Help me change my naff diet

[Shorty]

In all seriousness, I need help (in more ways than one)..

My missus is living & working away for another few months yet.. so Im suffering the curse of being..

1) A lazy cook.
2) A terrible cook.
3) Cooking for one sucks and I can't be arsed to do a "Jamie Oliver" in the kitchen after work each night. I just need quick and simple.

My current food intake is bad, bad. Microwave food or takeout.

Suggestions needed for quick & easy to make meals that are vaguely healthy for me

[Nick]

This needn't be a chore, even if you do have take out or microwave meals.

First off, supplement your meal by having some vegetables with it. So even if you are having a ready made fish pie, then just throw some frozen peas, cauliflower and broccoli on a saucepan, cover with boiling water from the kettle (if you want to hurry things along) and have them with the pie.

The idea is to get your fibre intake up, which will help you feel more full, meaning you can buy the smaller porions of ready made meals, which in tunr will help you to reduce your fat and salt intae, which most ready meals are quite high in compared to home cooked versions.

Next would be to plan a couple of days ahead. I know this is a pain, but it can be really easy too.. Say you have chilli out of a can one night. When you boil up the rice for it, do a double amount and save the rest in the fridge. The next night you now have rice ready for a stir fry! The same can be done with pasta and potatoes too.

Here's a recipe for a quick stir fry, that takes ten minutes max... and even if you don't have all the ingredients, you can still give it a go.

Nasi Goreng

1 chicken breast, shredded
1 red pepper, sliced
2 tsp Nasi Goreng paste
150g cooked rice
Dash of light soy sauce
50g cooked peeled prawns

Method

Warm the wok over a high heat and brown off the chicken.

Add the pepper and fry for a minute or two, then add the paste and fry for two more minutes.

Add the rice and stir well, then stir fry for 5 minutes.

Stir in the prawns and heat through, then season with the soy sauce.

[Iain]

Nasi Goreng (Nosey Gammon). Deck made it the other night and it was ace. Had a medium sized bowl and was struggling to get through it. Oh and you should see his spice rack(s). Huge selection. I only have 3 and 2 of them are salt and pepper....

[Jiff Lemon]

Don't know the offical Chef's verdict but what about making double portions and freezing one? So, for example, make a hooge Spag bol (Check out the varying recipies for it in here!). You can have one portion and freeze another, so that when you come home and really CBA to cook, you've your own ready made microwaveable meal.

[Nick]

Jiff's got a point. In general, if you're freezing anything you have cooked yourself, make sure that the container you want to store it in is spotlessly clean. Cool the food in the container with the lid on until it is coole enough to be picked up by hand. If you put it into your freezer when it is very hot, you risk warming your freezer up and defrosting the food the container is next to. If you ahve a quick freeze compartment, use that.

When defrosting NEVER defrost at room temperature. A 1.5 litre bowl of frozen bolognaise will take roughly 8 hours to defrost if left at room temerature. That's plenty of time for any bacteria to multiply in the sauce around the edge which will defrost first and then make you very ill.

The other alternative is to defrost in the microwave as this shortens the time that bacteria have to multiply dramatically.

[Shorty]

This is a cool stuff. keep it coming