[-erin-]

Juliet usually wants to eat NOW when we walk in the door at night so lately it seems that her dinners have consisted of cheese, fruit cups, cottage cheese, crackers, rice, cereal and similar. By the time we get something more substantial made (even something as simple as chicken nuggets), she's done. What are some super super quick easy dinner ideas that incorporate more veggies and meat?

[MrsLMB]

We buy the steam in bag veggies that are quick and simple to heat up in the microwave. The only thing I could suggest for meat is grilling a bunch of chicken breasts on the weekend and keeping them in the fridge to use throughout the week. Tuna is popular around here too since its straight out of the can eatable. Also, if she is into rice I highly recommend a rice cooker. You just dump the rice in and add water and in 20 minutes you have tasty rice that you can refrigerate for a few days. We buy our rice from an asian grocery store and it is so delicious!

[lunarmagic]

I've been having a similar problem... she's pushed her nap later so when she wakes up at 4 or 4:30 she's hungry NOW and then doesn't want dinner.

[-erin-]

We have a rice cooker, so we use that a couple times a week. I guess what I'll need to do is instead of just making up the food the night before so I cook it (which takes 20-30 mins) when we get home from work, I need to cook it the night before too so I only have to heat it up and it's basically like leftovers. We have a bunch of the steam bags of veggies, but DH never thinks to take them out and cook them (he gets home a few minutes before us and usually will start dinner if I lay it out specifically for him).

or we need to put blinders on Juliet and get her to the living room first so she doesn't beeline for the boxes of cereal as soon as we walk in the door

[edgeofelise]

I made a super easy dinner last night that you could prep the night before. It was the best stir-fry I've ever done! I diced up some bacon and browned it, then added onions and garlic, red pepper flakes, and diced chicken breast. When the chicken was almost done I put in an insane amount of vegetables (cauliflower, red, yellow and orange peppers, green beans, carrots, basically everything we had in the fridge.) Frozen ones would be fine. At the end I added a bunch of fresh spinach and a few handfuls of walnuts. I made a super simple dressing with garlic, olive oil, lemon juice and thyme and tossed it in at the end so the lemon wouldn't get bitter and the garlic would be fresh. It took maybe 10-15 minutes to cook it all--most of the work was in the prep which I did a few hours earlier when Eliza was eating her snack. Mmm, bacon and walnuts...

[survey77777]

^ That sounds really good Danielle!

What about using a slow cooker Erin. That helped me out so much when we were both working nutty schedules. For a while I was really good about making black beans and rice all the time and that was perfect to give G anytime this happened. We had rice bowls out of it, burritos, just plain beans and rice, added it to salads. I usually keep some leftovers in the fridge too so that I can cube up some cooked chicken for him. This keeps him busy with a little snack while I finish dinner. I usually keep some homemade soup in the fridge too. Stir-fry dinners are a quickie we go to too. I make curried everything too. THe pre-marinating meats before freezing them saves a lot of time too. Usually if I at least know what I'm making I can get it done fairly quickly but I am horrible in the planning department. Making spaghetti sauce the day ahead so all you have to do is boil noodles works well. I also freeze a few portions when I do this for future dinners. Tacos are fast of course. I used to make batches of burritos with my sister and freeze them so that we had quick healthy dinners on hand. We'd usually each make one meat filling and then do the veggies etc. together. Sometimes her stepdaughter would join us and we'd have pulled pork, chicken and beef burritos on the go. Those were tasty times.
Those pre cooked rotisserie chickens from the grocery store are great for this too. Costco ones are huge and a good deal if that's convenient to you. I cut off the meat and make chicken and broccoli casseroles, and other yummy quick things with these. Then you also have enough left over for a second main course or else sandwiches and a soup.
Rambling as usual. I think the crockpot is the best thing for your situation though. I love it when I get organized enough to use mine on a regular basis.