Pasta with pesto. But it’s healthier and more fancy looking than you’d think …

• my grocery sells “fresh” stuffed tortellini and ravioli in “family” sized packages that are good for more than a month
• I prefer pesto over marinara, but they each come in a jar and lasts a long time

1. Brown some meat. I like found Italian sausage meat when my grocery has it. I’ve also pulled the skins off (spicy) Italian sausage, I’ve used ground beef, ground turkey, or chicken breasts cut into bite sized pieces. It doesn’t matter which
2. Slice a red pepper into chunks
3. Cook the pasta - remember to save a little pasta water (I always forget)
4. Dump into a colander
5. Put the pot back on the stove
6. Add a few tablespoons of olive oil, a couple shakes of crushed red pepper, and a tablespoon or two of garlic, and cook a minute to draw out the garlic
7. Dump in the pasta, the meat, the peppers , half a jar of pesto and mix it all in.
8. Add the pasta water (you remembered to save it, right?) shaved Parmesan and a handful of baby spinach and mix (this should be right before serving so the spinach is not over done)

Now you have simple pasta but it’s colorful, looks fancy, has vegetables.

Cacio e pepe

I call this recipe Baja balls

Get a crock pot and fill it with some plain frozen meatballs.

Dump the entire contents of a can of crushed pineapple in there, maybe a can of pineapple rings too if you’re feeling fancy.

Cover with low sodium teriyaki sauce and cook on high or medium depending on how much stuff you have to do today.

Cook up some rice when it’s looking done.

If you want it to be extra fancy you can garnish with some chives and sesame seeds

Takes literally no effort to make (especially if you have a rice cooker), kid friendly for all of the parents out there, nothing too expensive goes into it, and literally everyone I’ve given it to went crazy over it.

sad bastard cookbook. Recipes start from basic survival level and you can add more depending on how you feel.

• rice
• bag of frozen vegi
• protein

meals for months, just rotate the veg and meat you’ll be gold.

go to an Asian grocery store and get some sauces to add a whole new combo for more meals.

Lentil soup.

Are you talking about when the executive function is completely offline? Because if that’s hitting hard and I’m going “I’m hungry but I can’t make anything” my go to is a quesadilla.
Seriously if I can stand and heat a frying pan, it becomes easygoing to warm up some tortillas in the fry pan and throw some cheese between them. Bingo bango bongo you’ve got a Mexican cheese sandwich.
And then as I’m eating the first one I can be making a second and maybe throw in some ham or some salami, or better yet some leftover taco meat. All of a sudden I’m not so hungry and I’m happier having eaten something and maybe I can be motivated to eat some veggies or fruit.

Engineered staple foods. Huel, “This is Food”, Soylent etc.

Also pretty nice is a hot air fryer and a freezer. Grilled salmon right from the freezer, frozen vegetables with sauce included. Kind of a luxury dish, same effort as fries.

A smoothie. Banana, avocado (if they’re not $1/oz), maybe some frozen fruit, 2C oats (cooked prior, 1qt in fridge), 1C yogurt, protein powder, salt (or peanut butter), fresh water

No thinking involved. Add to blender, pour into face hole. Then, coffee. Calmly. 🖖🏼

p.s. There are a lot of great suggestions & tips in the comments, so please understand that mine is especially for those times when you realize you’ve not had nutrients in several hours and must eat rightgawdamnednow. It’ll flip those switches back to green, but there are numerous more fulfilling and dietarily sound solutions.

A rice cooker with a steam basket is great for this. Rice down below with some marinated protein and a courtesy vegetable up top. Think chicken thighs and sweet potato, sliced beef and broccoli, tofu and edamame, etc. To marinate just put your protein in a ziploc bag with equal parts olive oil, lemon juice and soya sauce.

Japanese curry is another nice easy one. Boil your protein with potatoes and carrots for 20mins, add the package of curry blocks, stir and let it sit for 10 mins. Serve it with rice or udon noodles. Pretty minimal effort and can be done in a large batch like chili

Rice from the rice cooker, fry an egg on top. Pretend you’re in a Ghibli film and crush that shit, instant mood boost.

Breakfast:
Simple: Scrambled eggs on a tortilla and in a burrito
Something More:

• Greek Yogurt, similar enough to sour cream but healthier
• Shredded cheese
• Spinach
• Can add a little milk or flour to the eggs and whisk it all together before adding it to the pan to make the eggs fluffier
• Plenty of spices can be added on top of salt and pepper to give it even more flavor

Lunch and Dinner:
Simple: Penne pasta, spinach, some form of cubed or ground meat, alfredo sauce
Something More:

• Squash (Green, Yellow, Mexican - all good)
• Broccoli (I sometimes like to steam them in a separate pot, though you can grill them in the same pan)
• Mushrooms (lionsmane and shitake have some good health benefits)
• Onion
• Garlic
• Shredded cheese
• Can save some if the water you boil the pasta in to add to the final product after, apparently this adds more flavor though in all honesty, I’ve tried this a few times and it’s adding a few extra steps with no payoff

Both of these can utilize a lot of the same ingredients, making meal prep easy. I like having big containers containing everythjng already cooked, and then I can just add to the same container day after day. Less dishes overall, and just takes the one day of cooking a bit to make the rest if the week super easy.

If you don’t have one, buy a good sized freezer. It takes just as long to cook a meal for six people as it does for only one. Freeze the extra and nuke it when you’re not in the mood to cook.

I have a five quart pot; I’ll make a big batch of chili or soup and freeze it in pint containers.

You can cook a whole roast chicken on Sunday, and use that as a meal base for the week. Chicken tacos, chicken sandwich, chicken and rice.

Canned beans on rice.

Spaghetti with jarred sauce.

Baked potato or baked sweet potato with whatever toppings are around.

If you are really having trouble, keep on hand nuts and dried fruit, Triscuit crackers (high calorie), olives and hummus. You don’t have to cook any of that, and can arrange it into a few healthy meals. Keep cold oatmeal in the fridge - oatmeal, yogurt, water or juice or kombucha and some nuts & dried fruit.

A pot of chili in the slow cooker can be supper all week.

Super zero brain? PB&J sandwich. Or a deli meat sandwich.