5 No-Recipe Recipes for Fall

Sending good thoughts, Claire! What an exciting time. I didn’t breastfeed, but I made these lactation energy bites because I didn’t want to snack on granola bars all day. They helped a lot in the newborn days when I didn’t have time for breakfast and suddenly it was 10 am and I was starving. And if you’re breastfeeding, even better! I made a bunch and would just grab from the freezer when I got hungry: https://lovejennyblog.com/recipe/peanut-butter-and-chocolate-lactation-energy-balls.

Smitten Kitchen’s breakfast burritos are such a great thing when your days and nights are mixed up and you need something you can eat with one hand. They keep for ages in the freezer. If you think you might nurse, you can make lactation cookies ahead of time and freeze the dough balls. Cookie and Kate’s sweet potato black bean enchiladas also freezes really well. Congratulations!!

Honestly the most important thing about those new born meals is — can they be prepared and eaten with only one hand? Anything that requires you to sit at a table with a knife and fork is going to be a no-go. I remember making things like enchiladas and lasagna and then not using any of it.

If you have an instant pot, the food blog pinch of yum has a whole freezer meal set that we love!

Seconding the breakfast burritos idea! Cookie and Kate has a recipe that includes sweet potatoes, red peppers, goat cheese, onions, eggs, and black beans that I LOVE. My husband still makes them and it also works as a frittata!

I made quite a few items to stock the freezer so that we basically didn’t cook for about a month after birth. Try to divide the servings in the freezer so it’s easy to just grab 1-2 and they defrost faster!
Some meals I made:
*Chicken enchiladas
*Turkey lasagna
*Potato & spinach quiche (similar to this https://smittenkitchen.com/2016/11/spinach-sheet-pan-quiche/ but crustless).
*Sweet potato soup w/ turkey meatballs (similar to this https://smittenkitchen.com/2007/10/sweet-potato-and-sausage-soup/)
*Chickpea and couscous stew (similar to this https://www.hellofresh.com/recipes/tuscan-chickpea-kale-tomato-soup-603f99afdf085d7000361850)
*Banana nut muffins
*Oatmeal scones

Also freeze some deli meat and bread loaves (already sliced) so you can easily grab some for a sandwich. Plus… frozen pizzas :)))

My suggestion is to get a rice cooker (or ask for an Instantpot as a holiday/birthday gift). It’s amazing what you can make in them, including one pot meals. Bonus: it can stay in your room easily!

Emily, a few suggestions from my grad days – black rice (or any non-white-sticky) salad, cook rice and cool (can you get a rice maker for your room?), then add a handful of chopped veg like bell pepper, corn, green onion, cilantro, an excellent dressing… this lasts for days and is great for grabbing a few spoons or a full bowl. Another thing I’d make in bulk is cakes: sauteed veg cakes like grated zucchini, carrot, herbs, mashed chickpeas (with aquafaba as binder), form into patties and add to pan one at a time, few minutes on both sides. This is some babysitting upfront but they keep well, you can have the cakes hot or cold for almost any meal, or make into a sandwich. Try pre-cutting veg in your room (to control for the nice environment you like) and packing into meal prep or tupperware containers to carry into the kitchen. Have a “mess bowl” to collect random trimmings and waste in 1 location, much easier cleanup. That way you can be in and out of the gross kitchen quickly. Good luck!

Thank you both!! Sasha, the cakes are a great idea!

Vegan chickpea salad is one of my favorites – https://buildyourbite.com/smashed-chickpea-salad-sandwich/. Quick to make with staples on hand (you can omit the fresh dill if needed) and I usually add a little minced onion as well. You can also find all sorts of recipes with adjustments like adding grapes, shredded carrots for more veggies, etc. It’s my weekday lunch go to on toast and I’m not even vegetarian. Lasts a good long time in the fridge too.

If I have to chop something it’s a recipe.

Omg, I am nursing a nasty polenta “bloop” burn from stove top cooking and this tip might just save me next time! Thanks

I also have made oven roasted polenta and it is delicious. I like a recipe I don’t have to fuss over. Only consideration for me is it sticks to the pot and clean up is an effort. If anyone has tips to manage this aspect I’d love to hear them.

I do polenta in the oven in a dutch oven as well. So hands off and comes out great every time.

Gosh, aren’t we all just a hands off idiot by 5pm! That cracked me up. Thanks for the tip!

I think it might depend on if you’re using an instant polenta or a regular polenta… I’ll defer to Jenny though!

Hi Isabelle,
I am Italian and get polenta Molino from World Market. If you have one nearby, I strongly suggest you to try it. It cooks in few minutes as it has finer grains and I love it!

I always make my polenta in the oven because I’ve been burned by polenta gurgles before. It takes a bit longer, but is almost completely hands off. If it’s good enough for Paula Wolfert, it’s good enough for me! https://www.finecooking.com/recipe/oven-roasted-polenta

40 minutes is about right for standard (non-instant or ultrafine) polenta. Less than that and you’ll be stuck with a gritty texture and a too-thin consistency. I know the ye-olde Italian grandma technique is to stir constantly, but in our Italian family it’s always worked fine to just give it a stir several times during cooking, and then a vigorous 30-secondish stir at the end.

I like to buy it precut! Can usually find it at my grocery store or Trader Joe’s. It doesn’t taste quite as good but it’s a lot easier. Otherwise I’ll just slice a butternut squash in half, deseed it and roast it which is less time intensive than cutting it before cooking (I have a 9 month old so I totally get it and don’t even manage to cook most days).

Sam, this may not be the answer you’re looking for, but buy a great knife! I used to avoid winter squash due to the dense skin, but my Wusthof chef’s knife cuts through butternut squash quickly easily. A good knife is a bit pricey, but totally worth it.

They sell precut butternut squash at trader joes! I bet those chunks would be easier to slice thin than starting from scratch with whole squash. They make me nervous to cut too.

I was in the same boat as you (re baby & extremely limited meal prep times) last fall and I bit the bullet and got pre-cut butternut squash from my grocery store’s produce section. Not sure if your grocery store carries the same but in general I went from someone who always did everything 100% homemade to adopting some cheats to my cooking and it might life so much easier. I assume when my kid is 18 I can get back to slow cooking 😝 Congratulations on your baby!

Pierce the squash with a fork in several places, then microwave 2 min, flip over, and microwave 1 min more. Makes it *much* easier to peel and slice. It will be hot coming out–handle with an oven mitt or wait a couple minutes.

Is there any time during the week when you can wash and cut a bunch of vegetables so they’re ready to cook?
Butternut squash is rather quick because you don’t need to peel it. Wash and dry, cut top to bottom, remove the inner fibers and seeds, then lay each half flat on your board and chop chop chop. For squash that’s particularly big, I first cut it in two, just above the rounded part—so there’s a long part with no seeds, and the round part with seeds. From there, again, cut top to bottom, then lay flat and slice.
Hope you have fun feeding yourself delicious meals while caring for your beautiful baby!

A mandoline is a greate investment – you can easily and quickly slice potatoes, butternut squash, zucchini, onions. The better quality ones have more settings for thickness. I can promise it won’t take you more than 5 minutes to slice.

Hi Sam, maybe a mandolin would make things easier?

like this: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FUV2q9j_Urs

Another vote for precut butternut squash! We get it (and precut sweet potato!) all the time from the produce section of the grocery store. We used to prep it all by hand but then – just like you – a baby changed it all. We roast it, use it for super quick soups, and it would be great in half these recipes here, too.

Sam you are doing great. Hang in there with the baby/ dinner dance.
I’m in the same boat with a 1 year old and my trick is to chop everything for the week- while the baby is napping and put them in the fridge or freezer and pull out when you need it. Good luck!

I find the skin to be the worst, most time consuming part or it, but have found that a Y peeler can be used to take it all off. (The straight peelers work too, but don’t allow for as much precision imo). I generally cut the top off the bottom before peeling, as I find this makes the awkward shape or the squash easier to deal with.
Once the skin is gone, I split the bottom in half lengthwise, scoop out the seeds, and then everything is relatively straightforward to dice or whatever. You can also use the Y peeler to make super thin ribbons!
(This is the one I have been using for over a decade: https://www.williams-sonoma.ca/m/products/kuhn-rikon-peeler )

Hi Sam,

Not sure where you live and what the grocery options are like, but I love butternut squash and have basically given up on it because it’s stressful to chop. I now always buy “honeynut” (looks just like a butternut, but smaller), “kabocha” (dark green and round, looks somewhat like an acorn squash), or “delicata” (oblong and pale yellow with greenish ridges).

I realize this is a privilege of living in NYC where the farmer’s markets and my local coop have tons of options, but if you see happen to see these varieties, might be worth a try––especially if you’re trying to avoid the inevitable plastic that comes with precut. Congrats on your bb!

Y’all, how is no one using frozen chunks of butternut squash? It literally doesn’t get easier, and is more economical than buying the fresh pre-cut stuff.

My least favorite part of dealing with butternut squash is peeling it, so I was thrilled when I realized the skin in completely edible (thanks to Ottolenghi) and now I never bother. I think the fastest way to get thin slices (skin on or off) is to do it with the slicing blade of a food processor. To cut it into pieces that fit, after cutting off the top, I wedge my biggest chefs knife into the squash just far enough that it’s stable, then holding the knife in one hand and a rubber mallet in the other I use the mallet to gently tap the knife the rest of the way through the squash. once it’s in half you can repeat the process, but I generally can then cut it into food processor size pieces without the mallet.

My skillet has a non-oven safe handle, but if I wrap the handle in tinfoil it can go in the oven. No idea why that works though!

Here’s something that worked for my mom:
1. Pull everything out of your cabinets.
2. Put the stuff you use all the time back.
3. Look at what’s left, eliminate anything you rarely use. If it’s a rarely used but holiday-specific-must-have, set it aside.
4. Thinking time — of the stuff you have left, how can you reduce and streamline? Is there a thing you could buy to replace 3 things? Could you change techniques to eliminate things (ex. dutch oven and crockpot can do mostly the same stuff). Would you get more use out of these things if you stored / organized things differently? Could you live without it (ex. large blender, when you own a stick blender and a food processor).
5. Give everything that’s left a home. Try to leave breathing room, don’t cram things.
6. Are there any gaps you need to fill (things you need but don’t have)?

Yes, they are the same. The yellow stone ground grits are exactly the same as polenta. White grits (like you’d have in the deep south at a Waffle House) have a bit of a different flavor, but can be doctored up to taste very rich and hearty.

this southern girl whole-heartedly says NO – they are both delicious – but they ain’t the same!! :)

Bone in with skin is the way to be!

I always find them at the grocery store pretty easily (American south). Once my pickup order swapped for boneless and skinless and it wasn’t as good.

I cook bone in with skin thighs the way the recipe states (without the vegetables) on a weekly basis so I think it would work. I’ve also learned that starting with a cold cast iron pan on the stove top works well because the fat renders slowly as the pan warms up and that bone in thighs are forgiving in the oven. I’ve left them in for as long as 30 minutes and they turn out fine.

I wonder if “boneless” was meant to be “bone-in?” You are right that it’s unusual to see boneless skin-on chicken thighs sold anywhere, and the cooking time seems way too long for boneless (I usually broil boneless/skinless for 12-16 min total, half on each side).