What's for dinner today?

Nowadays restaurants are doing great business. And there is one major reason behind that. We almost stopped cooking food in our house. Some people already skipped the cooking part completely and others they do it 3/4 days a week only. You will see only few families which actually eat homemade food everyday. We are not only giving a lot of money to the fast food chains but also are missing healthy food in our diet. Health is the most important thing and if you think you are too busy to take care of your health you are missing the whole point. We always think that life has become too fast but this is not a very good excuse for take-outs.

With planning and a little organization anybody can prepare food in no time. Try to put these few things in your schedule and you will be surprised with the results. First decide your lunch and dinner menu for 2 weeks. Choose between your favorite traditional recipes, some new recipes from books/Internet and some quick and easy recipes. Once you are done with this you can repeat it for the whole month and so on. Every Friday evening make a list of groceries for this 2 week menu or even for 1 week according to your shopping schedule. When you shop don't forget to keep some important and helpful things like low sodium broth, pasta sauce, low fat shredded cheese, yogurt, salads, dressing, dry nuts, oatmeal, cereal, whole grain bread, tortilla, rice, noodles, pasta, eggs, sorbet, sugar free ice creams(why not), juice. Things like these can stay in good condition for longer period. Even you can store vegetables and fruits for weeks if you use green bags that you can get in the market nowadays.

Do your groceries on Saturdays preferably mornings. And when you watch TV or movies in the evening start some preparations like cutting vegetables in different sizes, cook & shred chicken, marinate meat, cut fruits. Store these in vacuum containers. If you use precut veggies, prepare your lunch/dinner and store it in refrigerator. Some suggestions are pasta, casseroles, rice dishes which can be done halfway and save the baking part for later. This way you can prepare food for first 2/3 days of the week in advance and make all the things ready for the remaining days for fast and fresh cooking.

Few important things will save your time when you actually cook the food. Keep some plate/bowl with you to put all the garbage. Always start your stove or oven five minutes ahead while working on something else. Keep all the required ingredients handy. Use good quality tools like knives, peeler, cutting board, can openers. Start cooking your food 1 hour before dinner time. Listen to some good music while you are in kitchen. No matter how tired you are put all the dishes in dishwasher in the night.

If you don't like cooking that much or really really very busy keep all the electronic gadgets in the kitchen. All kinds of counter top electronic appliances are available in the market. Appliances like grills, magic bullet blenders, skillets, pasta makers, griddles, deep fryers, toasters, rice cookers, slow cookers,crock pot and what not. These thing will work for you as if you have a personal helper. These will definitely save your time and money. But buy those only if you really need them. Don't get addicted to buying new things.
Ladies usually get tired of cooking because they are the only ones who do the cooking all the time. But if they ask for help from husband or kids it can be fun also. There is no need to wait for mothers day or birthday to make her happy.
So now let's try to work on this and think like there is no take out or drive through option available anymore for us.