11 Of The Best No-Cook Heatwave Dinner Ideas (Not Salad)

I have not forgotten the classic “slice of ham, pickled beetroot, coleslaw, and inexplicable spring onion” sunny day salads of my childhood, but I have forgiven them.

Sure, they seemed a bit chaotic at the time. But now I’m a full-grown adult in a blistering heatwave, cooking is the last thing on my mind, and I’ve been slapping together “girl dinner” concoctions of my own.

Nonetheless, I’m getting bored with endless butterhead lettuce and variously processed eggs. With the hot weather expected to last until at least the end of the working week, I preused Reddit’s r/EatCheapAndHealthy and r/Cooking fora to find the no-cook meals site users make on repeat:

“Fill with shrimp, julienned vegetables, herbs, chicken… so many possibilities,” u/114631 wrote.

This rice paper recipe takes minutes and is delicious with a peanut dipping sauce.

“Some brands of rice noodles just need to be soaked in hot water or microwaved for two to three minutes,” u/whatdoidonow37 wrote. “I top the noodles with whatever I have in my fridge ― frozen spinach or corn, shredded rotisserie chicken, cucumbers, julienned carrots, tomatoes, etc.”

If you want something even cooler, this 20-minute cold noodle salad recipe is crunchy, low-lift bliss.

“Take chickpeas, black beans, or lentils… toss them with fresh lemon juice, lots of olive oil, some finely chopped garlic, and whatever fresh herbs you can find. Salt and pepper. This mix keeps in the fridge for approximately five days,” c-soup wrote.

I swear by my “never-soggy” pomegranate, feta, chickpea, and cucumber combo in climes like these. It lasts me a work week, provided I remove the slimy middle bit of the cucumbers (a trick Gordon Ramsay swears by, too).

Multiple Redditors, including u/Esausta, swear by the American meal.

This salsa-adjacent mixture of corn, black beans, avocado, tomato, and red onion is best enjoyed with tortilla chips, all agree.

BBC Good Food adds that it’s not so much a strict recipe as it is a philosophy: whatever you can bring yourself to throw together in this heat will be fine, provided you get the starchy-fruity-crisp combo in there.

Last night, I had a crisp sandwich and hummus (don’t knock it ’til you’ve tried it) for dinner. And it seems I’m not the only one who reaches for bread in times of heat-induced fatigue.

“Look into Vietnamese Banh Mi, the cold cut version. All you need to do is assemble the ingredients,” u/UltraZulwarn wrote (this recipe takes minutes).

Others recommended simpler tuna or tomato sandwiches.

It’d be inhumane to ask you to fire up your oven in the current 30-plus-degree weather.

But Redditor after Redditor swears by pre-cooked rotisserie chickens when it’s hot out. Strip them, “roughly chop [the meat], and make yourself chicken salads and BBQ sandwiches,” u/Cultjake wrote.

Other site users recommended burrito bowls and wraps.

Everyone from u/Inevitable-Spite937 to u/Dngnb8 and u/mythisme said cereal is their go-to heatwave staple.

And u/mythisme added that they mix “two to three types of cereals and granola for varying crunch” and whacks some fruit and seeds on top for a “hearty meal”.

“All summer, I eat… Szechuan smacked cucumbers, which are super refreshing,” u/ttrockwood wrote.

“I use peeled regular cucumbers and just scoop out the seeds. Then I add in lots of edamame.”

And Sad-Database3677 said they “Use a mandoline or dice [cucumbers], add a little soy sauce, a little fish sauce, a few shakes of sesame seeds, maybe a little black vinegar, and a few spoonfuls of… crunchy garlic… Sometimes I’ll eat it with cold soft tofu”.

“Gazpacho and ajo blanco are great, even better made and let sit a few hours in the fridge,” u/ttrockwood said.

Reviewers love this simple cold soup recipe, which derives a lot of its fresh and cooling flavour from juicy tomatoes and crisp cucumbers. As the Redditor said, it tastes better with added time in the fridge.

u/Quarantined_foodie recommended the classic cold fish dish, which only has two steps on BBC Good Food’s recipe.

Fill these with mashed chickpeas, u/BigSerene wrote, or do as u/SassafrasTeaTime does and eat them with the aforementioned rotisserie chicken.

Others, like u/autonomouswriter, suggested dipping them into hummus.