Fast Cooking meals ideas

When you think about cutting down the time you spend in the kitchen, you might think that means buying more takeout and processed foods (with plenty of calories, fat, and sodium). But it doesn't have to be that way. You can prepare meals in your kitchen with an eye toward health while still keeping the time spent in a hot kitchen to a minimum. Here are a few fast-cooking tips and tricks to help you save on prep time while making healthy meals for yourself and your family.

Fast-Cooking Tip No. 1: Use Pre-cooked Meats

•     In your grocery deli, you can often buy roast beef or roasted turkey, both of which are lean meat choices. You can even ask for extra thick slices so you can dice it and use in recipes.
•     Fresh off the rotisserie or grill, skinless chicken breasts, whole chickens, and half turkey breasts are available in many supermarkets. Remove the skin, then shred or cut the meat as needed for your recipe.
•     A couple of companies are now offering seasoned grilled chicken strips. Find the packages near the lunch meat section in your grocery store.
•     You can buy cooked shrimp at the fish counter or in the frozen fish section.

Fast-Cooking Tip No. 2: Have a Main Dish Salad

Main dish salads are the perfect summer supper -- cool, light, and quick to fix. Salad greens are the base ingredient and that's easy: just open a bag of salad greens or spinach leaves and pour into a bowl. Then throw in the rest of the ingredients and toss. Convenient add-ins include reduced-fat cheese or crumbled blue cheese, grilled chicken, cherry tomatoes, baby carrots, dried cranberries, walnuts, etc.

Source : webmd.com/diet/10-tips-for-fast-cooking

Quick and Easy Meals: 5 Tips for Faster Cooking

You don't have to be a master chef to create delicious meals. These 5 expert kitchen tips will help you cook faster, so you can get dinner on the table sooner and with less sweat.

1. Buy Meat in Bulk

Doesn’t matter if you’re shopping for hamburger, chicken breasts, or fish, the best deals in the meat department come in the largest packages. At home, immediately divide those big packs into individual servings and put each one in a Ziploc bag. Add your favorite spices or marinade and then freeze ’em so you have instant entrées that just need to be grilled or baked. To save money, check out hangar steaks. They’re tasty, high in protein, and very inexpensive, says chef Josh Eden, of NYC’s Ten Ten restaurant. “Just cut them across the grain to keep them tender,” he says.

2. Keep Produce Fresh Longer

Don’t just chuck everything you buy into the fridge. Tomatoes, avocados, squash, and citrus are better off sitting on a cool countertop for a few days instead of being blasted with cold temperatures. Never wash veggies before storing either; just keep them in a loosely rolled plastic bag. You can also hit ’em with a dash of olive oil first. “The oil keeps them from going bad as quickly,” says Guillermo Tellez, executive chef at Square 1682 in Philadelphia.

3. Embrace Cubism

Instead of drinking the red wine leftover from that marinara sauce you made, pour some into an ice cube tray and freeze until you need it. You can do the same thing with fresh juice, pasta sauce, pesto, gravy, even broths and vegetable stock.

Source : www.mensfitness.com/nutrition/what-to-eat/quick-and-easy-meals-5-tips-for-faster-cooking