I love cooking in the winter: it's warm, it's cozy, it gives me something to do when I'm trapped inside, hiding from the wind and snow. Summer is another story.
Cooking in the summer feels so inconvenient. My AC doesn't work well, my house is hot, and I want to be out playing, not inside melting by the oven or stove. The kids are home and need to be fed 4 times a day. It can feel burdensome.
To save myself from serving little Cesar's pizza every night, I batch cook in the summer. I double and triple recipes so we eat at least 3 times from the one meal I cook. I also make food that requires little actual cooking: like salads, pastas and dips. Here's an example of that below!
Monday: Hummus and tzatziki with store bought naan bread, frozen mangoes and salad greens
Tuesday: tortellini salad (cook tortellini noodles and put on top of salad greens with dressing, cheese, canned kidney beans and chopped apples - it's like the photo below, but instead of croutons I use cheese tortellini noodles)
Wednesday: Cold peanut sauce noodles with frozen broccoli, cabbage ramen salad, cut apples
image from Real Mom Nutrition
Thursday: Kid's last day: little cesars pizza + green salad (I have a lot of salad in the garden right now)
Photo is of the lettuce in my garden!
Friday: left over hummus and tzatziki inside tortillas with salad greens
Saturday: tortellini salad leftovers
Sunday: Peanut noodles leftovers, make a second batch of cabbage ramen salad
Happy cooking (or minimal cooking anyway)!