With three kids under three, running a business from home, doing laundry for five people, cleaning the home….well you get it, I’m a busy lady. All moms are busy. We have a lot on our plates. Samsung Home Appliances and TwitterMoms know moms are busy and want to know our “mommy tips” for getting dinner ready in a flash. And they’re giving away this beautiful French Door refrigerator randomly to one mom who participates in sharing her fast dinner tips. “For FRRREEEEEE!?!?!” (think Adam Sandler in the movie Bedtime Stories) Yes, for FRRREEEEE!!!! So of course I want to share my tips and get a chance to win that gorgeous French Door refrigerator!

At my house, dinner time can be the most stressful part of my day. It never fails that all three kids will be loud at that time & the older two will be begging for food (and if they do eat anything, they won’t be hungry for dinner). So, I try to get dinner ready as quickly as possible. It minimizes the fussing & allows me to accomplish more of my daily tasks. So what are some tips I’ve learned to cooking dinner in a flash?

1. OAMC – That’s Once a Month Cooking. Not familiar with OAMC? It’s where you devote one day a month to cooking and you cook enough meals to last the whole month. Doing this will save you lots of time (and money). You will make your own “convenience meals” that you will pop in the microwave or oven (with little to no prep) on the day you eat it. Sure, you spend a lot of time cooking on that one day, but it is well worth it for the other 29 days you have stress free (& quick) dinner! There’s a great book about Once a Month Cooking with recipes to help you get started. It’s the Frugal Mom’s Guide to Once a Month Cooking.
2. Plan your meals & roll them into each other (use those leftovers to your advantage!) – Even if you don’t do OAMC, still planning your meals out will help streamline your cooking time. And it will alleviate the stress of trying to think of what to make for dinner that night. Plus, you can be effective with your time and resources by rolling meals into each other. Let me give you an example. Night A you have spaghetti, Night B you have baked pasta (just make some modifications to your spaghetti leftovers and stick them in the oven). That’s a really simple example, but you can definitely be a lot more creative with it.
3. Keep weekday meals simple and leave the elaborate cooking to the weekend – Keep some staples on hand for a quick dinner. Pasta & spaghetti sauce, grilled cheese sandwiches and tomato soup (yes, from the can), a frozen pizza, a bag of mixed frozen vegetables with precooked meat & teriyaki sauce can be a quick stir-fry meal (again, if you don’t do OAMC, you can still bulk cook your meat and then freeze it to use as needed; this will definitely speed things up as meat seems to always take the longest to cook for me). Another favorite of ours is english muffins with spaghetti sauce, shredded cheese & pepperonis on top – see my mini pizza recipe. I think you’re now grasping the idea for simple weekday meals.
4. If all else fails, let your husband cook. This takes the stress off me and also provides us variety, as he gets pretty creative with his meals.

Do you have some tips for cooking dinner in a flash? You can read the details for the Samsung Home Appliances & TwitterMoms Sweepstakes here – heads up, it closes October 16th with the winner announced on October 23rd.

Please feel free to share any tips you have for making dinner in a flash here, as I would love to read them! And if you do write a post on your own blog with your tips for cooking dinner in a flash, please post the link here too! I love to learn from others!