Cooking for one??

happycauseIride
happycauseIride Posts: 536 Member
in Food and Nutrition
I don't normally cook for just me. Usually when I cook it's for my family and if I'm by myself I just heat up a healthy choice or a bowl of soup or something. But we have been on the go all week, pizza and fast food and I will be alone for supper tonight again and I want real food. I don't want easy mac and a hot dog tonight.

Ideas? Help?

Replies

  • navyrigger46
    navyrigger46 Posts: 1,301 Member
    Breakfast is always great for dinner, Eggs, Bacon and some fruit. Homemade nacho's. A baked, loaded sweet potato. Grill up a steak or some pork chops and have a salad with it. One of my personal favorites is stir-fry and or some fried rice, both are simple one person meals.

    Rigger
  • MyaPapaya75
    MyaPapaya75 Posts: 3,143 Member
    have breakfast!
  • KarenJanine
    KarenJanine Posts: 3,497 Member
    Lots of my mid-week meals when I'm eating alone consist of steamed fish with steamed veggies or omellettes with whatever needs using from the fridge thrown in.
  • lilRicki
    lilRicki Posts: 4,555 Member
    I grill a fish fillet (my family doesn't eat fish), steam some veggies and rice :) it's beautiful with a glass of wine :bigsmile:
  • IronmanPanda
    IronmanPanda Posts: 2,083 Member
    Throw a steak on the gril
  • micheleb15
    micheleb15 Posts: 1,418 Member
    Pasta and cereal were always my go-tos when my husband worked nights. I would make a bolognese sauce and freeze it, or saute some veggies and make a chicken broth based sauce with parmesan cheese and garlic. Pasta ideas are limitless and so easy to make for one.
  • bert16
    bert16 Posts: 726 Member
    I live alone so cook for myself all the time! It's super easy to make a stir fry with chicken or shrimp and some veggies, bake or grill a chicken breast with some steamed veggies, make a turkey or a chicken wrap... just make smaller portions of what you'd normally cook for the family.
  • jeremyjirwin
    jeremyjirwin Posts: 15
    What I had last night...

    On a hot skillet or wok.

    1 tbsp of sesame oil or peanut oil.
    3 oz of peeled, de-veined shrimp without the tails
    1 oz of sliced almonds
    1 cup of chopped broccoli
    3 tbsp soy sauce (I used ponzu, which is a soy sauce citrus blend)
    1 minced garlic clove
    2 oz udon noodles
    1 teaspoon curry paste
    Shriracha - add to taste - optional

    I heated the oil in my pan then threw in the shrimp and started frying them. Once they were looking good, a couple minutes of cooking from frozen, I threw on the broccoli and added a tablespoon of ponzu and curry paste and garlic (you can add more seasonings, but I don't really think it needed it). I think I also added a little bit of water to mix the curry paste in a little better... Not more than a couple tablespoons, I wasn't making soup here. Once that had all cooked off, another few minutes, I threw on my cooked udon noodles and the sliced almonds and added the rest of the ponzu. Stir fried it for another minute, dumped it on a plate (this filled my whole dinner plate). I finished it off by spreading a little Shriracha over the top.

    This was a REALLY big meal, so don't be afraid to add just a small amount more of all the ingredients and splitting it between two people, or reducing all the ingredients for one person. You could also cut the almonds out and have a full meal for just a little more than 400 calories, or slightly reduce the amount of noodles to add a small amount of almonds because they make it super tasty! I was just sharing what I ate. It took less time to cook than the kids' pizza they begged for. A LOT LESS TIME. Heck, I could have made this in less time than a frozen pizza from the store even.
  • dawningr
    dawningr Posts: 387 Member
    A protein and veggies are my go-to. Chicken breast/ lean pork/ turkey burgers.

    zucchini and summer squash overload for me lately, I love summer :-)
  • kuroi19
    kuroi19 Posts: 45
    1. Meat of choice (chicken or fish go best, beef is healthy but difficult to cook right) also fish or chicken you can oven cook next to the potatoes-about 150cal for a piece
    2. Boiled or ovenbaked baby potatoes - can be as little as 100 cals for a few of them
    3. Vegetables - either fresh if you have any (tomato and cucumber salad dressed with vinegar?) or just mixed frozen. They get you full, cost little, rather healthy and fill up. - 100 cals or so also. Yup takes a lot of veg to make up 100 cals, might as well.
    Optional: Hollandise sauce, Parsley sauce... - depends but most of them take only water so rank up at around 50 cals for a large quantity of sauce. And I mean large as in half a litre, enough to make two meals swim in it.

    A full meal of as little as 350-400 cals, Most things are not spoiling too fast, you can easily freeze the rest of the meat and vegetable you didn't need and it takes very little time and effort so won't feel like a waste of time standing in the kitchen just for yourself.
  • marydillet
    marydillet Posts: 14
    Hi, i do baked sweet potato filled with cottage cheese and lots of ground pepper or i throw some chopped veg ie: onion, pepper, mushroom and courgette in a frying pan with a spice (cumin, curry, chilli, oregano) and a half can of tomatoes let it all simmer for about 15 to 20 mins and pile it on top of 75g of your favourite rice. I also do a 3 bean chilli, a homemade tomato sauce and homemade turkey burgers, make each one enough for 4 portions, keep them in the freezer and you will always have something low-fat, low calorie and nutritious to fall back on. Good luck x
  • happycauseIride
    happycauseIride Posts: 536 Member
    Wow this is great. Thanks for all your responses. I think I'm loving the breakfast idea. Omelets sound good. But so does fish because I'm the only one who will eat it. My family loves stir fry so they would be disappointed if they missed that. Hmm. Now I really have a decision to make.

    Thanks again.
  • crystalmoore83
    crystalmoore83 Posts: 103 Member
    I love this alfredo sauce recipe, super easy and delicious, add some steamed broccoli and grilled chicken, or what ever you want!

    1 cup 2% milk
    1 1/2 tablespoons butter
    1 1/2 tablespoons flour
    3 tablespoons parmesan cheese
    1/2 teaspoon minced garlic
    1 dash pepper


    Directions:

    1.The key here is patience, add all ingredients gradually!


    2.Melt butter in sauce pan on stove top with medium heat.


    3.Gradually whisk in flour.


    4.This will create a yellow paste.


    5.Gradually add milk, whisking until incorporated and no lumps are present.


    6.Continue to whisk until hot.


    7.Usually 3-5 minutes.


    8.The longer you cook the base (without the cheese) the thicker the sauce will be.


    9.Add parmesan slowly, again whisking until incorporated.


    10.Add crushed garlic and pepper.
  • PapaverSomniferum
    PapaverSomniferum Posts: 2,670 Member
    Whenever I cook a meal for the family that I am especially fond of, I make just a bit extra and save a portion (or two!) in containers to freeze.

    That way, when I end up eating alone, I basically have a microwave dinner already prepared. It's way nicer than the slice of toast or bowl of cereal I'd otherwise eat.

    I'm way too accustomed to cooking for 4 people to manage to cook for just myself.
  • auddii
    auddii Posts: 15,357 Member
    I cook larger amounts, eat some for dinner, and then portion the rest into individual portions and freeze for later. I don't mind eating the same thing day after day, so I do huge batches, but you could cook 2-3 servings of a few different things and have quite a variety in your freezer.

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