There’s nothing worse than the sinking feeling you get when you realize you have nothing to eat for dinner. It can be a struggle to come up with dinner ideas to prepare at home. The easiest option is to eat out, but that affects your health if you do it too often.
With a bit of planning ahead of time, you can create delicious meals to enjoy throughout the week. Check out these 7 quick dinner ideas that you can prepare quickly at your house:
1. Meal Delivery Service
If you’re in need of a quick meal, meal delivery services can help you out during busy times. With a meal delivery service, you’ll only need to warm up the food. You won’t have to worry about shopping for ingredients or keeping ingredients fresh until you’re ready to cook. Meal delivery services are portioned to provide your body with exactly what it needs throughout the day.
You can give feedback to your meal plan delivery provider to get meals with flavours that you enjoy the most. Since meal delivery services are tailored to your tastes and your body, you’ll end up wasting less food over time.
2. Lentils & Rice
This is an extremely inexpensive meal anyone with any amount of cooking experience can make. A can of lentils can be as cheap as $0.99 cents and last you multiple days when eaten with rice. Lentils are extremely healthy and help promote healthy cholesterol levels. Lentils are also loaded with dietary fibre, which gives your body protection against diabetes and issues with your digestive system.
When making lentils and rice, all you need to do is cook the lentils in a bit of oil on the stove and season to your liking. The same seasoning you would use on meat are great for creating a tasty lentil dish. Once you season the lentils and cook to your liking, simply serve with rice for a quick, filling, and healthy dinner.
3. Stewing Beef & Potatoes
Another quick dinner idea is stewing beef and potatoes. Many people enjoy this dish since you can make it in a single pot within an hour. All you have to do is season the stewing beef to your liking and put it in the pot with some oil to get some colour on the outside. At this stage, you don’t need to fully cook the meat. Once the stewing beef has a nice crust, you can add soup stock and vegetables to the pot and let everything simmer on low.
Allow the meat to simmer for an hour. About 30 minutes in, you can add the potatoes. If you like your potatoes soft, you can and them even earlier. Stewing beef and potatoes is a dish that’s easy to make in large amounts within the same short cooking time. With this dish, you have the option to freeze leftovers for another day.
4. Eggs
Eggs are one of the healthiest foods you can eat and remain an underrated option for dinner. One of the best aspects of eggs is the many different ways you can cook them. If you want something more complex than a simple omelette or fried egg for dinner, you can make a quiche or try a homemade soufflé.
While soufflés may seem complicated, they are just a mixture of eggs and cheese that anyone can make into a satisfying dinner. Adding a poached egg to a bowl of soup or making an onion and potato frittata are other options you have to get eggs in your diet for dinner.
5. Shepherd’s Pie
Shepherd’s pie is another meal that’s quick to prepare, even for beginner cooks. Shepherd’s pie may look complicated when it’s finished, but it’s only two main ingredients mixed together. Simply cook the ground beef, season to your liking, and add frozen vegetables at the end. In another pot, boil your potatoes until they are soft enough to mash, then season with garlic, butter and other spices of your choice.
At this point, the shepherd’s pie is ready. If you want to be fancy, you can put the ground beef in a dish and layer the mashed potatoes on top. You can then put the dish in the oven for 15 minutes to get a nice golden layer on the potatoes.
6. Falafel Balls
Falafel balls are a quick, healthy, vegan option you can enjoy for dinner. Most grocery stores sell premade falafel balls in the frozen section. Cooking these falafel balls takes less than 20 minutes. You can serve the falafel with salad, hummus, garlic sauce, and hot sauce. For carbohydrates, you can eat the falafel with pita bread, rice, or a regular bun. Falafels are a quick and delicious option for people pressed for time.
7. Spaghetti & Meatballs
College students love this dish, thanks to its simplicity. All you need to do is cook ground beef, combine it with tomato sauce and serve with noodles. Making your own tomato sauce with tomato paste, crushed tomatoes, garlic, and other seasonings is easy and helps make this dish healthy. By making the ground beef yourself, you can control the amount of salt in the dish and create a quick, healthy dinner.
