5 wholesome meals for 1 | Quick, easy, no-waste, & budget-friendly

There are many reasons why those of us who live alone can fall out of good habits when it comes to feeding ourselves proper, nutritious, balanced and wholesome meals. The cost of ingredients being disproportionate when buying for one, unused fresh produce going to waste, getting tired of eating leftovers of the same meal to avoid waste, lack of motivation when there's only one to cook for, amongst other reasons. And so today I want to share with you five of my favourite wholesome meals to cook for one, alongside some cooking hacks to make it quicker, cheaper and to avoid waste. Lately I've enjoyed cooking joints of meat. My go-to's are chicken, beef and gammon. I think often people who live alone miss out on this because why would you cook a whole joint of meat for one person? But I like to take the leftover meat in sandwiches or salads to work for the next couple of days so that it doesn't go to waste. And let's face it, sandwich meats in supermarkets are so expensive for how much you get compared to using the meat cooked on a joint. The only thing to remember with this is the meat will take longer to cook this way, so pop it in earlier, carry on about your day and then come back to do the rest when it's almost finished. I'm going to serve my gammon with fondant potatoes, chopped into pieces and cooked in a saucepan with butter until browned. I buy a large bag of potatoes and use them throughout the week. I generally cook around my set of ingredients, so if I've gone for potatoes and traditional vegetables like this week, the meals will reflect that and you'll see a lot of the same ingredients. Whereas if I've bought salad items, onions, peppers and so on, I'll have a week of different types of salads, stir fries, fajitas and those sorts of meals. I do this to minimise waste but keep it varied from one week to the next. Once my potatoes are browned, I top up the pan with chicken stock, which I totally cheat using stock cubes and boiling water. I'll have this meal with carrots, which in this case I'll serve whole. I like to roast them, seeing as I've got the oven on already, but they'll take a long time this way so a little hack is to pierce them and cook them for a while in the microwave to soften them first, then transfer them to a baking sheet. I honey glaze them and season with salt and pepper and pop them into the oven. Peas are one of the vegetables I always have frozen and so I can simply pour out enough for one serving and again, cook in the microwave for ease. To mix it up for this particular meal, I decided to make a pea puree, which I'll only do if I'm in the mood for cooking and want to have a bit of fun with it, but it's not an essential. This one I made by blending the cooked peas with olive oil, water, salt and pepper. Depending on what meat I'm serving, I may add mint to this or garlic, but for this one I just kept very plain. I'll sieve it through for smoothness and then just reheat it before serving. And lastly, my gravy is done using gravy granules, which is just another little cheat to make things easier. And then it's time to serve. This is gammon with fondant potatoes, carrots and a pea puree. As I mentioned before, those of us cooking for one often miss out on a roast because that's just so much effort for one portion. Here's what I like to call a mini roast. Whilst I've already mentioned I like to roast a whole chicken when that's what I fancy doing, but since this is the mini roast and we're going to be doing it quicker and easier, I'll cook two chicken breasts rather than a whole chicken, and I can use the other one that I don't have today in my lunch tomorrow in a sandwich or a salad. I wash and boil some new potatoes in a saucepan. I peel and baton cut some carrots, again honey glazing them and seasoning with salt and pepper. And then I just use a packet mix where you just add boiling water to make some stuffing, like stuffing balls, but I flatten them to help them cook quicker. Like I said, it's a mini roast, so it's not got all of the trimmings, but you get a general roast dinner vibe. But you could add anything you wanted to. You can get frozen roast potatoes and frozen Yorkshire puddings if you really wanted to, and just cook what you need for your one portion. And once again, into the microwave with the peas, quick gravy granules gravy, and we're ready to serve. Since I've got potatoes and traditional vegetables to use this week, let's do an old classic, sausage and mash. I use frozen sausages as they last longer and never go to waste. I can cook as many as I would like for this portion. I wash and peel some potatoes and cube them. I use smaller pieces as they cook quicker, and I want these to be soft for mashing. Just as a little something extra, but not an essential, I chop and fry some onions for my gravy, and when they're done, pour in the gravy, you guessed it, made from granules, and leave it to simmer on a low heat. Just remember to stir it occasionally or you'll get a bit of a skin on the top. Then I pop some peas into the microwave. I could have also done some broccoli, which I also keep a bag of frozen florets on hand in the freezer, but I wasn't too hungry on this occasion and just went with some peas. I mash my potatoes with a little butter, milk, and season with salt and pepper, and then we are ready to serve. Need something quick, easy, and minimal effort? Fish and chips. The fish I will always 100% cheat and pop a frozen piece into the oven. This way I can buy a box of four, they'll last for four meals and won't go bad, and it just makes for such a super quick and easy meal when you've had a busy day. To make it feel like I've done a little bit of cooking from fresh and not just chucked everything into the oven, I peel and slice some potatoes into wedges and season with a Schwartz packet mix. I love these and have used so many of the different ones and rely on them for quite a lot of my meals. Whatever I don't use, I wrap up and pop a little peg on it and it can go into the cupboard. This meal is so low maintenance that I can leave it cooking and carry on with whatever I'm doing, come back later, pop some peas on, you guessed it, into the microwave, and then we're ready to serve. So you will have noticed a lot of repeated ingredients in this week's meals and that's going to happen when trying to avoid waste. And as I said earlier, I'll base my meals on a set of ingredients and then mix it up week on week. When I'm reaching the end of the week and I've got things to use up, cottage pie is the answer. I use frozen minced beef if I only want one portion and I'll use fresh minced beef when I'm happy to have leftovers of the same meal the next day. I add onion, dice up some carrots into small pieces, add frozen peas and crushed garlic. I make the Schwartz cottage pie mix and add it to the mixture and leave it to cook. I cube up some potatoes and cook those ready for mashing. As you can see, this is a great meal to use up leftover ingredients. I transfer the mixture into a one serving pie dish, cover and pop it in the oven. This helps to soften off the carrots and peas if they've not quite gone yet in the frying pan. I prepare the mash in the meantime, just as I did when I did sausage and mash. I pop it on top and finish with a sprinkling of cheese, which is optional, and return it to the oven so it can go crispy. As you can see, I overfilled this one and it exploded a bit, which just goes to show it doesn't always go to plan. I hope you were able to find a little inspiration in these wholesome meals for one. Let me know in the comments if you'd like to see another week's worth of meals using a different set of ingredients. Give the video a thumbs up and subscribe if you're not already and I'll see you again in another video very soon. Until then, take care, bye!