Time Saving Tricks

Everyone is looking for tips and tricks to save time while cooking and baking, some are practical some are not. I find that a lot of time saving tips, involve a couple hours full of work one day, to save time later in the week. While this is handy it isn't always ideal. Below I have included some of my tried and true tips that I use weekly. They aren't rocket science and you may already use them, but if you don't I am sure that by enlisting them they will save some of your valuable time.

1. Onions - Almost every recipe uses onions. By Thursday I am thinking 'man I want to make this sauce but I am so sick of chopping and crying over onions'. My solution is the first day that you require onions for a recipe, cut one or two extra. You are already chopping them anyways so chopping a few extra honestly takes like 2 minutes longer and saves time later on.

2. Pureed Vegetables - It takes about an hour to cook and puree vegetables (we use puree in smoothies, oatmeal, risotto, etc). Instead of spending a whole evening cutting and waiting for sweet potatoes/squash/beets or carrots to bake or boil, I make a soup like squash soup and triple the amount of squash I bake. I use the amount the recipe calls for and take the extra and puree it in a blender. I take the pureed squash place it into ice cube trays and let freeze. Once it is frozen I tip them out into a zip lock bag, and use the cubes when I need them.

3. Garlic - Used as often as onions, this smelly little secret weapon lends great flavor to so many recipes. The first time I need to use garlic in a week, I press out about 6 extra cloves and put them in a glass container with a tiny bit of olive oil. I still prefer to use fresh grated garlic for salads and anything that you need raw garlic for, but the extra pressed garlic is perfect for recipes.

4. Fruit - My son tends to get in a spree where he likes to eat the same fruit(s) everyday for a couple weeks then he moves on. When he requests say a nectarine I take out 2 and cut both up. I give him one and put the second one into a container in the fridge. Then you are only cutting every other day. This also works for cheese and vegetables.

5. Pizza - This isn't exactly cooking, but it saves you from cooking. . . even better! When we order pizza we freeze the extra. Instead of trying to finish the last half before it goes bad we freeze it and have it at a later time. In fact sometimes we order extra pizza on purpose to freeze it. As long as you reheat it in the oven it will taste as good as when it was delivered.

6. Quinoa - We eat this usually about twice a week. The first time I make it I double the recipe and put the extra in the fridge. Sometimes we don't have it the second time then I transfer it to the freezer. This healthy grain freezes really well, in fact you can't tell it has been frozen at all. You can also double rice when you make it, though I have not tried to freeze it yet. 

I recommend using glass storage containers for storing food. They don't contain chemicals like plastic ones. Also you can reheat them, and if you are storing something like pasta sauce they don't absorb the colour and stain.

Enjoy the few extra minutes you have!