How do y'all feed yourselves?
Between school and working full time I have less than 0 energy to cook food when I get home. I also don't have the energy/time/attention span to pack a lunch most days. I've been eating like a raccoon for a month just waiting to feel up to meal prepping because this current pattern is bleeding me dry. What works for you?
Main strategies right now:
If someone else is cooking I'll eat what they make.
If I have the energy to cook : Ground beef and eggs mixed in a cast iron pan for easy cooking and cleanup.
If I don't have the energy to cook: A block of mozzarella cheese and cans of tuna.
Most of my meals are things I can throw on top of each other or things I can microwave.
tortilla wraps, throw on feta cheese, hummus and spinach. Shove in face.
If you can get the energy to make pasta or rice, throw on beans and frozen veggies and sauce. Just on top and into the microwave.
Beyond that, I supplement heavily with protein bars, protein chips, trail mix or dried fruit. Things I can leave in a bag.
There's no shame in eating lots of little things. Picnic lunches. The variety actually helps.
I only cook batch meals that can be frozen. Cooking 6 servings is not much harder than cooking 1, and it means I only need to cook roughly 1 day per week.
If I have extra energy I might cook more meals and stock up.
If I run low and still don't have energy, I have some backup options in the form of frozen supermarket meals. They're not particularly healthy or cheap, but they are better than fast food.
Having a shelf-stable (or freezable) lunch can also help. You could pack multiple lunches when you have energy, then just grab one from the stack when it's needed.
Cook a huge amount when you can, eat leftovers forever.
You're a student? I guarantee someone on campus has already done the hard work of making a calendar with all the events with free food for students on it. Subscribe and dine.
Me, I have a job that feeds me at least one meal a day. I eat what I can there.
this is how I made it thru college
What worked for me is marrying someone that is a phenomenal cook. Have you tried proposing to any chefs?
My partner taught me how to cook and now relies on me to be the family chef haha. She's chronically ill and already working full time to help keep a roof over our heads while I axe my overtime for school. Safe to say she's more spent than I am at the end of her shift
My more serious answer would be something along the lines of a crock pot. You can get fancy and do stuff like brown your meat before putting it in or timing some ingredients, but most recipes will work just fine if you just dump everything in and turn it on. Along with that you can make freezer meals for the crock pot. Cut up everything and toss it in a freezer bag. You can include seasoning. If there's anything extra that needs to be added on the day you make it you can just note it on the bag. Then when you want it just dump it all in same as before.
Hey !
On the last 4 years I've been working full time / having a lot of occupations the rest of the time, and yeah ... it sucks.
Depending on my social situation I have two main solutions :
This also comes with alarm clock, reminder etc... so I don't fck up my rhythm.
Also, I am vegetarian and had a lot of financial issues lately, this was also a strategy I / we used to buy food from wholesale merchants.
~melimosa
That’s awesome
StirFrys, get a pan screaming hot, chop veggies, chop meat, wack them in, stir em up, add a sauce packet (black-bean/hosoin&garlic whatever you like) chuck noodles on top, 12 minutes top, serves 2.
Any veg and any meat will work, the sauce packets and noodles (not the dried type!) will keep for ever
You don’t even need to chop. I keep a zipper bag of pre frozen stir fry mix from Costco in the freezer. They take slightly longer to cook because frozen but they brown just fine.
I also cook meat and veggies separately. Meat first, then rest and chop on cutting board while veggies cook. The veggies also deglaze the delicious meat crust from the pan as they cook. Once they’re done, add the chopped meat and whatever else (sauce, noodles, toppings) and eat.
Easy meals like chili are a fan favorite but I also grab a bunch of vegetables, lather them in olive oil and whatever seasonings I'm feeling and then put them in the oven at like 350-400 until crispy enough to munch on. Great success
Sometimes I eat peanutbutter out of the jar. Rice is also great if you have a rice cooker
Grabbing a slow cooker and recipes for hearty stews is a solid starting point - only prep work is chopping veg and adding spices, chopped tomatoes are a good base for almost everything that involves a "chuck it in the pot" recipes. After it's cooked the only thing you need to do is cook some rice or pasta to finish off the meal.
Alternatively training your brain to think 'If I don't cook a meal for myself I'm only going to feel worse tomorrow' helps (Only slightly hypocritical coning from a guy that reached the point where my health was in serious decline during the worst times of not eating, and despite wanting to die I know I have to eat every day.)
Poorly.
Air fryer. Seriously. I can have a ton of frozen foods in stock and eat exactly how much I need or will eat rather quickly. It's not exactly healthy, but it's calorie intake. If I didn't have frozen food I'd be gaunt, or super fat/broke from fast food. The fact that I'm still alive is owed to my kid, my dog and that air fryer.
Sandwiches
First off is taking some of my meals as a liquid, Protein powder plus iced coffee has been doing wonders for me in the morning and it takes seconds to assemble. The other one is made a deal with my roommate that I'd cook dinner most nights if I never had to mow the lawn so the subtle pressure of not just needing to feed myself helps as well.
Another thing is you can't let perfect be the enemy of good. Some days if its calories that isn't pure sugar then I count that as a win and promise to try to do better tomorrow. I still skip meals on the regular to the point that my name has become a verb to describe the phenomenon but we do our best right?
I do have a bag of protein powder collecting dust on top of my fridge. I think I'll give it a shot, thanks!
Salads are just chopped vegetables.
Soups, chili, or anything watery can be made in bulk and then frozen in quart baggies (or other size-of-use) container.
Keep stuff like humus and peanut butter around so you can have a semi-healthy snack in a hurry.
Tofu is fully cooked already - just drain and (optional) season and (optional) heat. Chop, brush with oil and toss it in the air fryer, then heat up some frozen broccoli while you're waiting. Bit of soy sauce and garlic and that's a meal.
Keep easy precursors around. Refried beans, tortilla shells, and frozen fajita mix. Buncha beans, onions, and tomato paste for no-shop chili. Curry mix, dried mushrooms, and frozen tofu. You get the idea. Then whenever you get to the store you can make something that needs fresh ingredients - say a white bean and mirepoix soup that you can make an entire crockpot of and freeze.
rice cooker to me is easier than ordering food. Plus it only needs to be a few times a week as leftovers are microwaved and my containers are glass and sized about right for a meal so just eat it in it with no additional dishes.
Ethan Chlebowski has a cool video on how to meal prep if you hate meal prepping, a really flexible way if you don’t want to decide what you’re eating each day for a whole week.
Basically you braise a fuck load of meat on Sunday, which just means stick it in water in the oven for at least 5 hours (I generally do chicken thighs or beef ribs) and then shred it and put it in a container in the fridge. Then you make whatever you feel like on the day but because you’ve already done the meat, it generally takes 10mins or less to cook anything.
On a lazy day I’ll get a packet of instant ramen, some spinach and brocoli and throw it all in a pot with a decent serving of the shredded meat and that’s a meal in less than 10mins.
If I’m feeling like a bit more work, I’ll make the tinga recipe from that video and a fat bastard burrito with all the trimmings.
In between I might make some kind of pasta ragu with a pre-made sauce and then have a punnet of berries afterwards to make it a bit healthier.
Sporadically.
I have kids with ADHD who all think I am, what I tell them to do when they get too skinny (maybe it is racoon food, but)
Buy Triscuit crackers and hummus and olives and nuts. High calorie in a small package but not unhealthy, some good fats are calming.
Take a banana with you, and a water bottle. Sandwiches are also such good travel food.
In a pinch, a spoonful of peanut butter. But the one that doesn't have high fructose corn syrup.
Try to stay away from refined sugar until you are eating better and more regularly. Don't be afraid of caffeine though.
It is hard. I have done full time work and school, it's hard for anyone. It's not you. Can't say life ever slowed down but school was the worst for me.
Sorry, just read down and saw you need to cook for someone else too.
Chili in the crockpot.
Canned beans on rice.
Those cooked chickens from the grocery make good quesadillas.
Ramen, you can throw shrimp in there while it's cooking, or some of that leftover chicken.
I’m fortunate enough to be able to afford to buy meals that I just need to warm up in a microwave (the edible kind, not frozen ones). There is a place where I go on my way to work that cooks new batches of various dishes every few days and sells them for a pretty low price. Im actually loosing quite a bit of weight this way!
If not for this I would… starve I guess? Or eat junk food from a convenience store nearby.
“Dad’s Lava Chicken” (my kids call it that); it takes about 30 minutes from start to finish (depending on how much I have to trim the chicken), and makes tons of left overs. Pro tip: don’t cut the asparagus, break the ends of with your fingers.
A super easy Tuna Casserole (if you’re into that sort of thing).
A White Bean Chicken Chili. Tons of left overs.
My personal fave: Balsamic Vinaigrette Chickenin the crockpot.
Ps. I also buy ready-made salad and use just balsamic vinegar and pepper as the dressing for my veggies.
Do they sing the song?
Yes. We all do. It’s kinda catchy. 🤣
Those all sound lovely and low effort, I'll have to try them out, thanks!
Anytime! I’m a single dad who has to feed two youngish children, so I feel the pressure just like you do with school and work. It’s exhausting, but worth it. Bonus points: it’s also helped me lose 20 lbs over the summer because I’m not eating like crap. So there’s that too.
Chicken and broccoli. I buy a large pack of chicken, four heads of broccoli. Use the same dosh i cooked the chicken in to roast thw broccoli, takes about an hour and I feed myself for 6-8 days depending on how much chicken was in the package.
If you dont mind eating the same thing for most meals, its only an hour of cooking for 1-1.5 weeks
soylent original is my FAVORITE
original as in the powder? or the pre-mix drink? the pre-mix was a game changer when it came out.
the powder is what i prefer.
You just put one foot in front of the other
Wood science.
Tovala. Prevents me from having to go grocery shopping as often, easy to make the food and it reminds me when the food is ready and shuts off the oven.
I have a wide variety depending on whether I'm cooking for myself, eating with others, and what is going on.
Generally in the mornings I make either over easy eggs with toast or breakfast burritos as both csn be whipped up in about 10 minutes with minimal cleanup. If I'm lazy in the evening I might make a can of soup with crackers, or beanie weenies that I can eat over a few meals. If I get some time and motivation on the weekend I will cook down onions, bell peppers, and jalepenos to use on the eggs and breakfast burrito during the weekdays.
Other than that it is fast food/takeout if I'm busy or unmotivated and if motivated I will make something random that takes around 6 ingredients because that is about my limit. Home made burgers, grilled vegetables, steaks with a side of broccoli or corn, etc.
Then if I have workplace appropriate leftovers I take those, although they also have salads for sale. I work from home 3 days a week and heat up whatever leftovers are around.
If you are absolutely unmotivated then simple sandwiches with an apple on the side worked for me when I didn't cook enough for leftovers.
There's a startlingly large quantity of meals that start with olive oil and seasoned meat in a pot and end in being served over a carb that you can make ten pounds of in less than an hour. I keep dried onion flakes and a jar of minced garlic on hand for when (buying and) cutting fresh aromatics is too many steps. But really, skipping enough "you should do this it makes the dish better" steps can turn everything from beef stroganoff to japanese-style curry to cottage pie into one-pot meals that provide "leftovers" for a week or more. If you crave variety, you can compress the effort and do the same amount of work "per week" but commit more time to one day: this lets you make three or four ten pound Meals that are then divided into freezer-safe portions that can be defrosted or reheated as desired. So instead of "red sauce pasta week, teriyaki chicken week, bacon and egg and hashbrown bowl week, etc" you spend a day per month prepping 3-5 meals and then just microwave those meals for the next month. This strategy basically requires a chest freezer though. Pairs well with compressing your month of grocery shopping task into one big trip to Costco where you can buy 40lb of raw meat to prep into meals.
Take shortcuts, be lazy, compress all the effort into one "task" ("meal prep for 2h a week" or "meal prep for 6 hours once a month" instead of "make 3 quick meals every day"). Basically ask yourself "what is actually wrong with eating hot pockets for three meals a day" (expensive, not actually that good tasting, lacks a lot of important nutrients) and fix that problem by making something better that takes just as little effort as a hot pocket does when you're actually hungry.