Foodie Friday - Shortcuts!

A couple of weeks ago, I was reading a blog post by a girl that was looking for dinner shortcuts because her life is CRAZY busy!  This is something I definitely know about, as I am sure most of you do.  My typical day goes a little something like this:
5:00 a.m. - wake up, get dressed and work out
6:00 a.m. - shower, iron, breakfast
7:15 a.m. - 5:30 p.m. - Drive to work, work, drive from work (I have a 30 minute commute!)
5:30 p.m. - 6:15 p.m. - Clean, Barefoot Belle work, walk Outlaw (one or a combination of the above)
6:15 p.m. - Cook dinner (30-40 minutes) then J gets home and we eat
7:30 p.m. - Clean up dinner, continue with neccessary chores not completed earlier
9:00 p.m. - IN THE BED and hopefully asleep.  I know, I'm such a dork for going to bed so early.  But really, I need my sleep!

So, when it comes to cooking, which I really, really LOVE to do, I've developed my own little system of shortcuts that I would love to share.  I hope this helps some of you guys.  What are your tips for helping with dinner during the week? 

1.  Plan ahead - For me, this is the single most important factor in saving time.  I am a planner and nothing gets me more flustered that not having at least some sort of idea of what I will make for dinner.  Before you go to grocery store each week (or two weeks), decide what meals you want to prepare for the week.  You'll always have waht you need and might even save a little money and defintiely time by not having to go back and forth to store during the week.

2. Cook in bulk - When you're browning meat, do double.  Or when you're boiling chicken, cook double or tripple the ammount you need. It takes hardly any extra time to do this and will help you later in the week on a night when you don't have much time. Usually, I do this on Saturday or Sunday when I have some extra time.  I divide it up into portions and put what I need for the week in the fridge and put the rest in the freezer for later. 

3.  Find recipes that can pull double duty- For example, one of my favorite recipes like this is Sloppy Joes and Shepherd's Pie.  Once I've made the sloppy joes, I barely have to do anything the next night for shepherd's pie.  There are a lot of cookbooks that can help with this.  Better Homes & Gardens Cookbook has some of these and Robin Miller also has a lot of recipes like this. You can even do a google search on double duty dinners and find some good help!

4.  Your freezer is your friend - When you have time, make a double and freeze for later.  I do this a lot when I make chicken spaghetti or chicken tetrazini and when I make spaghetti sauce.  There's also a great cookbook called Super Suppers that's full of recipes that you can freeze and the author tells you at what step you can freeze things.  This has been a great help to me. 

5.  The deli is your friend - Grab a rotisserie chicken and cut it up!  One of thsoe babies can feed us for 2-3 meals.  If you know you won't have much time that week, sometimes the deli will have great sides. And don't forget about prepackaged salads.  They are fab!

6.  Always have a backup - When a recipe fails (aka the oven catches fire...I was not prepared here!) or you just do not feel like cooking at all, you always need a back up!  When you're at the grocery store, pick up some frozen or quick-prep meals.  Some of our favorites are frozen pizza (of course!), Stouffer's Easy Express Skillets Garlic Chicken and Grilled Chicken & Vegetables.  I also really like Macaroni Grill's Chicken Alfredo.  It takes a little work because you have to supply the chicken and a few other ingredients, but it's REALLY good and quick.


Those are my tips.  I hope they help you as much as they do me!