I Gotta Feelin'

            Since I started working in August, I’ve worked to hone my lunch prep plan.

First try: Healthy Choice Fresh Mixers. They don’t require refrigeration like frozen Lean Cuisine meals, they’re quick to prepare, and they actually taste pretty good for pre-made lunches. The problem? They’re about 3 bucks a pop, which makes them slightly out of my price range.

Second try: Whatever happened to be leftover in the fridge. Good in theory price-wise, but didn’t quite work out because our dinner menu isn’t steady enough to guarantee that we’ll always have leftovers in the fridge. So I was back to square one.

Finally, I decided to turn to my mother’s method with a twist. Why I waited so long to follow her advice, I have no idea. So what’s the ingenious method? Simple: Cook a big pot of something delicious. Freeze it in lunch-size portions. Whenever you need something for lunch, grab something out of the freezer and voila! The good thing about Mom’s method is that if you start with enough things frozen then you can have something different every day!

My problem? Patience. Because I’m starting fresh, I don’t have enough of a variety already frozen. And of course I don’t have the patience to cook one item a week and get that variety built up. I do, however, have one thing on my side. I don’t mind eating the same thing for lunch every day for a week. So I use Mom’s method, but I just alter it a little. Cook a big pot of something delicious. Put lunch-size portions into leftover bowls and put in the refrigerator. Bring one to work each day for lunch.

This week, I’m cooking Black-eyed Pea Gumbo, a dish that my sister made for New Year’s Day lunch.  This dish, like most of the dishes I choose as week-long lunch dishes, is super-easy to do. It’s not often you find a successful recipe with only 3 steps! Chop all your basic cooking veggies in a quick chopper/food processor. Cook them down in olive oil. Then add all the canned goods and let it cook for 45 minutes. Can’t get much easier than that, and it makes a really good soup-like dish that we served over rice. Another prep step I learned from my mom is to cut up and freeze the basics (like bell peppers, celery, green onions and the like) so that when it comes time to cook, all you have to do is throw them in there. It makes a super-simple recipe super-quick.

The third benefit of this particular dish (aside from ease and tastiness) is price. For a half recipe, which made five portions (enough for the work week) with some extra for a couple of weeknight suppers or for a couple of lunches for my husband, the supplies easily add up to less than $10.  That’s 7 meals for less than $10.

So if you’re looking for something quick, easy, inexpensive, and flavor-rich, give this recipe a shot! Let me know what you think.

Black-Eyed Pea Gumbo

[From Allrecipes.com]

Ingredients:

1 tablespoon olive oil

1 medium onion, chopped

1 medium green bell pepper, chopped

5 stalks celery, chopped

2 cups chicken broth

1 cup brown rice [I used white rice, and I didn’t cook it with the soup. Following my sister’s lead, we just served it over whatever rice you prefer  in gumbo style.]

4 (15-ounce) cans black-eyed peas with liquid

1 (10-ounce) can diced tomatoes and green chiles [With the half recipe, we just did this and left off the next ingredient. It gave it a little added kick.]

1 (14.5 ounce can diced tomatoes)

2 cloves garlic, finely chopped

Directions:

1. Heat the olive oil in a large saucepan over medium heat, and cook the onion, pepper, and celery until tender.

2. Pour in the chicken broth, and mix in rice [Again we didn’t do this step. We just served over cooked rice, but to each his own.], black-eyed peas with liquid, diced tomatoes and green chiles, diced tomatoes, and garlic.

3.  Bring to a boil, reduce heat to low, and simmer 45 minutes, or until rice is tender. Add water if soup is too thick.