5 Days of Tips for Homeschooling Parents: Meals Made Simplier
Why does it still surprise me so much of the time? These kiddos want to eat at least 3 meals a day! And, after I’ve fed them a meal, they appear in the kitchen only 30 minutes later, hungry again! They must be growing. Too many times, I get to the end of the day and then remember I have to cook dinner. I know I’m not alone, so I want to share a couple of tips for getting meals on the table.
- Set aside 15 mins a week to plan your meals! I like to do this on the weekend. Some of you have beautiful meal planning boards where you write out your meals. Mine is a super simple laminated sheet of printer paper. Lame, I know. I repurposed it, ok? 🙂 I drew columns for the days of the week, and then I write our dinner meal in each column. I look over our weekly schedule at the same time, so I can plan accordingly for meals on the go for nights we have sports. This helps SO much because it eliminates the directionless moments where I wander around the kitchen trying to figure out what we’re going to eat!
- Meet my new friend, the Instant Pot. Have you seen one of these things yet?
It’s like glory in an electronic bucket. lol. You can cook pretty much anything in this and it’s FAST! Frozen chicken to dinner, in 30 minutes, including prep time. The possibilities are about limitless, and I discover something new to make all. the. time. There are tons of cookbooks and recipes online. I’ve been using the instantpot site most of the time, because I expect their recipes to be well tested!! There are a plethora of recipes on Pinterest!
I made mashed potatoes for Easter dinner in less than 25 minutes!!! I washed the potatoes, tossed them into the Instant Pot, added 1 1/2 cups water, some salt, and hit start. 18 minutes later, I pushed the little valve to let the pressure off, and pulled out the potatoes. Super D had a blast mashing them up with a hand masher, we added a little milk, and we were golden! He declared them the best mashed potatoes he’d ever had! Score!
A few examples to whet your appetite:
Lasagna Pie (my kids inhaled this!!)
Have fun playing with your new kitchen buddy! Pair it with meal planning and you’ll e a head You can pick up yours from Amazon here –> Instant Pot. They even have a “smart” version that you can program using your phone!
Kym @ Homeschool Coffee Break
Latonya @ Joy in the Ordinary
Laura @ Day by Day in Our World
Leah @ As We Walk Along the Road
Lisa @ Farm Fresh Adventures
Lori @ At Home: where life happens
Meg @ Adventures with Jude
Megan @ My Full Heart
Melanie (Wren) @ finchnwren
Melissa @ Mom’s Plans
