What's your evening meal stop-gap?

[sasha]

You know the days - where you come home really late or it's been a horrid day or you've been up all night with one child or another - and you're so not interested in cooking and there's not much in the freezer to reheat. What do you make which is filling, kind of healthy and takes only a few minutes and minimal effort?

I'll admit I'm pretty boring - usually it's cheese or baked beans on toast, or an omelette, or at a pinch I've been known to give them a couple of weetbix each!! I finish off with fruit and yoghurt, most of the time.

Any more inspiring ideas? With only a few weeks to go and no signs of life slowing down any time soon, I'm trying to stock up the freezer, but in case that just doesn't go as planned (quite on the cards, knowing me!) I'm wondering what other parents do...

[Kazbah]

pasta with cheese or pesto
tinned soup with toast
french toast
rice with frozen veg cooked through it and stir-through sauce

[Olive]

risotto cooked in the microwave!

[Arimeh]

uh toasted cheese sangas, pasta with cheese or scrambled eggs. They love scrambled eggs.

Tonight they had vegemite on toast for dinner.. lol

[Olive]

another one thats good here is i steam vegies in a stove top steamer with pasta in the bottom, then i puree the vegetables with some cream and or avocado to make pasta with vegie sauce!
quick and its easy as it all cooks together

[Santosha]

Oh YUM Olive, that sounds awesome. I'm stealing that one.

I usually do omlette with grated veg. Sometimes if there's a fair bit of veg in the mix I pour it into egg rings so it doesn't just fall apart.

Pasta with veg bolognese - tin of lentils, tin of tomatoes, frozen spinach, grated carrot and a bit of tomato paste

Toasties in the sandwich press with cheese, spinach, tomato and thin slices of zucchini and pumpkin (i toast the harder veg on the flat toaster first as it's warming up, to start the cooking process)

[willow5]

Oh YUM Olive, that sounds awesome. I'm stealing that one.

Me too! Thank you.

[Nelle]

Pasta with grated cheese and sweet chilli sauce
Scrambled eggs
Chicken nuggets/fish fingers/other frozen thing
Yoghurt with chopped fruit
Tinned soup with broken up bread or breadcrumbs to make it less runny for little ones

I might add frozen vegies and/or tinned fish to the first three.

[nothing2lose]

Here are a couple of things...Hope they help!

- home made sausage rolls - either use sausage meat mixed with onion and mixed herbs or actual sausages. Wrap in pastry sheet. Cut into little rolls. Bake

- Home made pizza -- whatever toppings you like on pita bread

- A jar of pasta sauce, mince meat and some spaghetti or other noodles - easy as!!

- If you have no aversion to packet food, it's good to have a couple of kraft macaroni and cheese on hand. Mix with tuna and frozen veg for a mini tuna casserole.

- baked potatoes with pretty much any topping - cheese, tuna, corn, spaghetti sauce, baked beans, vegies

- Googie eggs (aka egg soldiers) - soft boiled egg with toast fingers

- tacos

- try making extra when you cook and freezing some kid size mini meals (esp. casserole, chilli, spag bol)

- tomato soup with jaffles

- "chow mein" - mince (browned), pkt chicken noodle soup, curry powder, onion, celery, carrot, soy sauce, cabbage, garlic, little bit of rice, little bit of water. Put it in the pot , lid on, stir occasionally

-stir fried vegies with noodles and oyster sauce

- egg and bacon pie...eggs & bacon and a little bit of cheese cooked in a case made from pastry sheets

- pancakes (ok, more of a dessert...but oh, so yummmy!!!!)

HTH!!!!!

[Arcadia]

Tuna pasta- tin of tuna with lemon juice, a bit of olive oil and some steamed greens (brocolli, zucchini beans cooked in microwave if you're super lazy) stirred through cooked pasta and cheese on top.

BBQ chook and salad (and bread and butter)

Asian omelette and rice (basically an omelette with stir fry veggies from freezer and soy sauce)

Indian stir through sauces with steamed pumpkin, potato and sweet potato (and chuck in left over BBQ chicken) with rice and pappadums

Otherwise porridge, toast or weetbix!

[Daffodil Mumma]

Hmm Im a pretty pitiful cook on a good day so its hard to pick my "slack day" options lol
Mac & cheese with mixed frozen vege & tuna/shredded chicken/ham tossed thru
Toasted sandwiches
Ham salad sandwiches
scrammbled eggs

[sloane]

fried rice - just whatever i have in the fridge in the way of meat & vegies. usually some bacon, red pepper, peas, corn...that sort of thing. then some soy & sweet chilli sauces. we're not egg eaters but you could put egg through it as well. i often have some mini spring rolls in the freezer & will heat those up to go with it. you can cook the vegies/meat while the rice is cooking & then just mix. only takes 15mins.
welsh rarebit - just snazzy cheese on toast really!
baked potatoes with baked beans

[MummyNaomi]

Ours is fish fingers and one of those steamer bags of frozen veg - usually the brocolli, carrot and green bean one. Oh AND if I put a little pile of grated cheese on the plate DS is in heaven
And the 'adult' version of the quickie fish finger meal is a fish finger sandwich with lettuce and mayo - YUM!

[sasha]

Some really great ideas here, thanks you guys!

[Deedles]

My saviour is Kids ravioli , the chicken and vegetable or beef and vegetables. I mix some pasta sauce or ricotta cheese through it.

Also the kids love fried rice. If we have steamed rice from the night before just fry it with some veg and egg and ham, frozen veg if easier.

Cream cheese, vegemite and avocado sandwiches if I am in a total rush to get to work on time. They LOVE that combo the best for some reason.

[~Jayne~]

I really love zucchini slice. It's so simple & easy - the only downfall is it uses a lot of eggs & sometimes we don't have 6 spare eggs as my youngest is mad on eggs. We usually have a few rashers of bacon, a spare zucchini, some cheese, flour, corn & tomato on hand to make it though. It's delicious.

I'm also a fan of baked beans on toast (when we are in Aus, the baked beans here are awful).

[emc2]

Those microwave couscous packets.

[Muffy]

easy mac
eggs on toast
frozen stuff - chips/nuggets/fish fingers
get some steam fresh vegies.. in the frozen vegie section of the super market... chuck them in the microwave for 2 mins and you're done!
wheatbix
cornflakes

and another tip - make extra on those nights when you do cook and just freeze leftovers!!