What are your"too lazy to cook" recipe ?
I mean the one you do when you want something easy to do, but not when you're tired at the point you microwave a frozen-meal, or just cut down a piece of cheese and put it in a bread
I mean the one you do when you want something easy to do, but not when you're tired at the point you microwave a frozen-meal, or just cut down a piece of cheese and put it in a bread
I like to take those boxes of breakfast cereal they sell and I like to whip them up in a big bowl with some milk. I call it cereal with milk.
But what if you aren't feeling like soup?
Sometimes I add some sliced banana or strawberries, but that may be over the scope of this question.
Fake pizza: Make toast. Drizzle toast with a little bit of olive oil. Smear tomato paste on toast. Sprinkle with garlic powder and oregano. Top with a slice of provolone.
You just described one of the famous Catalan tapas Pan Con Tomate (maybe minus the cheese)
Damn, OP. Here you thought you were making shitty white trash pizza and all along you were making Catalan tapas Pan Con Tomate!
It's definitely popular here in Barcelona pan con tomate is a regular dish across Spain. It's especially hilarious when you get the little condiment container full of tomato & garlic and mini-olive oil bottle on renfe.
Yeah but the tomato pureé you guys make is way more delicious than the tomato paste that comes out of tubes this guy is referring to.
I feel like standard tomato paste must be cooked before eating. It’s so… tart? Tomatoey? Pastey?
Or be me as a kid
White bread Put ketchup on bread Put Kraft single on top Put in the oven under the broiler until the cheese melts and the edge of the bread crisps Eat it over the sink in order to not kill your mother by disrespecting the plates with that garbage Realize you’re still hungry and make 3 more
That was my teenage go to, except I used Ragu PizzaQuick because I was trashy.
Cook some rice in a rice cooker, top it with a runny sunny-side up egg, add some high quality soy sauce and a bit of butter. Sliced green onions if I'm feeling less lazy.
Egg and rice is the easy comfort food my husband learned from his grandmother. It's our too lazy to cook or shop dinner.
Looks like super easy and great, love the idea :)
Furikake to take it to the next level!
Add some peanut butter for some real gourmet shit
Pesto pasta.
Cook a packet of pasta and drain
Put in a bottle of pesto
Done.
Sprinkle goat or feta cheese on top and you're riding high
This, pesto is just too good.
This is my favorite too lazy to cook meal. I've eaten this regularly for like 20 years. I make it every few weeks. Great with ham or sausage and a bunch of sriracha.
Thin the pesto with a bit of pasta water if you want to elevate it without any extra work.
Ours is same but with bacon
I have an electric kettle, so instant ramen. I live near an asian grocery store, so I also have a ton of ramen varieties
Poaching an egg as you're cooking the ramen is probably my favorite life hack.
Sometimes I will fry some spam until it is a little crispy and add that too. Egg(s) + spam in spicy ramen is awesome. Favorite spicy noodles are nongshim shin noodles red.
Shin Ramyun black is a superior instant noodle IMO. Though personally I really like Samyang buldak hot chicken noodle.
I like to add a soft boiled egg and some sliced spring onion.
I love the black. Also a favorite.
Note that I said spicy noodles above. I think the red is still my favorite spicy noodle. Chicken bomb noodles are good but goddam spicy. I call the buldak chicken bomb...guess why...
I also do not like hard boiled eggs. Love medium boiled.
I think we agree about all this more than we disagree.
Yep, poaching an egg (or a couple) in the ramen as it's about to finish cooking is one of the ways I add eggs to instant ramen. Another is a technique similar to egg drop soup: stream pre-beaten eggs while stirring the ramen (also just about the ramen is done cooking).
But I default to adding soft-boiled eggs. I cook the thoroughly washed eggs in the same water I'd cook the ramen on. I take the eggs off (put them into cold water if necessary, or I can just take them a bit early and let the residual heat take it the rest of the way), then cook the noodles. While waiting for the noodles to cook, I peel the eggs and then put them back into the noodles just before serving.
If you have an Asian grocery nearby, try getting a package of salted duck eggs. They're boiled and packed in salt at the factory, so that the whole egg absorbs the saltiness trough the shell. They come individually vacuum sealed, so you can just cut it in half with a knife and scoop the egg out of the shell with a spoon, they're delicious in ramen.
That's a good one! One of my favorites is to order some hot and sour soup, and place cooked noodles in the cup
Absolutely, it's amazing how far you can stretch a good soup base. Hot and sour soup has a lot of flavor.
I’m too lazy for this. This means waiting for a pot of water to boil. I just pan fry one, shred it with the chopsticks, and call it a day.
Oh, to clarify - I'm talking about doing it in the same pot while the noodles cook.
Oooooh. Interesting! Gonna have to try that out.
I do it when my ramen has less than a minute left. It poached perfectly and makes the broth extra eggy/creamy.
peanut butter
Another option is adding canned chickpeas, they work with almost any ramen
Bake some frozen chicken nuggets, toss in buffalo sauce, cut up some iceberg lettuce and throw it all in a soft tortilla with ranch.
You can't just disrespect Germany like that...
Rice via rice cooker. Ground chicken cooked in a frying pan with preminced garlic and squeeze tub of ginger. Pinto beans from a can. Mix em all together in a bowl with shredded cheese.
Tofu scramble. I premake the spice mix, then open up a pack of tofu and crumble it into a preheated pan with oil, sprinkle over the spice mix, add black beans then pepper and sriracha (as well as a bit more of the spice mix), stir and heat it up a bit, then done. If I'm feeling less lazy, I'll add veggies and stuff, but it's honestly decent like this with the right spices. Here's what I use for my spice mix (this is for a full jar which will last between 10 to 20 meals depending on how heavily seasoned I'm feeling that month):
Boxed mac n cheese with tuna
I like the Pasta Roni angle hair pasta with tuna. Cooks in 5 minutes, throw the tuna in the last minute, delicious!
1 blue box Mac, finished + 1 ramen pack, finished = 'Hate Pot' cause you'll hate how much you like it.
Can be some dishes though, feeds two in a sitting, double to feed four, grab a fork and gather round the combination. Soul food for 90s latchkey kids
I did the most half-assed version of this for lunch the other day. Leftover half box of Kraft Mac, a can of tuna that was in the fridge, and a little tangy BBQ sauce, I think McD's brand. It was... passable. I think my stomach was okay with it. I'm still alive and not on the toilet.
A real cheat code here is when you truly can't find it in you to cook, have some easy heat and eat meal or something and then plan + prepare tomorrow's dinner.
Microwave burrito + take chicken out of the freezer for tomorrow
Crack open a tin of beans, smash them a bit with a fork. Salt, pepper, vinegar, and whatever seasoning blend is within reach. Put it on top of whatever carb I have (toast, tortilla, crackers) is my go-to.
If I don't have a tin of beans, I microwave some frozen peas to smash up.
Hummus also fits this niche but that's not something I keep on hand in the pantry, unlike beans.
My favourite no-cook meal is a slab of semi-firm tofu served cold on a bed of spinach, pour over some soy sauce, spring onion and furikake. But that requires fresh ingredients I don't always have on hand.
Instant noodles, with a handful of frozen corn, and a Nori sheet from the pantry ripped up in it. Tofu (or egg) if you can be bothered.
I'm on the hunt for a vegetarian alternative to a umami packed can of smoked Tuna. I miss smoked Tuna. (I'm allergic to nightshades and haven't found a allergy free fake fish on the market)
Another great lazy meal is hummus. process together a drained + rinsed can of chickpeas, a couple tablespoons of tahini, the juice of half a lemon, salt + spices, and however much water it takes to get the texture you like. Smear it on a plate, maybe add a puddle of olive oil with some herbs sprinkled over, and wipe it up with pita.
"Every Day Dal" from Curries Without Worries 1 cup split red lentils Tbl ghee or butter 1-2 dried red chilies Tbs tumeric Tbs cumin 1-3 Tbs salt (to taste) 1 Tbs each minced ginger and garlic 5 cups water
Put in large pot bring to boil simmer 35+/- min stir it you want
Feeds 6-8 people & nice w rice
... Thats just avg dal, hows that lazy?
It's a one pot meal with almost no steps - just dump the ingredients in and cook.
Open faced sandwiches (smørbrød/smørrebrød/smörgås) - slice of bread or toast, butter and some topping.
Very nearly as no-effort is boiling or frying an egg. Very nearly as no-effort as that is a scramble or omelette. Grilled cheese sandwich. Pasta with butter (sauce), garlic and/or chili oil. Baguette/sub/hoagie kind of thing as an upgrade on the sandwich - they sell "half-baked" ones that keep for a good while. Bacon and eggs, carbs optional.
A basic stir fry or meat-in-pan-sauce are still easy. Get whatever equipment makes your preferred foods (or healthy eating) easier.
Schnitte reporting in.
Interesting. What we would call "snitter" is larger quantities of open-faced sandwiches, as more of a catering thing that's traditional in some contexts. Usually with a few typical toppings like scramble/smoked salmon, roast beef and potato salad, prawns and mayo.
Schnitte (pl. Schnitten) is just (local) German for – also but not exclusively open faced – sandwiches.
Omelette. Ham and Cheese. Low carb and tasty.
I usually go with over medium eggs on toast.
Not low carb, but still tasty.
Make rice, throw minced meat in, done. It looks like dog food but it's pretty good.
Lazy Chicken
You might need to add boiling water while it's cooking, but after making it a couple times you'll know about how much water is needed from the start.
It's gonna be the most 7.5/10 dinner but it's like 5 min prep, it reheats fine, and you can walk away and shower or take a nap. You can wash the baking sheet tomorrow, who cares? It was the first 'recipe' I learned how to cook in college, and it's still my go-to lazy weekday recipe.
This is called a tray bake, and it's great. I recommend chucking some (chopped) vegetables in with it: tomatoes on the vine, carrots, broccoli, asparagus, Brussel sprouts, cauliflower, onion, garlic... Limitless possibilities.
You can also do this with salmon (gotta be a bit more careful with timing on that). Or bacon. Or do sweet potato, or pumpkin.
All of this is true, the chicken and potato is just the lazy version. Lots of different vegetables can be added to this but the cooking time gets tricky because a lot of stuff cooks at different rates.
Avocado oil is better for you than sunflower oil. It has a high smoke point too so is my oil of choice for heat. Olive oil for cold uses only.
I've never even seen avocado oil but olive oil is perfectly good for cooking, just don't fry anything in it.
I've smoked it too many times in a hot pan, not worth the risk. It's probably OK in baked dishes that don't get as hot as pan fried dishes.
Yeah like I said, it's no good for frying, but for baking it's fine, and it can be added to hot dishes late too.
Pasta and jarred sauce
If you're lazy but not in a rush, legume soup. Throw lentils, canned chopped tomatoes, frozen veg and some spices and maybe stock powder in a pot and wait. If you don't want to wait for lentils to cook, replace by canned beans. Easy, cheap, minimal cleanup (this is usually the part I'm too lazy for) and very reasonably healthy.
I started making soups recently starting from beef or vegetable stock in those boxes (tetrapack?). So damn quick and easy! I do not know why I didn't start doing it earlier.
I just go to bed when I am too lazy to cook!
I am severely malnutrition 😎😎😎
I wrote this when I had just woke up, this is a lot less funny than I remember
Did you have breakfast yet?
Yes. (Though this is the exception, not the rule)
I guess it's only funny to people who are also severely malnutrition. I found it absolutely hilarious and dangerously relatable
I wonder how good Annie's boiled in tomato soup would be - just add the cheese mix and milk to it towards the end.
That’s basically my grandma’s macaroni. She adds ground meat. It’s delicious in its own regard.
Whenever I make soup, I always make a lot. The extra soup goes into quart bags and goes in the freezer. So I have a soup library.
Rip open a bag of soup, toss it in a pan on medium low. Make some popcorn in the air popper.
Soup and popcorn with about a minute of work. The hardest part is picking out which soup I want.
Some of mines
Pasta with frozen veggie and curry sauce, like take a bag of frozen veggie, put in the pan, add coconut milk and curry powder
Pasta with eggs, That's the extreme on the too lazy to cook spectrum just crack an egg in the pasta, an improvement is to add some garlic and olive oil
Sub rice for pasta in the first recipe and you have a passable curry. Add bacon to the second and hello carbonara!
This is not lazy cooking! It’s just regular cooking when you messed up your shopping ;)
I call it lazy, because, it's the kind of stuff I could do in 10 minutes even late on the evening, and that it compete on efficiency with microwaving a frozen meal (Which I also do, when coming home late)
Noodles with sriracha, olive oil and nutritional yeast
Canned tuna mixed with rice, and omelette with cheese
Omelette du fromage
Add peanut butter for some real gourmet shit
...to which dish? Neither sounds appetizing lol
Cook white rice in a rice cooker but instead of water, use a canned soup. Flavor of the soup gets into the rice. A few minutes of prep and walk away.
A friend use that one with instant soup and couscous during multi-day hike, he calls it awful but efficient
As an engineer, this warms my heart (and the resulting soup/rice mixture warms my tummy).
Chicken chickpea curry.
Canned chickpeas, whatever chicken you have on hand, canned diced tomatoes, curry powder, onion, coconut milk, lemon juice. Served over rice.
Too much effort. That's already non lazy cooking in full force.
Opening cans and throwing a bunch of stuff in a pot and turning on the stove is too much effort?
He shoots it down if it doesn’t start with “Have your robot slave …”
Cooking?!
When I'm specifically being too lazy to?
I don't even cook for myself on the good days.
I boil half a cup of rice, add 3tbsp of peanut butter and about 100ml sweet chili sauce, and I mix it evenly. Bish bash bosh.
I do the same, but the meal did not have a name. Until today, it's called "Bishbashbosh" now. I had to use google to translate to understand what it means, I am from Germany.
Haha, it's an expression that means "just like that".
Sliced mozzarella (or whatever) cheese in a bowl, and some sandwich meat. Served cold.
In a bowl? Do you eat it with a spoon like soup?
For me, this would be finger food.
It is finger food. I just find the bowl smaller and more convenient than a plate.
Throw rice, soy sauce, oyster sauce, onion, potato, chorizo, frozen peas, some spices and water into a rice cooker. Hit go, take 40 min nap, eat.
A bowl of hot instant ramen with a poached egg is my go-to. Very simple, takes at most 10 minutes, and tastes really good too.
I'll add to this a pan seared pork tenderloin that's finished in the oven...super simple and adds a top notch addition to ramen...also grab some sprig onions and dice some up toss on top as well.
Tin of (Aldi) chicken curry, add some frozen peas and spinach and fresh chopped (with a scissors) chillies. Better - in my opinion - than some take away and all chain pubs’ offerings. Five minutes maximum from cupboard and freezer to my mouth.
Savory oats. Put oats, milk, butter and whatever you fancy in a pan. Done.
spaghetti ala bolognese is my lazy to cook recipe or chicken paprikás (or rather it's less sour creamy version which is called pörkölt). if I make it from chicken, it's done pretty quickly
or, chili con carne. it's also in the super easy and quick category
bolognese a lazy recipe? takes me like 3 hours sheesh
it is, at max 35-45 mins.
obviously I don't make it authentic so calling it actually bolognese is a bit further stretch I allowed myself than should have 😅
I use dry noodles from the store, prechopped meat, boxed/canned tomato sauce, dried spices... only thing that needs actual prep work is some onions.
Smoked salmon and cherry tomatoes
Oatmeal made with milk. Stir in peanut butter when it is hot and ground cinnamon. Filling.
Spiced fried chicken breast, steamed veggies and carb of choice: mac and cheese, mashed potatoes, scalloped potatoes, or wheat bread.
"Stir fry": Fry meat of choice in a frying pan, add spices and vegetables of choice. Eat with rice or on/with wheat bread. 1 frying pan with meat and vegetables add carb to that.
Grill meat and vegetables of choice. Add carb on the side.
*Swap some butter for oil if preferred
Throw in a handful of shredded Parmesan and this is a dinner my kids will pretty much always eat.
Add some peas and bacon and that is a dinner I will pretty much always eat.
Upvote for butter. Good butter. Winner dinner.
Italian sausage, penne pasta, and marinara. Beyond easy...not particularly healthy.
Don't have any, too lazy...
My family's spaghetti and meat sauce recipe. 5 ingredients:
Water, salt, pasta;
ground beef, tomato sauce (from a jar if fancy, but canned is great)
Serve together.
(Of course there are details like how much of stuff, but that's the jist of it)
Rice cooker, after it's halfway, throw in an egg or two, leftover meat, can of beans, soup, or chili, whatever's available. It's nourishing and always tastes good.
Kraft Mac and cheese with sausage cut up in it.
I have a small rice cooker perfect for 1-2 portions. Aldi sells asian-style pan-fry veggie mixes including spices and all in large bags, frozen. They also sell veggie balls for frying, frozen.
Between those three + some spices + soy sauce, I can always create something nice with just a small pan, plus with the rice cooker timing is unimportant. Takes about 10 minutes max, most of which is standing next to the pan waiting for something to fry. Stacks nicely in a bowl, looks fancy, takes 0 effort, and I can customize the taste with the array of spices I always keep at home nowadays.
Nutella on toast. Ruin your life and food like me
Probably something from The Sad Bastard Cookbook. It's a free book with lots of easy meals and good advice.
https://traumbooks.itch.io/the-sad-bastard-cookbook
How fantastic is this? I personally love cooking so it's something I actually do to curb depression, but I know many people who could use this book. Even if just as a symbol of solidarity. Thanks for sharing!
Caprese salad
Buy a tomato. Slice it. Buy presliced mozarella Alternate tomato and mozarella on a plate. Put basil on top. Drizzle either balsamic vinagrette or salt and olive oil.
Delicous and super easy.
Also sometimes I make a quick melt on the waffle press, season with garlic powder and shredded parmeson, and dip in salsa. Fantastic and super easy.
Nice classical on, also, even in lazy mode, I feel like I am able to slice a mozarella ball, thanks
Dump everything into crockpot, come back after work and enjoy shredded chicken tacos / nachos / burritos.
Salmon and asparagus.
Fried eggs with sliced tomato
Uber Eats
okay so you're rich, way to flex on us
Rice, sardines, kimchi, avocado, soy sauce, sesame oil.
1 pound of breakfast sausage. I pull it apart with my fingers to make interestingly-differently-sized chunks. Fry, then eat. Good with syrup.
Biscuits and gravy is my lazy but I don't want eggs or cereal breakfast (I make it once or twice a month). For the gravy:
Add 1 lbs breakfast sausage to pot, add salt, pepper, sage, red pepper flakes, and fennel seeds (last three are optional, but highly recommend). Break up sausage and stir while cooking over medium/medium-high heat
Once sausage is browned, try a piece and see if it needs more seasoning
Add 1/4 cup all purpose flour and stir until it's thickened and there's no white flour left, about 1-2 minutes (congrats, you have officially made a roux around your sausage!)
Stir in 2 1/2 cups milk (I prefer whole milk), stir often until it's thickened. Turn off the heat before it's the thickness you want, it will thicken as it comes out of the pot and cools on whatever you put it on. If it's too thick (aka if the thickness looks like it would be perfect on your food while still in the pot) just add more milk and stir in. If you add too much milk, just bring it back to a simmer until it reduces to an appropriate amount.
Add salt and pepper to taste, mix in, then serve.
I added more details than needed, it's honestly a super easy and tasty recipe, plus the most expensive part is the sausage. It makes enough gravy for 2-3 people, 3-4 if you don't each each a lot of the gravy which is... difficult.
For biscuits, I recommend Alton Browns buttermilk biscuits: https://altonbrown.com/recipes/southern-buttermilk-biscuits/
I personally make my own buttermilk substitute (1 tbsp lemon juice per 1 cup milk) and use butter instead of lard and they still come out fluffy and excellent. Also, the tip about putting them in a bowl lined with them covered by a kitchen towel makes a world of difference. It is well worth dirtying a cloth and bowl over letting them sit on a baking or cooling tray.
I should specify that I love cooking, this is low effort in my opinion since the gravy really can't be messed up unless you leave it and burn it, the biscuits are more effort but I bake a decent amount so I don't mind. Store bought biscuits from a tube work fine too if you aren't a morning person or don't like baking.
I think I just won at lazy bro
Slow cooker stuff if I'm lazy but thinking ahead a bit. Just throw shit in a pot and turn it on. I tend to get big lumps of meat rather than steaks or whatever, so the slow cooker has the added benefit of me not needing to do much cutting. I just do a few big chunks and it'll be so tender by the time it's ready it'll fall apart. Takes longer to put it away in containers than to prep it, then I'm done cooking for a week lol
Spaghetti bolognese is a regular if I need something soon. Little more work, but it's extremely quick and doesn't require being in the kitchen for the whole thing. Still makes a ton of meals that keep and reheat nicely.
Roasts are nice if I'm sort of having to impress someone but I'm lazy. You just throw shit in the oven and wait. Occasionally come back to throw in something that has a shorter cook time than the meat. Might be heresy but I've never really been keen on the leftovers of a roast though, so one cook is usually only one meal and maybe a sandwich the next day instead of several.
Boil some frozen veg - add an egg if you’re feeling fancy. Throw some instant noodles in when the veg and egg is cooked. Strain. Season to your liking.
This isn't what you're really asking, but I have a bunch of stuff in the freezer that I can pull out when I'm sick, don't have enough time to prepare a meal or am just exhausted from whatever.
Making lasagne? Make 4, freeze 3. Mex night? I make 20 black bean burritoes at a time. Check out https://onceamonthmeals.com/ for inspiration. Less cooking, less dishes and less food waste. Go pro and pick up a food saver. I make 8 cups of rice and freeze it in a pint food saver bag. It's winter where I live and I have "soup bags" in the freezer so I can take out veggies that were at their peak when they were frozen and put it in a crock pot so I can have summer fresh soup.
Lemon pepper chicken, take chicken breast, slap it in a pan, fill the pan with lemon juice, So that the chicken is effectively soaking in it while it cooks, put copious amounts of lemon pepper seasoning on the top of the chicken breast, Wait until fully cooked. It's absolutely delicious!
Carbonara.
Cook some chopped up bacon until crispy. Boil some pasta until cooked. Dump half cup of pasta water into bacon, mix. Mix 3 eggs with a half cup of parmesan, drip in a few tablespoons of pasta water while mixing. Turn off stove, dump pasta into bacon, mix for a few minutes, dump egg and parmesan in, mix vigorously. Eat with a big chunk of crusty bread. Should take 20 minutes from turning on the stove to eating.
How is this not just regular cooking?
It is. What constitutes "cooking" for the purposes of "what can I be assed doing" is a tricky question, though. Carbonara is arguably a simple recipe, but I wouldn't say it's necessarily low effort...
If your idea of "cooking" is just throwing a bunch of stuff together in a frying pan, then yeah I guess this is cooking. My idea of cooking involves more technique than just stirring a few things.
If you want dead simple, boil some pasta, drain, dump in a can of Catelli meat sauce, stir, serve. I did this a lot in college.
If you want dead dead simple, dump bag of Green Giant Garlic Pasta into pan, cook until warm, serve.
How low effort does it have to be? I thought 5 steps was low effort. Even if this is a huge effort for you because you've never done it before, do it once or twice and you'll want to do this from now on before reaching for the blue box.
Because regular cooking is a lot more involved than just sitting back and watching bacon and pasta cook. Seriously, I don't do anything for most of the 20 minutes.
I mean, there's chopping, mixing... Hell, even some vigorous mixing!
Most of these comments say to boil pasta. The majority of the effort is just mixing stuff. I don't even measure anything...I just go with what my heart tells me. At most, it's 5 minutes effort and 15 minutes waiting.
I knew if I said carbonara people wouldn't believe me but it's true. Bonus points if you chop the bacon with scissors instead of using a cutting board. It's very very easy and people think it's magic because you're "making your own sauce". It's as easy as any of the other one ingredient pasta suggestions, and only slightly harder than the instant ramen suggestions.
Keep on bacon'on.
An even lazier option is just to buy pre-cubed pancetta. I keep it in the freezer, then just dump it in frozen. But most people buy bacon more than they buy pancetta.
Not sure they keep that in stock around here but given the scissor method, it's really a non issue. I do that with adding bacon to Mac and Cheese too, along with a frozen veg (like green beans) for minimal effort and cleaning. If anyone ever gives me trouble I tell them it's the Korean BBQ way.
Khai Jiao
It sounds super fancy and foreign, but it's really just a simple omelette with some fish sauce thrown in. You can get fancy with cornstarch to make it a little crispy, but I ain't got time for that.
Instructions:
It's done when there's no more liquid on top. Eat with rice (can microwave some precooked rice).
Total time: 5-10 min. Try it even if you don't like fish sauce.
Not sure if this would count, but here it is:
Boil water amount on the box in the electric kettle. Drain canned chicken. (Some brands need to be rinsed because of the amount of salt in the broth they're canned in.) Add stuffing, butter (amount according to the box) and chicken into a bowl. Stir to incorporate. Add boiling water, stir again, and cover for 5 minutes. Fluff and serve.
I suggest using the low sodium version as there will be a lot of salt between the box of stuffing and canned chicken. Can also use leftover cooked chicken.
Oh damn, I’ve been wondering why to do with my extra box of stuffing.
I’m gonna try this this week. Sounds tasty.
Boil pasta. Drain. Add whole can of canned tomatoes to pot (fire roasted or Italian seasoning versions optional)
While you cook up some boxed mac and cheese on the stove, cut up some broccoli and onions or whatever appropriate veggies you have lying around, and open a can of tuna (any kind of cooked protein is fine, so fry and shred some chicken breast or ground beef if you're feeling ambitious.) When that's done, mix it together in a casserole dish, throw some cheese on top and chuck it in the oven until it turns a bit brown.
I don't even go that far. A can of chicken and some frozen peas (heated in some water in the microwave then drained) go into the final mix. Eat it from the pan or a plate if you're feeling fancy.
Pasta with a glass of pesto
Call me crazy, but I’ve never liked store bought pesto
You're crazy.
There are good ones out there. Barilla has some for example.
But you're right most of them are just oil with salt and cheese
Indomie! It's not instant ramen soup, exactly.
You cook the noodles, drain them, then mix the flavor packets in. I prefer using half the salt powder package.
They are the pretty much the best instant noodle, and available in the West too. Seriously, go try them sometime!
If I'm too lazy to cook, I open a can of fish and wash a pile of cucumbers to eat as side dishes with the Indomie.
Hard boiled eggs
Porkchop and potato cut into wedgies tossed in the toaster oven then some raw broccoli for pooping power later
5-min ravioli.
Mine is probably oatmeal.
Put half a cup of instant oatmeal, some nuts, peanut butter and a banana in the blender and pour some milk.
I usually put in the refrigerator and eat it in the morning.
For sweetening You can also use dates or maple syrup instead of sugar.
One of these 2:
or
Mixed with one of these 3:
or
or
Roasted peppers and pesto pasta with sun-dried tomatoes.
Pretty much all of them. I've made it a project to feed myself with just nonperishables given like 30 minutes of cooking a night, and I'm about 75% of the way there, I'd say. Salad greens and eggs seem to be impossible to replace, but I can realistically have my own chicken coop and a little growing area indoors. Canadian food prices and qualities are fucked, yo, especially away from big centers.
Last night, I had stierum with a simple salad. It's a bit like a single, big savoury pancake, and you eat it cut into cubes. The dressing is cream (the one rule-breaking element, for now), a dash of vinegar, and salt and pepper to taste. I like to let it soak into the bread a bit
On nights I really DGAF, my go-tos are pasta with jarred sauce, or shakshuka. You can get shakshuka sauce in a jar now, so you just empty it into a frying pan, crack four eggs in, and cover until they're cooked. Serve with toast, which you can butter with vegetable oil or ghee.
You can make a vegetarian pulled pork with canned green jackfruit, an onion, bottled barbecue sauce, buns and jarred red cabbage and apple in place of the coleslaw. You pretty much pull apart the jackfruit, and add it with the sauce to sauteed onions. It's delicious, all three components are slightly sweet and they go together well.
I'll stop there, unless somebody is actually interested, but I've got a few more.
Sometimes I bulk out my shakshuka with another great pantry staple - lentils. And a little more involved for this thread but mujadara is another great dish that's primarily pantry ingredients plus onions. But I almost always have onions on hand and they keep so I give them a pass
Onions could also be pressure canned, if the world is ending. They keep well enough they're not usually an issue for me, though, unlike literally all other produce except common tubers and maybe cabbages.
Lentils in shakshuka is a neat idea! I'll have to try that if I ever have to feed more than two with it. Do you use canned or dried? Funny enough, I have tried to make mujadara, although I don't think I "nailed it", and found it kind of bland. Any tips on seasoning?
Have you tried powdered eggs?
No, actually. I guess somebody still makes them? I heard they went out of fashion because they were really bad, but I'd give it a try for the sake of completeness.
I've had chickens before and enjoyed the little bastards, so that's actually not a downside for me.
I love chickens, they're just not non-perishable! :)
I guess not, in the shelf storage sense. Lettuce growing in a pot isn't either that way. You don't have to ship in anything nonperishable to keep them going, though, which for the purposes of dealing with a fucked supply chain (my situation) is good enough.
Carbonara. It's ridiculously easy and very tasty.
Bruh lmao. Carbonara requires cooking bacon/guanciale/whatever cured pork product, boiling noodles, grating cheese, making a sauce that can break pretty easily if you're not careful... You're looking at at least two pots, a knife, a greater, a strainer, and a serving bowl at minimum to clean afterwards. How is that a lazy recipe?
Here's how I do it:
In total I'd say 25 mins of prep + cooking. Dishes to wash: a pan(with just pasta water, pretty easy to wash) a skillet, one grater, a bowl and a fork you used to whisk the eggs. And I guess the plates and cutlery you use to eat.
Lazy enough to not make a crap tonne of things, but not lazy enough that I just microwave some ready-made meal. Imo, it fits the question.
Lol yeah I know how to make carbonara. It requires at least 25 minutes of active cooking. There are no steps where you can set and forget something. You have to be near the stove the entire time it's being made.
It's a relatively quick recipe, sure, but I definitely wouldn't classify it as lazy.
Fair enough. I would, I find that if I want to make a dish, it's probably gonna take over 40 mins, so 25 mins is pretty quick, and doesn't take much effort.
Black pepper "if you'd like"... in Carbonara? Do we know what the "carbon" in carbonara is not so subtlety hinting at?
Also, your instructions are misleading at the "throw the pasta" step. You need to take the pan off heat before you add the egg and cheese and a add little of that pasta water should in pan before egg/cheese as well - otherwise you're making scrambled egg pasta with oily separated cheese clumps instead of a creamy carbonara.
Thanks for the additions.
Instant oats + milk powder+ peanut butter+ hot water+ mix tf outta it + add some fruits as garnish if you have any to feel royal :P
A good nutritious meal
If you want to be just a little less lazy, you can throw a handful of raw pecans on top of the brussles sprouts to roast about 18-20 minutes before that hour is up.
Why is this downvoted? It's a long list literally just because of writing style, if that's the issue. I guess an hour is a little on the long side, but lots of people are throwing out slowcooker recipes.
Roast brussels sprouts and sausage in an oven, with certain spices. Come back when it's done. Better?
I know, right? Maybe if I ever create a social media platform, I'll require people to write a short explanation why every time they downvote. Lol.
The "MAGA temperature units" comment was tongue-in-cheek and making fun of Americans like me for using the cockamamie Fahrenheit system, I promise.
Meatballs and spaghetti :)
Rice, salsa, cheese, sour cream, wing it from there with seasonings and proteins like beans or meat.
Tuna salad sandwich
Tuna, celery, onion, mayo, dry dill, garlic powder, pickles if you want in a bowl and mix. Spread on toast and that's it. Has plenty of protein and will keep you full.
Next is ramen.
Boil water to cook ramen noodles
Stir fry some onion, scallion whites, other hard veggies and garlic, once tender add some soy sauce, broth and some bouillon powder, and soft or leafy veg and the scallion greens.
Let that cook and add noodles and a light drizzle of sesame oil
Chicken Teriyaki. I often have left over grilled chicken breast or thighs so the hard part is already done. I just throw the chicken into a skillet along with some broccoli, pour in store bought teriyaki sauce and serve it on a bowl of rice.
Is the broccoli already cooked? Or are you just heating it up to absorb the sauce?
No, not cooked. More specifically, I throw them in first with a bit of oil to roast them a little before adding the chicken and sauce.
How long does that take? Are you using high heat?
Not long, 5-7 minutes, medium heat. Cook the broccoli for a minute or two until it browns on one side (I cut florets in half so it has a flat side), add in chicken and sauce and cook until they're hot.
Thanks! I’ll try to make it over the holidays.
Sourdough pancakes. Just put some oil in the pan, pour your starter, and add some spices.
Put 3 frozen chicken breasts in the instant pot, add 1 cup chicken stock, sachet of taco seasoning, half a cup of salsa, and a tin of kidney beans, pressure cook for 17 mins, break up the chicken and mix back in, serve with sour cream and grated cheese. Amazing.
Ravioli or tortellini.
Grab them in the premade packages dried or "fresh."
Boil them, drain them, dump the sauce in.
I'll never get tired of pasta.
Leftovers. Honestly, I cook like two times a week. Throw most of it in the fridge, some of it in the freezer, and grab a collection of whatever and microwave, air fry, or convention oven it. Even better is if the "cooking" is smoking or crock pot. You know, throw it in, check every few hours, kind of deals.
Otherwise, I'll just eat ingredients and pretend it's a charcuterie.
The other is sandwiches and eggs. Make bacon, use bread or eggs to clean up grease, throw some meat or cheese on it, season with bull shit (whatever premixed seasoning sounds good). I like mayo and balsamic on my sandwiches too. That's my easier than eating out and actually worth eating stuff.
Steam cooked carbonara from instant ramen, cheese and bacon
1lb ground beef 2 cans sweet corn 2 cans of kidney beans Two cans diced tomatoes 1 can tomato paste Taco seasoning (I buy McCormicks from Costco so I have no idea how many packets)
In a large pot brown the beef Once browned open all cans and put them in the pot, juice and all Heat to simmer and add taco seasoning with your heart
Serve with a dollop of sour cream and/or some shredded cheese on top
Taco soup
Usually I cross the street for some Mexican food! Cheap and magnificent!
Cassava flakes mixed with milk and sweetener
Canned fish + rice + potatoes + maybe some vegetables + water + maybe some spices. Put on heat, return after some time, get a soup.
If there's no canned fish, pour in some sunflower oil, etc. Every part is variable.
Depending on the amount of rice and water, this may not be a soup in the end.
If there is leftover rice in the rice cooker, a fried egg, chili paste and pork fu on that rice is great. Avocado on there is good too. Chili paste on rice if you don't want to make an egg.
A piece of cheese and an apple is good. Apple and peanut butter good. Cheese and crackers good.
I think your best bet, though, is to cook and save a portion you can pop in the microwave when you don't want to cook. And keep something like hummus on hand, healthy and easy. Seasoned canned beans.
What's the deal with left over rice in the rice cooker? You just make a full pot and leave it in there for days?
Hopefully not what they mean, rice needs to be chilled fairly quickly after it's done - even then, you don't want to keep it for long. There's a specific bacterium B. cereus that thrives on rice and can be really nasty.
I cover it with a damp paper towel and yes it lasts a couple of days like that.
Please stop doing this. Food poisoning from rice can potentially kill you.
ETA: The recipe you suggested sounds crazy good, though.
Some rice cookers have a "keep warm" option, which might be what they're using
Warm is arguably even worse. Heat kills microbes, but all the reactions driving their growth tend to accelerate when it's warmer. Rice can harbor some nasty pathogens so it's important to chill and refrigerate it ASAP
The "keep warm" function on a typical rice cooker isn't 100° warm, it's a food safe temperature like 140+.
As long as the cooker is working properly, it's fine to eat hours later. I wouldn't go overnight or anything.
Why wouldn't 100° be food safe? Is it because that would only kill stuff in water when it boils, but solids won't boil?
If any dangerous pathogens are kept out or killed, I guess more power to the you? However, I'm just thinking: "Why not make fried rice out of that?" Heck, you'd just need some oil and garlic and letting that day-old rice cool and dry out a bit.
Fry the egg first, then using the same oil the egg is fried in, then once the garlic is almost golden brown, take it off the oil and add the rice. Let the rice heat up and then add the chili paste, the garlic, the pork fu and/or whatever else you might have on hand you fancy adding. Season to taste and cook to desired "doneness". Some like it cooked to the point of the rice gaining that scorched and crunchy layer.
And that's just basing off your recipe. A lot of dinner left-overs can be added to next day's fried rice, and it's just basically a way of dealing with left-overs (and rice) and cooking a one-dish meal out of it..
I was just basing it on "too lazy to cook". I will note egg fried IN chili paste & oil is ridiculously good too. But haven't really worried about rice kept out, it has a keep warm button on the rice cooker? It's only for a day usually, have a family so it gets eaten.
Oh, yeah, I hear you! My go-to for those "I feel too lazy to cook something substantial" would be ramen because fried rice can actually be pretty hard work, lol!
Also, thanks for the tip about fried eggs. We usually don't add much to our fried eggs here, just a bit of salt and a bit of all-purpose seasoning if we're feeling fancy. Otherwise, it'd be an omelette with onions and tomatoes and all that and it's already become a dish of its own.
Breaded chicken tenders with spaghetti and jarred sauce or pesto.
Pre-portioned chicken pieces in one drawer of the air fryer, tater tots in the other. Slice up tomato and carrots to go with them. Nothing left to do except wrap the bones after so the cats can't get them, but that's a future-me problem.
Does "whatever is on the Hamburger Helper box" count?
Oh I have a lot of recipes like this, all pasta based because it takes just 10 minutes to boil the noodles.
Cream or tomato based sauce - Microwave meatballs that are fully-cooked out of the pack for 3 minutes. Toss in the pan with onions and garlic, pour bottled sauce, mix in noodles.
Pasta limone with shrimp - Generously salt water for boiling noodles. Fry a pack of fully-cooked shrimp with butter, garlic, onions, and lemon pepper. Mix in noodles. Add a couple of spoons of salted pasta water. Squeeze half a lemon. Sprinkle a good amount of parmesan.
Peanut pasta - Dilute 2 tablespoons of creamy peanut butter in the pan with water until you get a saucy consistency. Add 2 tablespoons of soy sauce and sesame oil. Add a couple of spoons of salted pasta water. Mix in noodles.
My too-lazy-to-cook recipes still involve some cooking. One has me cut up some chicken thighs, add a load of spices, and throw em in a frying pan. Stir occasionally. Then stick em on some tortillas with shredded lettuce, garlic sauce, salsa, sriracha and grated cheese.
Alternatively, fry some diced bacon while heating up a pot of water for spaghetti. When the bacon's good, remove & discard about half the rendered fat. Next, beat an egg and grate in some Parmigiano Reggiano* cheese. When the pasta water is good, cook some spaghetti. When the spaghetti is done, take it out of the pasta water with some tongs and throw it straight into the pan with bacon. Then add the egg mixture and start stirring immediately, the egg mixture cooks from the heat still in the spaghetti. Add cheese and a little bit of pasta water to taste.
* more generic parmesan will do, though the best texture is reached with freshly grated cheese. I have access to Parmigiano Reggiano at a price that won't break the bank for me though, so the real Italian deal it is for me.
In a saucepan caramelize some onions (or at least until translucent), then add a package of ground beef and heat until cooked through (optionally spice) then throw some cheese (ideally a provolone or other neutral cheese) on top until it's melted... shovel all that into a baguette and enjoy a munkwich.
I know you clarified that they can just be to translucent, but it's hilarious to me that the first step to a lazy meal is to spend 45 minutes caramelizing onions.
Or add a pinch of baking soda and get it in ten minutes. Still not lazy but faster. Maybe use an air fryer?
Caramelization is a specific chemical change to the sugars in the onions. Brown =/= Caramelized and will affect the flavor significantly so you really shouldn't cut corners.
If I'm commiting the time to do it I just make sure to make as much as I can fit in my pot.
Laziness, for me at least, is about effort more than time - caramelizing onions (once you're familiar with the process) can be done on autopilot in fifteen minutes or less. But for the above recipe, five minutes should be plenty.
But true caramelization on onions is still like 45-60 minutes of constant attention. It's not difficult, but it does require a lot of time and effort. You're not getting a caramelization in 15 minutes without a pressure cooker and even then they taste like nothing so what's the point?
Oh, sure, but 90% for a fraction of the time is a great trade for a lazy meal.
I do this but with fondue meat (the thin slices). Baguette is great, excellent in subway type bread too. Mayonnaise is excellent with it.
If you like fondue meat but want it cheaper, then you should check out Korean butchers - they'll usually sell meat pre-sliced for bulgogi-ing.
Unfortunately kind of limited on options for Korean butchers, living in the middle of corn fields, but I make a trip down to the Asian market an hour away once in a while to grab all that stuff. Will check on that!
Water + rice + frozen mixed vegetables + plant-based protein source (beans, frozen faux chicken, TVP chunks, etc) + seasoning.
Throw it in a pressure cooker and you're done. Maybe 30 seconds of effort for a healthy, hearty, inexpensive meal
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Grilled veggies, crispy garbanzo, some Greek yogurt and zaatar. Super quick and easy.
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It's butter chicken for me and my gf
A'ight, you're gonna have to actually give the details on how this is done if this is your "Too lazy to cook" recipe
I make butter chicken from sometimes but if I'm doing a "too lazy to cook" version it's with jarred sauce and leftover rotisserie chicken.
Cut chicken and cook it in a pan. Rice cooker. Dump the sauce in.
Usually either a lazy pasta dinner with jarred sauce, frozen broccoli, and vegan sausage, or I'll air fry some soy curls and make my husband make a dipping sauce for them
I'm gonna respond to yours with mine because I like yours, and mine is also vegan!
I make chickpea salad a lot lately: take a can of chickpeas, dump it in the medium size Pyrex, take a potato masher, smush smush, add mayo, mustard or mustard powder, and a solid sprinkling of salt. Then add any more extras depending how I'm feeling, maybe pickles, pickle juice, a splash of white vinegar, nutritional yeast, crushed red pepper flakes, bell peppers, celery.. many many options!
That sounds tasty, I'll have to try that!
I make a no knead pizza which is incredibly easy. It takes me about 15-20 minutes to prepare the dough in the morning. Just mix it in a bowl, cover it and let proof all day.
About an hour before you plan to eat, flatten the dough onto a baking sheet and let proof again. Once you're ready to eat, just put sauce and toppings of your choice, cook at the highest heat setting on your oven. Should be ready in about 10-15 min.
Best pizza I've ever had. Doesn't compare to the local pizza shops. A lot less greasy also.
Sounds like a lot of work and planning ahead for being "too lazy to cook".
I spend on average an hour cooking then another hour doing dishes/clean-up almost every night of the week. Taking 15-20 minutes twice in a day then only having to clean basically a pan and bowl is definitely too lazy to cook for me.