I keep seeing this question, so thought id pipe in some unsolicited advice - cos going from never shopping/cooking/cleaning for yourself to doing it all for yourself all the time can just seem overwhelming.
Everyone can cook (with or without recipe) curry, spaghetti bolognaise, pasta dishes etc. BUT the problem is they are a shopping, cooking and cleanup time sink. It’s easy to do one of those, but all together, every day, week in week out each night of the week, can be exhausting. Yes you could just “be an adult” and get on with it, but one step at a time yo
Evening meals
You want two types of meals.
Easy, healthy but lazy meals where ingredients overlap to avoid waste and save money.
Overlapping meals
carbs (rice, potatoes, pasta, best to avoid chips)
Veg (no cook: leaves, cucumber, carrot, radish, celery) (cook: roast veg like mushrooms, peppers, onion, tomatoes etc.)
Protein (chicken, fish, steak, ribs)
Spices: Cajun spice, sauces etc
You want these to be stuff you can walk into a shop when you’re stressed, tired or running on empty and can sorta half-grab and know that’ll sort you for a few days-the week.
Packet rice is a godsend, all the veg and protein is interchangeable. It’s not a luxury meal, but you can do it in the oven in 30 mins with 1 or 2 trays. Or fry and do something in the oven.
Frozen veg, chicken, fish can save money but is again not the most ideal/healthy.
Example meals:
Chicken veg rice
Salmon veg rice
Ribs veg rice
Yeah, boring, but nearly as fast as frozen food and won’t make u feel like shit.
Effort meals:
The nights you’re back early, can put something on and leave or want something decent to eat.
Your curries, spaghetti bolognaise or anything that needs a few pots and pans and cutting of ingredients. This is a lifeline. You can cook 2+ portions (heck cook 7 portions). I used to cook a 8 servings chilli (with excessive veg) to have cba microwave meals. Can do tacos, chilli n rice, nachos etc.
Breakfast
Everyone does breakfast differently, pick one maybe 2, but:
Yoghurt and oats
Eggs on toast
Beans on toast
Smoothie
You want to be able to make these while you brew a coffee. If you can be arsed to make yourself a lunch too, cereal isn’t ideal but if necessary choose something that ain’t coco pops.
Lunch
There’s a lot about your lifestyle that decides this, maybe there’s a cheap cafe at uni, a co-op, whichever suits you.
Buying a bag of crisps and some fruit, and making a sandwich in the evening while you cook your tea can remove a lot of stress for the following day.
You can cook a pack of chicken and wrap individually in cling film.
If you have a microwave when you lunch: do some micro rice and chicken.
If you don’t: microwave the rice the night before, let it cool, unwrap and place frozen chicken on top, and let it defrost in the fridge over night. By time lunch comes, the chicken would have defrosted.
You’ll also have some spare meals from the effort meals. And some protein that serves 2 that u could cook and have for evening + lunch the next day.
The main thing to take from this
make your lazy meals manageable, healthy and easy to shop/cook/clean. If you’re eating shit you’ll feel like shit. If you’re putting same low effort in and eating healthy, you don’t need to put in effort to allow yourself to bounce back/recover. Plan for lazy you
You now now a norm, you can choose to cook better meals as u get accustomed to shopping/cooking/cleaning and ur ingredients/spice rack grows. You’ll find steak is actually a quick meal to cook, and other meals you enjoy will be muscle memory.
You can still have coco pops, frozen pizza, ready meals, donuts, snacks bits, beige foods, takeaway, but they’re not sustainable all the time, and you’ll feel it.
All da best ✌🏻
