Ready meals and living alone

avoidtheupsidedownbottles

M&S convenience meals are better quality than most I suspect.  Buying them on yellow sticker brings the prices down to a more tolerable level.  If they are bit short on vegetables I supplement with a portion from the freezer.  

PipneyJane

sixtiesgal_2 said:

I feel my main issues are time, although batch cooking saves time in the long run. Pots - I hate washing pots and with a ready meal all you have to wash is one plate. When I reheat the meals I cook they never stay hot for long and seem to cool quickly. Buying and storing all the ingredients for receipes is a pain. I did start using the Pinch of Nom website, not that I am dieting but they do have healthy receipes but they have so many ingredients in them and I am loathed to buy a bottle of say Worcestershire sauce just to use a teaspoon full and then may not use again for ages.  I am also very paranoid about reheating chicken so I tend to eat that as I cook it. Also I run out of ideas. The main meal I am cooking and freezing at the moment is lasagne. I tend to waste food a lot with being on my own so I mainly use frozen veg.

Pssst.... I'll let you in on a secret. NOBODY likes washing pots!   My solution is to let the pot cool then fill with cold water and leave to soak overnight.  If something is burnt on and soaking doesn't lift that off, replace the water with enough to cover the burnt bit, sprinkle over a couple of tablespoons of bicarb soda and boil it for 5 minutes.  (The chemical reaction will break the bond between the burnt stuff and the pot.)

The best investment you can make is to buy a decent draining rack for the kitchen - also one of the hardest things to find - since you can leave everything to dry while you are off doing other things.  Just get into the habit of emptying the draining rack when you get home from work, before you start cooking dinner.  Personally, I'm one of those people who washes the dinner dishes up in the morning, before heading out for work.   (I am too knackered to wash up in the evenings.)   I walk into the kitchen, put the kettle on, set a timer for 10 minutes and then empty the water out of any soaking pots and fill the sink.  I rarely go over the 10 minutes but the rule is "if it is in the sink when the timer goes off, then it gets washed up".   

What is your worry over reheating cooked chicken?  It is much safer than raw.

There is nothing wrong with eating frozen veg. 

- Pip

Blackbeard_of_Perranporth

Last ready meal I had was carp and I was in digs on a farm. The dog even shoved his nose up at it.

Mistral001

I live on my own and sometimes eat Indian or Chinese ready meals (maybe once every couple of weeks).  A trick I use to make them taste a little fresher is to mix in some fresh ingredients about half way through cooking in the microwave.  Slices of fresh onions and some parsley in Indian dishes can work wonders and fresh onions and thin strips or strings of carrots in  the sweet and sour dishes can also make the meal taste a little more fresh. You have to partially cook the onions in the microwave or pan before adding them.

Brambling

Personally I don't like ready meals and would rather create some of my own for the freezer for when I can't be bothered or work late, however one of the advantage of living alone is eating what you want when you want.  I would check the salt and fat content and pad out with extra veg if you can afford to eat them 

sixtiesgal_2

PipneyJane said:

sixtiesgal_2 said:

I feel my main issues are time, although batch cooking saves time in the long run. Pots - I hate washing pots and with a ready meal all you have to wash is one plate. When I reheat the meals I cook they never stay hot for long and seem to cool quickly. Buying and storing all the ingredients for receipes is a pain. I did start using the Pinch of Nom website, not that I am dieting but they do have healthy receipes but they have so many ingredients in them and I am loathed to buy a bottle of say Worcestershire sauce just to use a teaspoon full and then may not use again for ages.  I am also very paranoid about reheating chicken so I tend to eat that as I cook it. Also I run out of ideas. The main meal I am cooking and freezing at the moment is lasagne. I tend to waste food a lot with being on my own so I mainly use frozen veg.

Pssst.... I'll let you in on a secret. NOBODY likes washing pots!   My solution is to let the pot cool then fill with cold water and leave to soak overnight.  If something is burnt on and soaking doesn't lift that off, replace the water with enough to cover the burnt bit, sprinkle over a couple of tablespoons of bicarb soda and boil it for 5 minutes.  (The chemical reaction will break the bond between the burnt stuff and the pot.)

The best investment you can make is to buy a decent draining rack for the kitchen - also one of the hardest things to find - since you can leave everything to dry while you are off doing other things.  Just get into the habit of emptying the draining rack when you get home from work, before you start cooking dinner.  Personally, I'm one of those people who washes the dinner dishes up in the morning, before heading out for work.   (I am too knackered to wash up in the evenings.)   I walk into the kitchen, put the kettle on, set a timer for 10 minutes and then empty the water out of any soaking pots and fill the sink.  I rarely go over the 10 minutes but the rule is "if it is in the sink when the timer goes off, then it gets washed up".   

What is your worry over reheating cooked chicken?  It is much safer than raw.

There is nothing wrong with eating frozen veg. 

- Pip

Hi, my issue with chicken is reheating it once its been frozen, as in batch cooking. I would rather cook it and eat it straight away.

HOWMUCH

When I lived on my own and was working full time....... on my 2 days off I cooked a meal that served 4/5 people and portioned it into freezer tubs, home made cheap ready meals. You are only cooking 2 days a week and build up different meals very quickly. To start with you will have to cook extra, I did chilli and bolognese and lasagna bulked out with grated carrot and lentils, these base is very similar and you instantly get 3 different meals. The following day cook a chicken ..... curry, roast dinner, fajitas, chicken pasta bake. It’s more healthy and flavoursome x

PasturesNew

Everybody has a different variation, their own drum to bang, about what's healthy and what's not.  Do what works for you. 

However, I'm a purchaser of super cheap foods, not M&S.... and if you look carefully at things like calories, sugar, salt, you often find that the budget/super cheap ready meals are "healthier" by those measures than the pricier brands which rely on sugar, salt and cream to beef them up.   If cost is an issue, I'd direct you towards the Tesc0 frozen 65p ready meals.... and 67p pizzas.   

https://www.tesco.com/groceries/en-GB/search?query=hearty%20food&icid=tescohp_sws-1_m-sug_in-heart_ab-226-b_out-hearty%20food 

missychrissy

I’m single too but I usually cook like I am still a family of six which gives me one for today, one for tomorrow and four for the freezer. I’m retired now but when I was working (4 nights a week) I would get in on a Friday morning and get the slow cooker going with: bacon joint, split peas and onion; chicken carcass, bag of dried soup mix (lentils, barley split peas etc) and veg such as carrot, swede, onion and celery; small beef joint and veg as above or small lamb joint and bag of scotch broth soup mix and whatever fresh veg I had. This fed me when I got up in afternoon and left me lots for the freezer. On my way to work I would take a box out of the freezer which would be nicely defrosted by about 1 in the morning.  Sometimes on a Sunday I still do a full roast. I slice up the left over meat into one person sized portions and freeze and also freeze Yorkshire puddings individually. I can then make a quick roast dinner whenever I want with just the addition of some veg and gravy. It’s worth thinking ‘big’ and your freezer is well stocked with homemade, cheap and nutritious ready meals.

maisie_cat

When I lived alone I had M&S ready meals during the week as I worked long hours. When I gave up work I was cash poorer/time richer and started to batch cook so I always have home made ready meals in the freezer for busy/lazy days. I much prefer the fact that there are no preservatives etc in my meals but portion control is sometimes harder. I find recipes for 4 servings are often too large and tend to try and eke out to 6 portions.