6 quick kitchen tricks

Have you ever read the book Cheaper by the Dozen?  Though the dad in that book is a little extreme, I have always secretly identified with his eternal quest for greater efficiency in the home.  I am always on the lookout for ways to save time, and thought it might be fun to share some of the ways I save time in the kitchen.  I’d love it if you add your own ideas in comments, below.  Who can’t use a few good time-saving strategies?

1. I double-batch whole meals at least a couple times a week. It only takes a few extra minutes to measure out more ingredients or chop more veggies or meat while the kitchen’s already a mess. Leftovers can go into the fridge to serve at lunch later in the week or in the freezer for a different week entirely.  Common examples include big pots of soup or chili, or pans of enchiladas to stash in the freezer.  Time savings per meal: at least 30 minutes per meal, especially when you consider there’ll be much less mess when serving that second meal.

2.  You don’t have to double batch a whole meal to save time, however.  Even doubling one portion of the meal can save prep work a different day.  For example, when I am cooking meat for a meal like tacos, fajitas, or Molly’s chicken, I will often cook more meat than I need for that meal, setting aside the extra to use a different day  in a soup or a stir fry. (Remember to set that extra meat aside before the meal, however, so your family doesn’t just gobble up the extra.) Other examples of this tip include making extra pizza dough one day so kids can easily make their own pizza another day, or making extra rice and setting it aside for fried rice another day.  If your rice AND your meat is already cooked, it’s perfectly possible to get a meal of fried rice onto the table in 20 minutes flat.  Time savings:  20 minutes per meal

3. When I am beginning dinner, I always think about which part of the meal will take longest to cook and start there. Since I have lots of meals that take less than 30 minutes to get to the table, that often means starting rice or pasta cooking. On spaghetti nights I  get pasta water heating first, then cook ground beef and simmer sauce while noodles cook.  If the meal is a stir-fry, I’ll get the rice going in the rice cooker, then chop/cook the chicken, then work on the veggies while the chicken (and rice) chicken cook.  I love having multiple pots going at the same time– it feels so efficient. Time savings: at least 10 minutes per meal.

4. Especially when meals are labor-intensive, I get help! The other day I had 10 pounds of potatoes to peel– we were bringing mashed potatoes to a potluck.  I started by putting the water on to boil, then asked 5 kids to peel three potatoes each.  (We have lots of peelers!) It was a tiny bit of work for each of them, but getting their help made the job at least 20 minutes shorter than if I’d worked alone.   Even tiny kids can peel carrots or garlic.  Elementary age kids can set them table and pour drinks.  Bigger kids, with training, can do almost any part of cooking that I can.  And whatever you do, always say yes to a kid who wants to make cookies.  When they’re little, it feels like more mess than it’s worth, but they get efficient quickly, and there’s not much in the world that’s nicer than fresh-baked cookies that you didn’t have to bake yourself.  Time savings: probably at least 5 minutes/child/meal, but this varies by your child’s age. 🙂

5.  If you need a quick side dish to fill out a meal on a busy day, crank your oven t0 475 and chop whatever fresh veggies you happen to have into bite size pieces.  Almost any veggies are wonderful roasted;  I’ve roasted carrots, potatoes, sweet potatoes, onions, whole peeled garlic cloves, Brussels sprouts, green beans, asparagus, and broccoli.  Toss your choice of veggies (cut into similar sizes) in a couple tablespoons of olive oil on a cookie sheet.  Then spread them out evenly across the pan, top with a few grinds of salt and pepper,  and roast for 10-15 minutes, or until veggies are getting browned bits and are cooked to your liking.  Yum!  You may even convert a veggie hater in your house– this is the only way my husband will eat Brussels sprouts.  Time savings:  depends on what you would’ve made instead. 🙂  This recipe takes about 10 minutes of prep time.

6. One last tip for frazzled mommas:  often I’ll decide at the last minute that I want baked potatoes for dinner.  Problem is, they take an hour to bake, and they’re just not the same when cooked in the microwave.  But there’s a way to shave half an hour off that cooking time.  Just preheat the oven to 425. (convection is best, if you have that feature) Then wash and poke potatoes, then zap them in the microwave 2 or 3 potatoes at a time for about 3 minutes.  By the time the oven is hot, the potatoes have already begun the cooking process in the microwave, which means they’ll only need another 25-30 minutes in the regular oven.  But they’ll end up cooked as nicely as if their whole cooking time had been in the regular oven.  Time savings: 30 minutes per meal.

OK– your turn!  What are your best quick kitchen tricks?

For more affordable and quick recipes, check out my cookbook: Family Feasts for $75 a Week
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• The flowers above are from my sweet mother in law to celebrate the launch of Forever Mom.  (Hope you’re not too, too sick of hearing about it! 🙂  )  Very sweet of her to help me celebrate!  We are enjoying the prettiness of the flowers on our table.
• I did finally get around to canning grape juice– we did about 20 quarts.  That will be good either to drink as juice at breakfast or to make into jelly later in the winter when our jam stash is diminished.
• I found chicken thighs on sale for 99 cents/lb.  I used some as a meal with rice, some in chicken and rice soup, and some in a stir fry. I like to cook them in a crock pot slowly with some water, which makes them quite tender and then also nets me some chicken broth to use for soup.
• I made corn cakes this week that turned out yummy, and served them alongside a lime cilantro slaw that nicely complimented that corn cakes.  The recipe was pretty much the same as this recipe except I used gluten free flour mix instead of regular flour.
• I also made a chicken skillet pot pie this week with a biscuit topping and lots of garden veggies. (I have LOTS of cabbage and sweet peppers right now.)  Pot pie always feels like a treat, but it is actually very affordable to make.
• I made some more homemade spaghetti sauce the oven-baked way.  It turns out so good that way, and gets very rich and thick.
• The girls and I chopped some sweet peppers to go in the freezer.  They’re so lovely fresh that it feels like a shame to freeze them.  But we simply had too many to use quickly enough, so after using lots in stir fry, fresh on sandwiches, and in pot pie, into the freezer the rest of them went.  I’m relieved to be finally getting the excess produce cleared off my kitchen counters.  Though the abundance is a gift, the clutter and the knowledge that I need to do something about it gets to me after awhile.

• Salsa was another thing we got done this week, finally.  Super spicy this year!  I was glad to use most of the last of the tomatoes, but then John brought more in from the garden, so we still have a basket full ripening on the counter.  We still haven’t had a hard frost, which is really unusual around here.  Lots of time the garden is completely done by the second week of October, and here it is, almost November.
• I was in the mood for some more fall decor, and so instead of buying something, I found some Christmas lights that actually still worked– hooray! — and twined them in with several fall-leaf garlands that I’d bought earlier this month on a 40% off clearance.  It looked pretty and saved me a trip to the store. We also spread pumpkins around on our front porch from the garden.  No big ones this year, but lots of medium and smaller ones.  We’ll be making pumpkin pie soon too, I’m sure.  Yum!

How did your frugal adventure go this week?  I’d love to hear about it!  And if you an adoptive momma in need of a getaway, remember to enter the drawing for the Created for Care Getaway package!