Kitchen Tip Tuesday: cooking shortcuts & multitasking meals

I thought I'd share a few tips for cooking shortcuts. I'm convinced that certain geographic regions move at a much faster pace then others...and I happen to live in one of those regions. So because of the busyness of our lives and yet the desire to make things from scratch I try to be a little more prepared ahead of time.

Cooking Shortcuts that help me:

1) I buy several packages of the mini carrots. Some for snacking but the rest for cooking with. They don't need to be peeled and can be cut quickly...I like their flavor better as well.

2) I buy a few types of pre-packaged salad mixes. I can then combine them and quickly add other things into it as well, such as more veggies, cheese, etc.. I usually buy an iceberg type mix, and then a spring mix with more specialty lettuces in it.

3) When I have extra time (or just remember), I precut some broccoli and celery, so it's ready to snack on, or ready to cook up for a meal.

4) I purchase my chicken from Costco so that I don't have to take more time to separate and freeze it. It's already individually frozen.

5) I take more time to organize things when I get home from shopping because this saves time later.

The other tip I had has to do with multi tasking but also can double as a shortcut. Tammy's new birth prompted this thought. When someone in our church has a baby, several women will volunteer to make meals for the new family for the first week. I've heard women say they need to make two meals (one for their family and one for the other family). My thought is always "why"? Just double up one meal, take half to the family and leave half for your own. Last week I made the soup, salad and rolls. In the past I've done spaghetti, casserole, etc... Don't make things harder then they need to be.

With Joy UNquenchable,