Save Time With Double Meals

I often rack my brain trying to figure out how to get a nice, warm, home cooked meal on the table every night. With my hectic schedule it is a tremendous challenge.

Several years ago I discovered Rachel Ray and the 30 minute meal. At the time it was a life saver. I really learned how to take the slow cooked meal and make it fast. But now that 30 minutes doesn't seem to be fast enough. I am now on a mission to take the 30 minute meal down to 10-15 minutes.

So that is my challenge. I realized that in order to do that I would really have to plan my meals for the week no later than the weekend prior to my week. I did that this weekend. To give an example, I planned to have one day (Tuesday) as a meal of pork chops, applesauce and broccoli. I also planned to have another day (Saturday) as a meal of Pork Stir Fry with Vegetables. So instead of cooking my pork on two different days, I simply doubled up the number of chops I made on Tuesday and put the extra batch in a ziploc baggie in the freezer for use on Saturday. This will mean that I will have saved a tremendous amount of prep time on Saturday and will still have a fresh and tasty meal.

I did the same thing with my BBQ chicken meal that I planned for tonight. Last Saturday I cooked Italian coated chicken in the oven. I doubled up on the breasts where half of the breasts were cooked with a BBQ sauce coating and the other half were cooked with an Italian breadcrumb coating.

I just think that the doubling idea is a good one and really helpful. Twice the meals in the same amount of time. It really does work. Now I just have to get creative and start thinking of more ways I can double up meals. Any suggestions? Email me or leave a comment. I would love to hear it.