How To Cut Your Cooking Time In Half
While on vacation with Joel’s family, I’ve learned the tricks of the trade. I’ve usually seen Joel’s mom and dad cooking Indian food. Joel’s mom works most of the day and then will come home and cook. She has a bit more time to come home and do everything from scratch. Joel’s dad has even more time to prep food and cook meals throughout the day. What about when you’re busy with kids all day and then have to help them with homework at night?
Or you have work all day and school at night?
Is there a way to make Indian food a little quicker? Yes!Here are a few things I saw Joel’s aunts and uncles do.
Keep some prep food frozen.
I’ve always said fresher is better. However, there are a few things that you can have frozen and won’t change the taste at all. A few of those would be diced onions, halved green chilies, diced tomatoes, and ginger garlic paste.
Prep food at the beginning of the week.
There are a few things you’ll need whether you’re making Indian food, Mexican food, or American food. Diced onions are a huge staple in our house. Look at your meal plan at the beginning of the week and see what you’ll be using a lot. Then you can have the diced tomatoes, diced onions, shredded chicken, cut lettuce, etc in separate tupperware containers. This will definitely save you time in the long run.
Cook Multiple Indian Dishes On The Weekend.
This is by far my favorite. I always wonder how Joel’s family has the motivation to cook huge dishes every single day. I learned the secret… They don’t! Joel’s aunt, Chinnipinni, made three main dishes, four sides, and rice on the weekend. She also had some chapatis and roti on hand. This way she could take them out each night and change up the combinations each night. It was brilliant!
Left over Indian food!? I know what you’re thinking. You’re thinking about reheating a hamburger and fries you got from the restaurant over the weekend. It’s never good. The difference is that Indian food is way better reheated. The spices have time to develop and it just gets better.
If you wanted to do this with American food, it’s just as easy. You could make up a big thing of shredded chicken, black beans, seasoned ground beef, and grilled veggies. Then have some staples on hand like pasta, rice, pesto, etc and you can change it up all night.