How Long Does It Take to Cook a Meal? 5 Dinner Shortcuts to Save Time
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There are three kinds of people: those that love to cook, those that hate to cook, and those that don’t mind cooking but find it daunting.
If you fall into the latter category, even thinking about an evening meal can be overwhelming. Either you run out of steam at the end of a demanding day or you run out of time. Truth is, many nights your priorities are chauffeuring your children, squeezing in a social life, maintaining a fitness routine or attending some “extracurricular” activity designed to give you life balance.
If that’s you, we’ve got you. Let’s start with a high-level look at how long it takes to make a meal and then how to cut that down.
How Long Does it Take to Cook a Meal?
Preparing a meal can take anywhere from ten minutes to several hours depending on what you’re making. It may only take a few minutes to prepare cold wraps or an omelet, but cooking a full turkey or using a crock pot often requires the better part of a day. There are really three big factors that determine how long it will take to get a meal ready to serve - the prep time, the cook time and deciding what to make.
If your dinner process includes a tour of your kitchen or a conversation that starts with “what do you want for dinner?” you’re already in trouble. If you know what you’re going to make, but haven’t prepped any further than defrosting a protein, you may still have hours before you eat.
So, if you’re here because you want to minimize the time it takes to make a meal your best bet is to plan ahead, reduce prep times and use cooking shortcuts. Here are some tips to help you get dinner on the table while saving time — so you can put that time towards the things that matter most.
Plan and prep on Sundays
A friend of mine shops for and prepares all her family’s weekday meals on Sundays. It’s her thing — she leaves her kids with her husband and hits the grocery store solo in the morning. Then, she preps after lunch while watching Netflix or gabbing on the phone. She’s a pro, but it’s her thing.
But not everyone is that on top of things. Personally, I do try to map out our Monday through Friday menus on my weekends to ensure all the ingredients are on hand during the busy week ahead.
But truth be told, even that level of meal prepping can be challenging for a beginner. Fortunately, there’s lots of help online if you want to learn how to get started with meal planning.
Additionally, here are a few planning and prepping pro tips you can implement on the weekend when you might have the luxury of a little more time:
Buy, bag, and freeze boneless chicken breasts in different marinades. Just remember to pull them out the night before you plan to use them so they have time to defrost.
Chop and bag veggies, especially onions. Slicing and dicing are a major time suck when cooking. Do yourself a solid and take care of that on the weekend.
Discover the joy of wide-mouth mason jars. It doesn’t take long to layer up several meals at a time if you set them up assembly-line style then store them in the fridge. Think yummy salads and nutritious bowls. You can’t beat them for helping you choose a homemade lunch or casual dinner when time is tight.
Embrace timesaving tools
Ever heard of Salsa Chicken? In the morning, add one can of salsa to a crockpot with a few boneless chicken breasts and set it to low. At dinner time, stick a bag of minute rice in the microwave. Voila, in just a few minutes, you have a meal that is delicious and nutritious.
The key to saving time with this meal (and many like it) lies within the appliances. If saving time matters to you, you need to invest in at least one of these tools of the trade:
A slow cooker. These functional countertop appliances have evolved since the 1970s, though they still cook all day while you are away. Sure, they’re great for soups and stews, but you can cook meats and desserts in them, too. Today’s models are sleek and coordinate nicely with major kitchen appliances. Try this one from the Crock-Pot brand.
An Instant Pot. Pressure cookers are out now that Instant Pots are in. Marketed as a multicooker, Instant Pots are designed to expedite the cooking process, helping you produce superior tasting meals while maintaining nutritional properties. Go ahead and invest, but please read up and always put safety first.
A microwave. Wait, what? These are for more than making popcorn? Scandal! No, seriously, when used properly, microwave ovens help put balanced meals on the table in a short amount of time. Why? Because they let you multitask! While your protein is grilling, microwave up your rice and veggies. That time savings alone should justify the cost of a new, high powered unit if you don’t already have one in your home for, you know, that popcorn.
Try meal delivery services
I LOVE subscription services. I’m a bit of a junkie for things regularly showing up at my house that bring me joy. So when I discovered meal delivery kits, it didn’t take me long to try them out — and I tried more than one.
I started with one that allowed both my husband and I to feel like gourmet chefs as we made nightly meals together and then we switched to another, as we were cleaning up our labels and appreciated the “whole” nature of the foods they included. Lately I’ve been eye-balling Splendid Spoon, which offers plant-based delights that might stretch beyond dinner to lunch and/or breakfast time. Every Plate is also appealing because all of the meals are designed to be ready in about 30-35 minutes and Sun Basket offers both pre-prepped choices and meals that are made to heat-and-eat.
There are so many meal delivery service options you may have to experiment with a few different types before you find the menu, ingredients and prep level that fits your family.
But you cannot beat the time savings that meal delivery services offer. You don’t even have to shop, they deliver the ingredients to your home. Each meal is pre-measured (it’s like you have your own cooking show). They break the recipes out step by step (making it brainless, folks) and the outcome is always delicious. Plus, the entire family can get involved — from spouses to kids — making a stressful event an experience everyone enjoys. Many hands do make even lighter work.
Not convinced? Don’t just take my word for it. Read our take on whether meal kit delivery services are worth it and form your own opinion
Shop for shortcuts
When I first discovered Sandra Lee and her Semi-Homemade cooking style, I realized I’d found my tribe’s leader. Fresh ingredients combined with store-bought items help get dinner on the table faster? Genius.
There’s no shame in using store-bought flatbreads for homemade pizza night — sauté some vegetables, add your favorite sauce and cheese, and you’ve skipped the takeout but saved the time.
Use those inexpensive packages of Ramen for a noodle salad — bonus points if you pick up a package of pre-cooked pulled pork and make it a hearty bowl meal. Grab breaded fish sticks from the freezer section to add variety to Taco Tuesday. Make a chicken pot pie using store-bought pie crust, frozen veggies and jarred gravy.
Here are a few items you should always have on hand to save you time when you’re being pinched:
Salad kits (Add black beans, frozen corn and your favorite pre-cooked protein and turn these into a meal.)
Jarred minced garlic (Trader Joes sells other herbs, pre-measured and frozen.)
Jarred tomato sauce (It’s okay, we won’t tell your mother, if you don’t tell mine. But leftover penne from pasta night tossed with a jar of sauce and shredded mozzarella makes a quick and easy baked ziti alternative.) You can also find jarred sauces in other flavors like Marsala, scampi, sesame, tika masala and many more. It may take some trial and error to find the simmer sauce brands you love, but the time it saves compared to making them from scratch is worth the effort.
Rotisserie chicken (There are so many uses for this time-saving winner. One week serve it up as is; the next, shred the meat up, add store-bought enchilada sauce and tortillas, and you’ll serve up a family favorite.)
Canned protein (Consider expanding past tuna to canned chicken and stock up on beans — black, white, and garbanzo — so you can get your macro game on if you’re in a hurry.)
Embrace the leftovers
If you want to save time, learn to love the leftovers. You can kill two birds with one stone if you think about your strategy ahead of time. Grill up chicken one night, then slice the pieces up and add it to Fettucini Alfredo two days later. Bake a ham on a Sunday evening, have breakfast for dinner on Monday with diced ham and cheddar omelets. Help classics like Shepherd’s Pie and Turkey Tetrazzini make a comeback by googling any leftover ingredients you have plus the word casserole (e.g., search for “cheeseburgers +casserole” and see some beautiful options).
Got leftovers from your time-saving takeout? Those can save you time and effort on the nights that follow, giving you even more bang for your buck. Add white rice to tomato soup to make it heartier or heat it to add to burritos from leftover taco meat. Fried rice can be the basis for a delicious bowl meal with pre-cooked shrimp and a few extra veggies. Make a chef’s salad out of the leftover lunch meat and cheese from that hoagie (or sub sandwich, depending on where you are from). Even pizza can turn into a fresh meal — trim the crust off the pieces and them as “bread” for panini sandwiches or cut them into strips, bake them until they are crisp, and dip them into your favorite sauce.
The important thing to consider when reusing food in this way is that they don’t always stay safe for long. But if you factor that into your planning, you’ll find comfort in the comfort foods you can create with leftovers.
Some might say that all this thinking requires time you don’t have. However, when done on weekends when you likely have a little more time, advanced planning will free you up at mealtime so you can focus on your family, your friends, and the self-care you deserve.
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