i mean i never seem to be able to wake up in time to make a decent lunch (grabbing frozen bread and a tub of hummus really doesn’t cut it) and find that with everything going on with the holiday’s coming, i am either never home or home late enough that cooking doesn’t make sense.
It happens, we can all admit that there are times of the year when priorities have to be made, and sometimes things like getting groceries fall to the wayside. But there is only so long that you can put up with making meals out of things you find in your pantry and freezer.
It is for this very reason, that i make time each week to have a cooking day. Sunday night makes sense for me because it tends to be a day i am home early (even if there is a family function or holiday party, they tend to end earlier) so here’s what i did. Stop on the way home at a grocery store (if you are coming from a holiday party - don’t worry, you won’t be the only one in nice clothes) and buy a bunch of stuff (i bought brown rice, lentils, a pack of chicken breasts, carrots and cucumber). Why? you are going to cut up and cook up EVERYTHING so that during the week, there are no excuses for missing meals or taking a really pathetic lunch.
- carrots get peeled and turned into stick (good for snacking, and easy to chop for soup)
- lentils and rice get cooked, cooled, then put into containers (easily added to soup or made into a salad or even turned into a side dish)
- cucumber - the easiest snack/side dish there is, 5 second prep if that
- chicken - so easy to just cook a bunch, then put into the fridge (can make a sandwich, add to a soup, add to a stir fry or just eat on it’s own)
All in all it took me about 2 hours - but i had decent lunches, and fast throw together dinners every day for a week, even on days when i was home late and really tired.
It was an easy, more than cereal, no thinking, cooking for one food adventure!