To All FTWM: Let's find time to cook.

Salam,

Do you normally buy food from outside for dinner? Do you always find that you don't have time to prepare or cook for dinner? Do you always say that you are too tired to cook?WELL............................I don't want to be hypocrite to say that I don't do those things too. There are sometimes when I feel too tired after a long day at work and choose to buy food from outside. BUT after some time, I feel bored of the food as I realize that the price is increasing and the quality of the food is not getting better.

So, I try to do certain things to ensure that I can prepare some simple food at least for dinner during the week days. These simple things help to save some time in the kitchen and you don't really have to like a "Masterchef" just to prepare a nice and delicious dish for your family.

HOW TO PREPARE/COOK FOOD AFTER YOU COME BACK FROM WORK:

1- Plan ahead the menu for a- 5- days. 
    Make sure  you have to diversify the food to encourage your kids to eat. For example, Monday: Chicken Curry, Tuesday: Omellette and Fried Veges, Wednesday: Beef Soup etc.

2- Prepare the ingredients ahead.
    It's easier  if you already blend, chop or at least have the raw ingredients like garlic, ginger and onion ready in your fridge. Another thing is to put enough portion of chicken in a tray or beef that you want to cook for a dish in your freezer. 

3- Keep some sauces, herbs, spices and other condiments handy in your kitchen.
    In Asian kitchen, it's a must to have soy sauce, chilli sauce, tomato sauce, fish sauce and others to add the flavour to our dish. Adding some of those can enhance your cooking too.

4- Keep pasta ready in your cupboard.
    It's very easy to prepare a quick pasta dish for children especially when you use ready made sauce or the canned mushroom soup. You just need 2 pieces of chicken or the frozen chicken balls (I love chicken balls from Ayamas), some vegetables, garlic, water and some pepper. 

5-Marinate the chicken, fish or beef at night and keep them in the fridge in the morning.
   When you come back from work, you don't need to thaw them and the cooking process can be cut into half.

6- Buy the ready made paste.
    I love to use the ready made Tom Yam paste or Tandoori powder. They come in so handy because I only need 30 minutes to prepare a quick tomyam and 45 minutes to prepare Chicken Tandoori.

I guess those are some the tips that I can share here. Hopefully they can help to inspire all mommies to cook even though they are busy with their career. The satisfaction of preparing the food for your family on your own is so priceless and it can help us to stay within our monthly budget. As doctors always suggest healthy eating, we can ensure that our family members will eat healthy food by preparing the food. Let's start NOW!

p/s: arwah mak saya ada berpesan yg air tangan isteri dan ibu itu lebih baik untuk menambat hati ahli keluarga dan mengeratkan kasih sayang.