“Go-To” Meals

I recently shared a post about meal planning and having a few standard meals that are easy to prepare and I love to eat them, has been key to having meal planning work for me. This doesn’t have to be a big planning session each week, but taking 15 minutes once to identify what these “Go-To” meals are for you and what the necessary ingredients are to have on hand to make sure you always have them ready to make in a pinch. 

This has been a big help in my fight against getting quick/bad fast food. Some nights I would not have any plan for dinner and end up stopping to pick up some fast food which isn’t what I really wanted and left me feeling unsatisfied. 

Everyone’s “Go-To” meals are different. They may be something that you grew up eating, a simple recipe you learned from an old roommate or a recipe online that caught your eye. Take a few minutes and think back to what you have been cooking over the last few months. What meals do you consistently gravitate towards? We want to find simple meals that don’t require too much fresh food (or fresh items that can be replaced by canned or frozen items). I know I preach on how much of your meals should include fresh fruits and veggies, but this is a place that we are giving up a small amount of health for the convenience of having the ingredients on hand all the time. 

My personal “Go-To” meals are:

• Spaghetti and meatballs– Using frozen meatballs, a jar of spaghetti sauce, and pasta with a side of frozen or fresh veggies. I keep frozen broccoli on hand just to have with this meal. 
• Pesto Chicken/Salmon– Frozen chicken tenders or frozen salmon filets, prepared pesto, served over pasta, rice, mashed potatoes, etc. I serve this with whatever things I have on hand. It is a super versatile meal that can be cooked from frozen. 
• Tortilla Soup– A recipe a friend shared with me that has a base of Chicken broth, white beans, green enchilada sauce, corn, and chicken. This recipe is super customizable and cozy! I keep some diced frozen chicken in 2 cup portions on hand all the time just for this recipe. 
• BBQ Chicken– Frozen chicken thighs or tenders, prepared BBQ sauce (or sometimes I use teriyaki sauce), served over pasta, rice, mashed potatoes, etc I serve this with whatever veggies I have on hand. It is also a super versatile meal that can be cooked from frozen. 
• Red beans and rice AKA Fake Jambalaya– A box mix of Red beans and Rice (Either Goya brand or Zatarain’s brand), cooked according to the directions. Then I slice up 1 piece of Andouille sausage into coins and fry them up. When the rice is done, add the sausage and serve with a side of veggies. I try to garnish with green onions and a bit of sour cream (when I have them on hand) because it makes this dish feel fresh and fancy!
• Sweet Chili Salmon– Frozen salmon filet brushed with sweet chili sauce for the last 5 minutes of baking. Sweet, tangy, and moist! It is a great dish! I usually serve with some quick-cooking white rice and a fast veggie.

Your meals may look different than mine. That is ok! This is to identify what works for YOU! What meals are easy enough and tasty enough to make forego the disappointing fast food to come home and make dinner? One of my criteria is that I can make it in 15 minutes of hands-on cooking time or less. The meal may take longer than that to bake or cook, but I can be doing other things during most of that time (usually laying on my couch… let’s be honest here!). I also want the meal to make at least two servings so I can have something for lunch tomorrow.

Now, what do you need to have on hand to make your meals?

Here is my shopping list:

• Angel Hair pasta 
• Frozen meatballs
• Spaghetti sauce (I usually have 2 or 3 different sauces on hand)
• Frozen chicken or frozen salmon filets (or on sale fresh chicken that I can wrap and freeze)
• Jarred pesto (from the pasta sauce aisle, not the fresh pesto in the deli area)
• Shaker parmesan cheese
• Rotini or penne pasta or rice for the Pesto Chicken.
• BBQ Sauce or teriyaki sauce from the condiment aisle (or get creative and see if there are any other sauces that catch your eye! I also love this with green chile sauce too!)
• Chicken broth
• White Beans
• Green chili enchilada sauce
• Pre-cooked frozen chicken or rotisserie chicken (usually I just make this myself and freeze).
• Box mix of red beans and rice
• Andouille sausage (I usually buy a 4 pack of sausage and freeze separately. 1 link is the perfect amount for 1 box of rice. 
• A few packages of frozen or canned veggies you enjoy using as a side dish.

Now I have what I need for 5 full meals ready to go when you have a tough or long day. Dinner can be ready and delicious in 20 minutes!

These items are customizable too. If you grow tons of basil in your garden and make your own pesto to freeze, then just keep plenty of frozen pesto to pull out and use for the pesto chicken rather than buying the jarred pesto. If you love freshly shredded parmesan cheese and always have a block ready to shred fresh, then buying the shaker can of parmesan cheese is probably an abomination to you. 

You do you! 

Once you have figured out these meals for yourself, then keep a small list of the ingredients you need to have on hand all of the time next to your shopping list. Each time you make yourself one of these meals, review the ingredients and add anything you are out of (or close to out of) to your shopping list. This cycle ensures you always have these items available to save you from the siren call of fast food at the end of an exhausting day. When I make these meals, I usually make 3 or 4 servings worth of food. 

Usually, if I have a crazy day, it ends up being a crazy few days until things calm back down to normal. When I sit down and look ahead at my week and identify a few busy days in a row, then usually I will plan to make one of these meals knowing it will only take me a few minutes and I will have hot and healthy home-cooked food. 

Change it up!

Eating these same meals over and over again would get boring. I usually find myself having one of these meals about every other week and rotating through them. Since I am often using whatever I have on hand for ingredients, they often taste/feel like different meals. This way I am less likely to get bored with them.

Occasionally, I will add some heavy cream to the pesto chicken after I bake it and have a luxurious creamy pesto sauce to serve with pasta. It tastes like a restaurant dish, but took me just minutes to prepare! Get creative with the recipes, experiment with what you like. For cooking, recipes are just a guideline. Feel free to add or change parts of the existing recipe to match with what you like or what you have on hand. These are your “Go-To” meals, make them work for you!

By having all of these ingredients ready for you, not knowing what is for dinner becomes less of a crisis for you to deal with. You know you can make something and be eating in 30 minutes (a couple of my items are done in 20 minutes!). That’s faster than I can call and get delivery. Plus at just a few bucks per serving, way more economical for my wallet. This is just one more way you can streamline your daily life so you have more capacity for other things. 

What are some of your “Go-To” Meals? Share them in the comments below or on our Instagram page!