How to Save Time Cooking on Busy Weeknights

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As I’ve mentioned before, thanks to seasonal affective disorder my energy tends to crater in the fall… particularly with tasks I don’t like, like cooking. These are a few of my favorite products to make the task less unpleasant… what are yours?

Products to Save Time Cooking on Busy Weeknights

The Crock-Pot

The Crock-Pot is obviously the old-school answer, but it’s still a good one. Throw everything in before work, turn it on, and dinner is essentially done by the time everyone is hungry. It’s particularly great for soups, stews, pulled chicken or pork, and anything else that benefits from cooking low and slow.

(Mine is ancient but this 7-quart slow cooker looks great; it’s under $50 at Amazon.

Slow cooker-friendly recipe: Really Good Roast Beef, by Creations by Kara.

An Air Fryer

For nights when you did not think ahead, an air fryer may be the winner. It preheats quickly (if at all), cooks a lot of foods faster than a conventional oven, and is great for everything from vegetables and salmon to chicken and frozen foods. It’s also nice when you’re cooking something small and don’t want to turn on the entire oven.

The Ninja Air Fryer pictured is less than $135, at Amazon.

Air fryer-friendly recipe: Air-fryer chicken breast, by Skinnytaste.

Souper Cubes

I’ve shared my love of Souper Cubes in the past, but I particularly love them for making your own Lean Cuisine-type frozen dinners. I tend to do a lot of cooking at once and freeze things to eat for lunch and dinner all fall and winter, but you can also use them to double (or triple) whatever you’re already making for dinner and freeze the extras.

They’re essentially sturdy silicone freezer trays that let you freeze soup, chili, sauces, shredded meat, and other leftovers in individual portions; once they’re frozen, you can pop the blocks out and store them together in a freezer bag. The truly brilliant part: four 2-cup Souper Cubes fit exactly into a gallon-size freezer Ziploc.

Souper-Cube-friendly recipe (from a reader!): Dad’s Lentil Soup. I add rotisserie chicken if I have it.

Bonus: Suvie

Full disclosure: I haven’t tried this one yet, but I’ve been intrigued by ads. Suvie seems like a much more high-tech version of “set it and forget it.” You can load the ingredients ahead of time, and the machine keeps them refrigerated until it’s time to start cooking — so you can schedule dinner to be ready when you actually want to eat it. They also sell prepared meals if you want to outsource even more of the process.

A Few More Ways to Save Time Cooking

Plan ahead — at least a little. You don’t need an elaborate meal-planning system, but deciding on a handful of dinners before you grocery shop can eliminate a lot of the nightly “what are we eating?” problem. Keep the ingredients for a few reliable meals on hand, and freeze whatever you won’t use right away.

Think in components, not recipes. Not every dinner needs to be a Recipe with a capital R. A rotisserie chicken, frozen rice, bagged salad, pre-cut vegetables, good bread, or a favorite sauce can become dinner in various combinations — and they’re also useful for lunches later in the week.

Cook once, eat more than once. If you’re already making something that freezes or reheats well, make more than you need. This is particularly easy with soups, stews, chili, shredded meats, meatballs, and other slow-cooker-friendly foods.

Keep easy food around. This applies to meals and snacks. Yogurt, cheese, nuts, fruit, hard-boiled eggs, hummus, and other grab-and-go foods can keep “I’m starving and there’s nothing to eat” from turning into another cooking project.