Need meal inspiration for hot weather!

TheRobotsAreComing

We're in the middle of a heatwave here, and I cannot face cooking much, if anything at the moment.

What are your go-to hot weather recipes? So far I have feta and watermelon salad, and Nigella's mushroom, lemon and thyme spaghetti (the only thing that needs cooking is the spaghetti for 10 mins).

What are your favourites in hot weather?

ReenieHJ

Ice cream!!
Yeh, probably not the help you were looking for. My downfall is that I'm not much of a cook so am always eating simple to put together foods such as yogurt and veggie salads with chicken. When it's really hot I don't want anything hot. Not even pizza. So for me, it'd be sandwiches, yogurt and salads.

futuresylph

The trinity for me these days: green salad, fruit salad, and tuna salad.

cmriverside

I pre-cook chicken (like in the mornings when it's cooler, or in the crockpot) - then it goes on salads and sandwiches or I just eat it cold with vegetables.
I also really like pasta salad with smoked salmon.
Hard boiled eggs are good to have around, it takes two minutes to make some egg salad for a sandwich and then a side of julienned vegetables.
Tuna salad
Pre-cooking potatoes comes in handy for potato salad or just cold potatoes
Pre-cooked rice has a lot of "salad" possibilities too. I get up at o'dark thirty so I do my cooking then.

AnnPT77

Gazpacho, though there are high calorie versions, but tasty low-cal ones are out there (I wing it).

Cold yogurt-based soups, including fruit soups as well as vegetable ones.

Cold soups can include pureed soft tofu or white beans for extra protein.

Bean salads from canned beans. I don't recipe, and many variations work, but one I do is something like red or black beans with some combo of sweet peppers, cucumber, cherry tomatoes, sweet or green onions, and calorie-affordable amounts of sweet corn (frozen cooks quickly) or avocado, and bits of smoked provolone or mozzarella (slicing string cheese is quick). Dress with salsa, or vinegar + herbs of choice. (I like malt vinegar, especially, with beans.) Eat on its own, or atop a heap of leafy greens.

acpgee

There are a couple of basic pasta's where the sauce is made in the 10 minues it takes the pasta to cook:
https://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/2017/aug/20/the-only-4-spaghetti-recipes-you-will-ever-need-giorgio-locatelli
Also a couple of other no cook pasta sauces are pesto alla genovese (freezes well so make a lot while basil is cheap in summer and enjoy a whif of summer all winter long) and pesto alla trapanese (needs to be made fresh).
https://www.food.com/recipe/pesto-marcella-hazan-448339
https://www.greatitalianchefs.com/recipes/pesto-trapanese-recipe

Pair your pasta with a salad. My favourite salad resource is this:
https://www.nytimes.com/2009/07/22/dining/22mlist.html

wilson10102018

Shrimp Cocktail (try 10 Jumbo Shrimp). A whole more protein per calorie than beef or pork. Lightly sauteed in a few Tbs of water and Old Bay or Better than Bouillon Lobster Base then cooled in the frig.

TheRobotsAreComing

Thank you for the suggestions! I like the sound of the bean salad, definitely going to add that one to the list this week.

kshama2001

I'm on the email list for allrecipes and received this recently. Have not checked out any of them yet.

15 No-Cook Meals You Can Make from Rotisserie Chicken

icemom011

Cabbage, broccoli and mango slaw. Other veggies that go in it are jalapeno peppers, red bell pepper, onion, cilantro, scallions, canned black beans, cucumber. Dressing is a vinegar (i use apple cider), lemon or lime juice, touch of olive oil if you like ( I don't add that anymore, i find it's great without extra calories), soy sauce, black pepper, cayenne, you can add sesame seeds too.
Salads are great, i eat bid salad for dinner few times a week topped with chopped up rotisserie chicken.

Antiopelle

If even boiling pasta is too hot, you can replace it by taboule. Put one cup in a bowl, add a cup of boiling water and a tablespoon of olive oil or a small cube of butter. Cover and let it soak for 5 minutes and then fluff up with a fork.
Top with veggies and protein as you like.

acpgee

Salade nicoise using the Alistair Little recipe. Potatoes and eggs boiled and tuna seared in the morning. Beans blanched by putting them in a salad spinner and pouring a kettle full of boiling water over them.

vanmep

Soft tacos, Greek salad, sandwiches and soup (I know people think soup is a winter meal, but I make lots in a slow cooker and then heat up a bowl for dinner)

janejellyroll

I live on gazpacho in the summer time, but I'm also a fan of just chopping up tons of fresh vegetables and tossing them with dressing.

acpgee

Caesar topped with salmon mi cuit and salmon skin crackling. Mi cuit cooked with the sous vide wand in the morning and served cold. Salmon skin removed after cooking and crisped up for 10 minutes in the air fryer in the morning.
We had a freezer crisis today probably due to the heat wave. Freezer alarm went off because it is not at a safe temperature. Had to cook the kilo of salmon we had in there (mi cuit using the sous vide wand) and am now re-freezing what we didn't eat tonight. I have a kilo of beef shin in the sous vide being turned into unseasonal estouffade which I will re-freeze after cooking. I also put the kilo of chicken bones in the freezer into the stock pot.
For cooking indoors in the heat my favourite gadgets are the air fryer, the sous vide wand, and the blow torch.

cwolfman13

It's always hot in the summer in my neck of the desert. I eat a lot more salads in the summer as well as things like gazpacho and other cold soups. We do very little cooking indoors in the summer and I'm on the grill almost every evening. Lots of fish and chicken thighs. We also received a sushi making kit as a gift and we've been working on our skills there.

acpgee

Taking a page from Sicilian breakfast that inclues granita, breakfast was peach sorbet and strawberries. Easiest tinned fruit sorbet can be made by blitzing a tin of fruit in the food processor. If packed in juice instead of syrup you will need to sweeten to taste with sugar, as otherwise it will freeze too solid. A tablespoon of vodka or fruit liqueur will also enhance scoopability. Freeze, giving it a stir with a fork every hour or so.

ReenieHJ

acpgee wrote: »

Caesar topped with salmon mi cuit and salmon skin crackling. Mi cuit cooked with the sous vide wand in the morning and served cold. Salmon skin removed after cooking and crisped up for 10 minutes in the air fryer in the morning.
We had a freezer crisis today probably due to the heat wave. Freezer alarm went off because it is not at a safe temperature. Had to cook the kilo of salmon we had in there (mi cuit using the sous vide wand) and am now re-freezing what we didn't eat tonight. I have a kilo of beef shin in the sous vide being turned into unseasonal estouffade which I will re-freeze after cooking. I also put the kilo of chicken bones in the freezer into the stock pot.
For cooking indoors in the heat my favourite gadgets are the air fryer, the sous vide wand, and the blow torch.

That looks just like my breakfast from yesterday. Except I used Rasp. Balsamic dressing and Minus the salmon skin. My dogs got that part of it. And it was such a good salad!!

IllustriousBee

If you can pre-cook chicken or other lean protein you can just have that with some sort of salad. I made an awesome, huge fruit salad the other day for my whole family with strawberries, blueberries, kiwi, and granny smith apples with a "dressing" made with 1/4 cup of honey and a couple tablespoons of lime juice. I also make regular greens salads all the time with a mix of greens, tomatoes, carrots, green onions, and cucumber with a fat free or calorie free dressing. I don't usually mind cooking in the summer, but I know some days I just feel too hot and muggy to want to stand in a hot kitchen.

acpgee

ReenieHJ wrote: »

Ice cream!!
Yeh, probably not the help you were looking for. My downfall is that I'm not much of a cook so am always eating simple to put together foods such as yogurt and veggie salads with chicken. When it's really hot I don't want anything hot. Not even pizza. So for me, it'd be sandwiches, yogurt and salads.

I've been experimenting with this and the best result so far and not too unhealthy is any tinned fruit in light syrup blitzed with a banana in the food processor. Freeze in a tub, mashing the mixture with a fork every hour or so. If you are short on freezer space put the mixture into a zip lock bag and freeze flat. Give the bag a bit of a massage every hour so that it freezes less solid.

MikePfirrman

I've been making Foil packets with corn, red potatoes, onions, green peppers and garlic (I leave the garlic in the skin, just cut off the bottom). Then another packet (later) with Shrimp, lots of seasoning (like Old Bay or Zatarins) and some orange or lemon slices and grilling them. It's just a take on a Shrimp boil, but it's quick, you don't have to spend time around a hot grill -- literally put it on and take it off, but the shrimp only take like 5 minutes, tops.

First time I made it, tried to put it all together and it burned the shrimp a bit. Now, I put the shrimp in later (in shell still). You can even use frozen, deveined shrimp as long as they are pulled apart with cold water in advance. I think that helps them from burning.

Chopped salads or quinoa/kale salads are also one of my go-to meals in hotter weather.

ReenieHJ

acpgee wrote: »

ReenieHJ wrote: »

Ice cream!!
Yeh, probably not the help you were looking for. My downfall is that I'm not much of a cook so am always eating simple to put together foods such as yogurt and veggie salads with chicken. When it's really hot I don't want anything hot. Not even pizza. So for me, it'd be sandwiches, yogurt and salads.

I've been experimenting with this and the best result so far and not too unhealthy is any tinned fruit in light syrup blitzed with a banana in the food processor. Freeze in a tub, mashing the mixture with a fork every hour or so. If you are short on freezer space put the mixture into a zip lock bag and freeze flat. Give the bag a bit of a massage every hour so that it freezes less solid.

I freeze banana chunks, add frozen strawberries or any other fruit I have in the freezer, maybe 1/2 cup of almond milk, peanut butter if I'm in the mood and whiz it through the blender. It's so good. I've also used frozen watermelon which is really good. It's a great replacement for ice cream and so refreshing, similar to what you do. I'll have to try the frozen canned fruit.

acpgee

ReenieHJ wrote: »

acpgee wrote: »

ReenieHJ wrote: »

Ice cream!!
Yeh, probably not the help you were looking for. My downfall is that I'm not much of a cook so am always eating simple to put together foods such as yogurt and veggie salads with chicken. When it's really hot I don't want anything hot. Not even pizza. So for me, it'd be sandwiches, yogurt and salads.

I've been experimenting with this and the best result so far and not too unhealthy is any tinned fruit in light syrup blitzed with a banana in the food processor. Freeze in a tub, mashing the mixture with a fork every hour or so. If you are short on freezer space put the mixture into a zip lock bag and freeze flat. Give the bag a bit of a massage every hour so that it freezes less solid.

I freeze banana chunks, add frozen strawberries or any other fruit I have in the freezer, maybe 1/2 cup of almond milk, peanut butter if I'm in the mood and whiz it through the blender. It's so good. I've also used frozen watermelon which is really good. It's a great replacement for ice cream and so refreshing, similar to what you do. I'll have to try the frozen canned fruit.

Frozen seedless grapes are a great hot weather snack too. They taste like sorbet pellets.

littlegreenparrot1

I like to make a frittata.
This week's had courgette and spring onion in it. Slice it up and it'll sit in the fridge for a few days.
A piece with salad or a baked potato is very easy. Made for nice lunch boxes in the sun this week

xrj22

Lentil salad, southwest salad, black bean dip or hunus on vegies or "Mary's gone crackers," fruit salads.

wilson10102018

wilson10102018 wrote: »

Shrimp Cocktail (try 10 Jumbo Shrimp). A whole more protein per calorie than beef or pork. Lightly sauteed in a few Tbs of water and Old Bay or Better than Bouillon Lobster Base then cooled in the frig.

I thought we were talking about meat substitutes. But, what the heck!

My favorite salad in Summer is crumbled up Tostidos with a layer of thin sliced tomatoes, then a layer of thin sliced Vidalia onion, then Basil, then smoked salmon chunks, than Balsamic vinegar and only the slightest drizzle of chili pepper infused olive oil. Add sea salt flakes to taste.

krjohnson1292

Homemade Stir Fry with Konjac Noodles are perfect for low calories and a light lunch. 3 ounces of Konjac noodles are only 30 calories.

Priasmama416

Chicken salad sandwiches, made with prepared chicken such as rotisseri,with salad or fruit on the side. I also have been using my air fryer alot to make things, so the house doesn't get hot with fruit or salads on the side

callsitlikeiseeit

we eat a lot of grilled chicken salad in the summer, or just grill in general

Clairin

AnnPT77 wrote: »

Gazpacho, though there are high calorie versions, but tasty low-cal ones are out there (I wing it).

Cold yogurt-based soups, including fruit soups as well as vegetable ones.

Cold soups can include pureed soft tofu or white beans for extra protein.

Bean salads from canned beans. I don't recipe, and many variations work, but one I do is something like red or black beans with some combo of sweet peppers, cucumber, cherry tomatoes, sweet or green onions, and calorie-affordable amounts of sweet corn (frozen cooks quickly) or avocado, and bits of smoked provolone or mozzarella (slicing string cheese is quick). Dress with salsa, or vinegar + herbs of choice. (I like malt vinegar, especially, with beans.) Eat on its own, or atop a heap of leafy greens.

For me this is a great answer. I have canned mixed bean salad and a carton of gazpacho in the fridge as I type this. I freeze fruit and blend with plain yoghurt. This I call fruit soup and serve with muesli or granola and fresh fruit.