Quick, Single Guy Meals

[DougieG]

I find myself living alone and hungry all the time for real food, but not having the knowledge or motivation to cook for myself.

Anybody that has been in my position have any quick and easy meals that taste better than Burger King? Preferably nothing with cheese or heavy cream based sauces as these are not favorites of mine.

Thanks guys.

[punkass]

Buy $8 piece of good steak - either ribeye, strip, filet, whatever. $8 will buy you a single serving size usually.

Salt and lightly pepper both sides, coat with canola oil.

Fire up a stainless steel pan and put on high heat for 5 minutes. Put some canola oil on pan. Once it's hot, put steak on pan. Don't touch. After 2 min, flip. Don't touch. After 2 min, take out of pan and onto plate.

eat after letting it sit 10 minutes covered with foil.

Simple. Quick. Steak.

[BigBadBabar]

hey man, here are some easy ones:

make big batches of pasta and just put it in the fridge in tupperware, then you can eat it throughout the week. do the same thing with rice. buy some cans of beans and put them in with the rice or pasta, and put whatever spices or sauce (red pepper, garlic, tomato sauce) you want on there--that's good. some of the frozen pizzas are not bad and you can make them in the microwave. yogurt/applesauce in a cup is good also and quick. fresh fruits are easy to eat. veggies are harder to prepare, but you could get a salad in a bag, or carrot sticks, or something like that. mashed potatoes are easy, you can buy the instant mix or just get a bunch of potatoes, peel em (or not), boil them til they're soft then mash em up and put some butter and milk in there. sandwich bread + lunchmeats + pb&j + tuna fish etc is good too. chicken is pretty easy to make too, buy it frozen and make it either on the stove or in the oven.

bbb

[Brainwalter]

Campbell's chunky chili is decent.

[T-God]

George Forman grill + various meats + various premade sauces.

Pasta, cans of Chunky soup are good when you are lazy.

[Vehn]

hamburgers/hot dogs obvious choices, I get low fat meat and light wheat buns and I think it tastes fine. Another good one is chicken stir fry: put some cooking oil in a pan, cook the chicken until its done, throw in a couple bags of the frozen stir fry stuff, half a bottle of ginger sauce, cook for 15 minutes, make some rice - 1/2 hour meal with good leftovers.

[tshort]

[ QUOTE ]
I find myself living alone and hungry all the time for real food, but not having the knowledge or motivation to cook for myself.

Anybody that has been in my position have any quick and easy meals that taste better than Burger King? Preferably nothing with cheese or heavy cream based sauces as these are not favorites of mine.

Thanks guys.

[/ QUOTE ]

The easy way is frozen food. If you want to prepare meals, I have found you will end up making a trip to the store about twice a week so you can have fresh ingredients.

Bagged salad. This usually is good for 4 or 5 days.

Pasta. As another poster suggested, you can save plenty of leftover spaghetti and eat it for many days afterwards.

Sandwiches. Toasted sandwiches, etc. If you eat salads and sandwiches then you can buy lettuce and tomatoes without to much going to waste. Tuna salad sandwiches.

Pretty much any meat. Salmon. Throw some seasoning (I like cajun or lemon) on it. Cook it under the broiler for 5 min. On the grill. In a pan with some olive oil. Do the same with chicken breasts or other meat.

Canned vegetables.

Other than that, you will often be stuck eating a lot of the same thing for 2 or 3 days straight.

[miajag]

I opened up this thread to mention stir-fry, but saw Vehn beat me to it. Easy and delicious. Fried rice is another good one.

[___]

fajitas!

Ingredients
4 servings flank or other cheap steak (bachelor cooking is all about leftovers)
2 red or orange bell peppers, sliced
1 red onion, sliced into rings
juice of 2 limes (~1/4 tsp)
chili powder
1 clove garlic, diced
1/2 (more or less to taste) jalapeno pepper, diced
some cilantro
1 tsp cumin
2 tbsp oil
tortillas

Combine everything but the meat, peppers, onions, and tortillas to make a marinade and let your meat sit 8 hours or overnight. If you forgot to do this, letting it sit of half an hour is ok, or you could even try making a paste with the juice of half a lime and a scant tbsp of oil, the other marinade ingredients, and some salt+pepper.

Drain the meat and cook it in oil over high heat until tender; about 6-8 minutes. Preferably use a cast iron pan, but don't sweat it if you don't have one. Don't overcook the meat; a little red never hurt anyone, but shoe leather is not for eating. Halfway through add the vegetables tp the same pan until they are lightly cooked.

Roll in tortillas with your choice of condiments. I improvised this (and don't usually marinate my meat because I make these on impulse), but you can find countless recipes with a quick google search.

[BeaucoupFish]

When you actually put in the effort to cook something decent for yourself (for one), make AT LEAST enough for two more meals and freeze them. It is no more effort, and very satisfying to have something decent / healthy later in the week / month with no effort.

I have one of those food-saver vacuum contraptions, and it is ideal for this.