On the phone with Jeaniene Frost
Me: I haven’t done anything for a whole week.
J: I hear you. Dragoncon was a lot.
Me: I might take the next week off too.
J: This is so unlike you. I’m starting the new project next week.
Me: But why?
J: List of reasons that make sense.
Me: No, don’t work!
J: I need to start it so I at least have something…
Me: No, be lazy with me!
J: This is highly ironic coming from you.
Clearly I need more time off. My body and mind are not ready. Nope.
Also Satisfactory 1.0 hit, Gordon and I playing Wow – Dragonflight is pretty awesome, so we are starting there, and I have read 2 books last week. If I can gather together enough willpower, I will clean the kitchen. Or I might not. I might just be lazy.
I think I ran out of whatever it is that makes workaholics function. I seem to have misplaced it. Maybe it’s in my craft room, around the yarn stash somewhere. I should really go look there.
Look at this cute doggie!
I still have to make some kind of a dinner. What is your favorite lazy meal? Please share and save me from having to let go of my laziness.
Happy Friday, everyone. I wish you the best weekend.
An easy meal I often have when I am alone is a couple of cheese crisps—depending on the size of the tortillas at hand. Turn on the broiler put a little salsa on the tortilla and add cheese. Broil until crispy, about 3-4 minutes.
TBT, I have this for breakfast, too.
My favorite lazy meal is pot roast. Put a chuck roast, several halved potatoes, and 5 or 6 halved carrots in the crock pot in the morning. Sprinkle 2 packages of Lipton beefy onion soup mix on top, and turn on low. Eight hours later I skim excess oil from top, add a little corn starch in water to thicken the gravy, and you’re ready to eat a delicious meal with very little effort.
Oops, forgot the part where I cover with water before turning on the crock pot. 🙂
Any pasta dish was our lazy dish. Particularly ramen with 1/2 or less packet of seasoning, lots of greens or any leftover veggies and egg dropped in with shiracha sauce. One pot cooking and warm, yummy, salty goodness and with veggies!! Alas can no longer do that any more, but the memories still make me smile.
Nachos with canned chili and cheddar cheese for the instant food win.
Lazy meal- Trader Joe’s Mac n cheese (shells and white cheddar) and Trader Joe’s party size meatballs( air fry them)~ combine done in like 15 minutes total
My favourite lazy meal is Garlic Bread Sandwiches. Using any kind of bun or bread that you like, make cheesy garlic toast. Slice and fry in pan: mushrooms, sweet peppers, and onions. (Go ahead and replace mushrooms with meat if you like.) Add some barbeque sauce to frying pan, stir around and scoop on top of cheesy garlic toast. Open or closed sandwich works.
When low on energy, the microwave and precooked food is your best friend. There are several companies that specialize in frozen, precooked meat, which is awesome for anyone with chronic fatigue or who does not want to or cannot handle raw meat. Some of my favorites are some of Tyson’s, including their chicken strips, popcorn chicken, rotisserie chicken wings, or ready pulled chicken breast or John Soules steak fajita strip, all of which can be microwaved. You can grab tortillas and whole wheat bread to make sandwiches, pair it with chips and salsa, or cook a Minute rice cup in the microwave to make rice and veggies. Add any frozen vegetable or soup you want. One of my favorite combinations is to cook the pulled chicken, Minute rice, and Birds Eye Asian Vegetable Medley. It has enough seasoning to make it feel fancy without my IBS taking offense (heads-up there is a small amount or onion and garlic in the flavorings).
My mother used to make something called “desperation dinner” — canned vegetable soup poured over a slice of toast.
I love what she called it! Personally, my lazy dinner is a pimento cheese sandwich and cold instant coffee. I’m moving but I have it even when I’m not. Too lazy to microwave the coffee.
Favorite (almost) no work meal- scrambled eggs with diced green chiles and diced cheese. Grating is too much work. Toast. Maybe a piece of fruit. If I have it. ❤️
Take a pound of mushrooms of your choosing. Fry them up (without salt) in oil/butter till browned. Add garlic to taste, salt, pepper. Then add a cup of broth. Boil up some egg noodles. Add the noodles to the mushies and stir till combined. Serve. Play with it and add whatever floats your boat. Enjoy!
I make several cottage / shepherds pies at once and stack them in the freezer so when life is too dang rough I pull one out, take the top of the pyrex dish, soven at 365 and if its already defrosted because I knew it was gonna be a rough day cook for 35-40 minutes, when the potato peaks are just golden brown, if its a real omg emergency, and its still frozen cover the dish with a bit of foil and after 20-30 minutes take off the foil and its gonna be at least 35 more minutes.
basic ingredients browned meat (lamb beef, whatever) or cooked poultry I have a fun thanksgiving edition, I like my onions caramelized so I add them to the meat when cooking some cooked sausage, some veggies – peas, carrots, green beans you can leave these frozen will cook when baked, Gravy of your choice, and enough potatoes to cover the top of the dish , for instance if you are making an 8×8 pan expect to need 1.5 to 2 cups smashed potatoes. I don’t use milk in the potatoes but broth and a bit of butter or avo oil, because it freezes a bit better. the spices change with the meat, but use whatever makes you happy for instance some poultry seasoning if chicken, all of them taste better when you make sure to add sausage, if you dont have sausage be sure to add just a bit of cayenne or smoked paprika or flavor maybe horribly bland. flavor is everything! I usually make 4 of these at once, and try to have at least two flavors in the freezer, you might think having 12 in the freezer is a bit much, but I try to have one a week, and i have a few other freezer meals too, because I’d rather cook a lot on one day a month than try to figure out what I want instead of whats on the so called menu. grumble grumble. weirdo that I am I also can meals. oh well I guess that outs me as closet homesteader
Not sure about lazy, but my favorite comfort meal is my mother’s potato soup:
peel (or not) and dice two or three potatoes (red, russet, yukon gold, whatever you have)
boil potatoes in salted water until fork tender but not mushy
drain water – leave a quarter cup if you want
add skim milk (or whatever you like) to cover potatoes.
Add as much butter as you want
season with salt, pepper, and maybe some dried marjoram (I love this ) or other herb you love.
heat until the butter melts and the soup is warm to medium hot (don’t boil)
curl up in your favorite chair with your favorite blanket and eat.
ps you can do this as individual meals as well, I make indie lasagnas for those times when the milk intolerant in the house want something I dont, usually the stuffed bell peppers which can also be a great freezer meal. Just tossing out some ideas, for the workaholics, this can be great especially when deadlines are involved, better than fast food and usually just one pan to clean up, though you can do foil pans if you must, then even less pans to clean up, foil isn’t really good for you though so I don’t usually recommend it, except as a temporary lid when cooking. Trader joes has a frozen shepherds pie I think? been a while since I’ve been there. anyway that and some cocoa with a good book on a rainy day, happy moments.
Lazy meal – jarred pesto (we like the kind from costco), bite size cut up chicken breast, zucchini halved lengthwise then ½ “ sliced, frozen broccoli florets, pad thai rice noodles
Start water boiling for noodles then saute chicken in a skillet, when it’s almost done add the zucchini, few minutes later add the broccoli, (water boiling? Add noodles) couple minutes later stir in the pesto. Chicken stuff over cooked noodles.
The pesto is messy and hard to clean out of cast iron so you could throw it all in a bowl and mix in the pesto.
We don’t always eat it with noodles. I used to make it with zucchini noodles (spiralizer) but on a tired, hungry day I just cut up the zukes and we ate it without noodles.
Lazy meal fall edition – pesto chicken soup with broccoli and tortellini
Chicken broth – jarred, boxed, from bouillon, not made today! Canned chicken, frozen broccoli florets, tortellini. We used to be able to get frozen tortellini in bags from costco but whatever you have
Get the chicken broth heating while you cut super huge florets to bite size, add tortellini to the broth, when it’s looking almost done add the canned chicken and pesto. Add the frozen broccoli at the end because it will cool the soup a bit and cooks quickly.
I don’t eat this anymore because I tested positive for gluten intolerance and haven’t found gf tortellini. So sad! I would make it with homemade broth and cut up chicken on a higher energy, less busy day.
Also – didn’t you have 🐦⬛ vid earlier in the year? I was low(er) energy and inflamed (achey, brain fog) for about a year after I had it.
Take care! Hope the recipes help!
Yes to rest and laziness! I will join you in spirit.
Love the photo of Mona.
Lazy food:
1. Baked potato (or boiled or nuked) with a scoop of cottage cheese, chopped green onion or herbs, salt & pepper.
2. Salmon filet baked at 400F in ceramic, lidded pot (or in tin foil) with a squeeze of lemon, dabs of butter, and maybe chopped dill, parsley and/or capers, etc, or not depending on personal energy level. Usually done in 20 mins or less, depending on size, & is lovely with rice and salad, boiled potatoes, or some green peas for super quick and no effort.
I love the salmon filet idea (and I saved your instructions) But I up the laziness factor and get it already cooked in the fancy deli section of my local Pavilions grocery store. Then I often add it to a noodle bowl or ramen pack.
Your body is telling you to rest because you had the you know what again. It is a very debilitating illness and you need to rest and recover.
I can live on cheese, crackers, a little prosciutto and some olives, plus a glass of wine. But if I need something that looks more like a meal, in the summer I love this Ina Garten recipe, https://barefootcontessa.com/recipes/summer-garden-pasta
Dragonflight was really good – and The War Within is just as good! (If not better in many ways.) Dynamic flying makes the world feel alive. 🍻
Eggs, in one of their many possible forms.
Fried egg sandwich on a piece of homemade focaccia.
Scrambled with leftover chicken or sliced ham.
Some type of omelette, maybe with the aforementioned leftover
Meat and frozen vegetables.
Hard boiled along whatever strikes you. Maybe chopped in a can of soup.
Lazy meal, or exhaustion meal I have 3… bag of chopped salad with cabbage, 1 can canned beef pre cooked (yes it exists and no, its not terrible and makes meal prep SHORT), taco spices, taco shells, cheese and tomato, onion or what ever you like on that taco maybe some jarred pico de gallo? Some avacado? Some jarred salsa? Cook the beef, shred it as it warms/cooks add the spices, construct the taco and add the ingredients you like. Simple, filling tasty and low clean up. If I don’t do that I do a form of Stroganoff with the chunky cooked can beef. I heat the beef add the sauce I make and cook some noodles. Simple, easy low clean up. Quite tasty. My last one is to make pork BBQ – you got it – pre cooked canned pork, Sweet Baby Jesus sauce (or any sauce you like), heat the pork up, add the sauce, bun etc or roll up in a tortilla for instant tasty snack. I can also do Avacado, cheese, pico, onion, cilantro, minus the BBQ sauces and yumm Because the meats are canned they are shelf stable for a looong time, no fridge needed. They are pre-cooked so warming up and adding to the ingredients is really all you need to do. Versitile and handy to have on hand. The canned chicken I add to broth I buy plus, chopped frozen carrot and peas, saute my onion and garlic, add the peas and carrots, then the broth, then the canned chicken. Noodles are optional. 🙂
Take some time to rest body and mind. If I really don’t want to cook I pull out leftovers from my freezer and nuke them. Add salad and bread and your good to go. Less lazy calls for quick cherry tomato spaghetti sauce (which also makes freezer leftovers). It only has a handful of ingredients and takes about fifteen minutes prep plus cook time once you get good at it. You still have to cook the pasta, of course.
Lazy dinners: the occasional frozen pizza (or lunch today) jalapeño popper pizza with blue cheese dressing. Last week: split pea soup. But the ultimate one requires advance planning and a smoker, but is easy food for at least week depending on the size of your smoker and your family—smoked brisket—that’s bare on the plate, chopped or sliced in hot sandwiches with or without that stuff in a bottle, hash, with gravy and mash as roast, cold with lettuce and tomato, made into soup… if the smoker is big enough you can also smoke some chicken and sausages for more easy meals… I smoke the sausages and they go in the freezer, I break off a piece for the spit pea soup, for potato soup, for fried cabbage, for breakfast with eggs, in hoagie buns… the chicken is good as is, in chicken salad, on salad greens… and all the cooked meats freeze really well.
Favorite lazy meal: Buttered toast with cheese. Although sometimes waiting for the toast is too much.
Mona is a cutie! 1 box Zatarain’s Red Beans and rice + 1pound of breakfast sausage ( or whatever meat you want)+ 1can of chopped tomatoes +1 can kidney beans. Comes together in about a half an hour . I get the reduced sodium in all of it otherwise you can spice it up individually with hot sauce.
Favorite lazy meals:
Canned salmon over hot rice. (with fresh cracked pepper it hits the spot)
Home made guacamole with chips.
GF pizza with whatever extra toppings we have.
Rotisserie chicken ramen (I pick the meat off the bones, use canned broth, gf ramen noodles, and soy sauce).
And when I can’t even–we get lettuce wraps from Jimmy Johns.
New favourite lazy meal is microwaved sticky rice with crumbled nori sheets, rice vinegar pickled carrots, kewpie mayo,cucumber, spinach (and any other vegetable you think might go like edamame or lotus root) and quick protein of choice (as a vego I tend toward omelette but it would be really good with tuna or something in the line of imitation crab). Sprinkled with seasame and eaten with pickled giner and wasbai.
It takes about 10 minutes total, has veggies and is close enough to sushi to feel satisfying. If you’re looking to lower the carbs you could halve the sticky rice or split it with other people.
Soup and a sandwich, Heinz tomato soup and a bacon sandwich in a soft white bap (crispy bacon of course!) all essential food groups and comfort food. Mug in one hand bap in the other 😁
Favorite lazy meal. take 4-8 frozen burritos, place in pan. Cover with canned enchilda sauce. Top with mexican cheese blend. Cover with foil. Bake for 20-25 minutes on 350. Remove foil broil for thee minutes to brown cheese. Serve.
I’ve been playing Watcher of the Realms and really enjoying it as a good distraction.
Happy to provide referral codes to anyone wanting to join as we both get in game goodies as you progress 😉
My fav lazy meal is udon noodles! I get a bag of stir fry veggies, a protein like cooked chicken or tofu. Sauté veggies, chuck in noodles & sauce, add protein, warm up and tada! I make a home made sauce that is like 4 ingredients but if you are feeling extra lazy you can buy sauce. I can whip this up in less than 15 mins and it is so tasty.
If you do not feel like doing anything for another week then don’t.
As I get more white hairs I discover that it takes longer for me to bounce back from things. Obviously energy was stored in my formerly black hair like a battery and when it got drained it turned white….
Lazy hot meal, shrimp and pasta.
Lazy cold meal, shrimp on salad.
We like shrimp. 🙂
Favorite lazy meal is cabbage roll soup. All the great yum of cabbage rolls but all the ingredients chopped up so no trying to get perfect cabbage leaves to stuff. Also I often add in more rice & it’s cabbage roll stew instead of soup. So easy! Ready in about 20 minutes
https://www.dinneratthezoo.com/cabbage-roll-soup/
Had a grilled cheese with thin slices of tart apples added to the innards before toasting. My new favorite version.
Grilled cheese sandwiches and soup; preferably tomato. So yummy and nostalgic!
Or breakfast for dinner! Easy peasey and always welcome.
Leftovers! Of course this choice does require you to have cooked on some previous day.
Play WoW! Dragonflight is awesome but The War Within is turning out to be really fun as well.
This year has been hard for many folk. You have has several mental and physical challenges this year, so it is not surprising that you feel you need a break. I have Fibromyalgia with Fatigue, and this year I caught pertussis which manifest Bronchitis and a throat infection. They call pertussis the 100 day cough, and they are correct. I was barely able to function from May until August. I now recommend verifying your DPT vaccine status to everyone I meet.
Thus my Fatigue has ruled my life, if I leave home on errands I am guaranteed to be in bed the whole next day, either sleeping or just out of energy. But prior to May the “I don’t wanna” was daily fight with a dull fatigue backing it up.
There is NOTHING WRONG with SHORT TERM “I don’t wanna”, as long as it’s short term. IF it goes MORE THAN 2 WEEKS it’s NOT SHORT TERM. At that point you need to consider if it’s a symptom of something other than normal burnout. The reason for the two week marker is that if you need outside help it may take a week or two (or more) to get it, while the problem continues. If the burnout lifts before your appointment you can always cancel.
But another cause of IDW is the lack of Fun. As we get older we often quit doing those things which were fun. Doing what you enjoy and fun are two different things. Going out for dinner is enjoyable, the waterslide at the amusement park is Fun. I used to ride my motorcycle for fun, but I physically cannot anymore. So now I fly parasail and paraglide type kites. They are easier to launch than flat ones, but its a fun workout for me. You need to laugh and smile like you’re 11 yrs old again, the serotonin boost will last days. I try to do 1 fun thing every month, so that the everyday things stay in perspective. Yes, you will be wiped out the next day because of age but it will be worth it, and you will find the “grind” tolerable again. Take care of yourself, we all luv you.
I have the same cleaning issue, white glove other people’s places, but can barely keep up with my own dishes. I have never figured out why.
Lazy meals:
1. Cereal, fried egg on toast
2. Grilled cheese, ham & cheese, Turkey & cheese
3. Tomato sandwich- 2 slice white bread, mayo, sliced fresh tomato, salt & pepper
4. Canned pork n beans w toast, beans w sliced hot dogs
5. Boil whatever pasta I grab, top with:
pesto, jarred sauce, melted butter & garlic, butter & Parmesan, Thai peanut sauce, canned chili with meat, canned chicken ala king, pouch of tuna salad, pouch of flavored tunafish, or pouch of pulled pork from Wal Mart
6. PB&J sandwich & fruit
7. Anything made by someone else, and grateful for it.
Dinner tonight – scrambled egg & cheddar on a toasted bagel and microwaved corn on the cob from the farmers market.
But that is because I am too lazy to dig down and find the dinner sized portion of home made chili, somewhere in my freezer.
Mona is wonderful content. Is there a Mona story?
takeout sushi is my favorite lazy meal. especially with spicy edamame to snack on. yumm.
Favorite lazy meal is sleazy rice and cheese (or as a roommate called it, risotto without the risotto.
Take some plain cooked rice. Put it in a bowl. Top with cheddar cheese, dried basil, onion powder, and garlic powder. Microwave until the cheese melts. Stir it together. Eat.
It’s called recovery not lazy… but lazy is more fun!
Since we are all recovering from a cold I decided to go easy and bake a potato in the microwave, add butter, chilli and cheese. Sometimes it is broccoli instead of chili when I’m being healthier. Easy comfort food.
My laziness is eating a bowl of cereal and reading everyone’s posts. thank you for the enjoyment BDH
Completely lazy thing to eat I indulged in a few times–pint of strawberries, washed and leaves removed, dipped one by one into Cool whip. and eaten with fingers.
Standard quicky lunch: Good bread and cheese. whatever is in the bread box and the fridge. Put the bread slices on a plate, put cheese on the bread, put the plate in the microwave, heat it for 45 to 75 seconds until the cheese is all melty. If being fancy, shake a little savory spice mix, like Ras el Hanout or Berbere, on top. If being very fancy, add a handful of cherry tomatoes after cooking the cheese.
Slightly weird but frequently used option: Take a nonstick skillet suitable for a 2-3 egg omelet. Spray with some olive oil. Crack 2 eggs into the skillet and mix them up with a fork. Add 1 or 2 or maybe 3 slices of bread and get the bread wet on both sides. Cut up some cheese into teaspoon size bits and put it into the egg and bread mixture in the skillet. Turn the stove on, maybe add some salt, turn the egg stuff over when it’s starting to brown, let it brown on the other side. If the bread shreds, you can kind of tear the bread up and pretend it’s on purpose. Dump the egg/bread/cheese mixture on a plate and eat it. (remember to turn the stove off after removing the skillet and its contents.) Cheese may be browned and sometimes tastes even better than fresh.
My mother’s grilled cheese sandwich, which I don’t make since I don’t understand broilers in a gas oven very well, but I have done this at home where we had an electric oven. Put 2 slices of bread per person you are feeding on the broiler pan. turn broiler on and watch to see when it is getting a little brown. Pull the broiler pan out, turn the bread over, put on some slices of sharp cheddar or colby cheese, put the broiler pan back in the oven and watch the cheese melt. It goes faster the second time. Pull the pan out and turn off the stove. Put pieces of bread on a plate and sprinkle with paprika, which doesn’t do much for the flavor but looks pretty. Goes well with tomato soup, but also can be enjoyed with carrots and celery for crunchiness on the side.
Most commonly used option: my husband is a terrific cook and generally makes nice meals. Sausages and frozen vegetables heated up is the mainstay of the menu, though sometimes we get really good stuff from Moghul Microwave or Hazan’s Classic Italian cookbooks.
In Australia, we call Maia’s ‘metallic contraption’ [Sept 13 @ 9.58am] a jaffle iron
Pie irons here in the American Midwest.
Take it easy!
Favorite lazy meal:
Indomie instant noodles with canned sardines, cucumber and an egg. The sardines are optional if you don’t love canned fish.
my favourite quick meal. 1 can cream of mushroom soup. ,slices of hot cooked potato in a baking dish. Fried chopped onion and mushrooms on top. cover in soup mixed with water or milk/cream. Top with cheese. Bake in oven until bubbling and hot throughout. Great on its own or with other veg and or meat!
Favourite lazy meal is cheese and crackers. With odds and ends thrown in. Cold cuts, pickles and nuts.
+1
Also, add castelveltrano olives. And maybe some berries. And chocolate chips.