{"id":1341,"date":"2015-03-12T21:37:09","date_gmt":"2015-03-12T20:37:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/ingmar.app\/blog\/?p=1341"},"modified":"2015-05-25T11:43:05","modified_gmt":"2015-05-25T09:43:05","slug":"solutions-to-9-of-the-greatest-challenges-and-obstacles-in-cooking-weeknight-dinners","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/ingmar.app\/blog\/solutions-to-9-of-the-greatest-challenges-and-obstacles-in-cooking-weeknight-dinners\/","title":{"rendered":"Solutions to 9 of the greatest challenges and obstacles in cooking weeknight dinners"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"Obstacles<\/a><\/p>\n

Cooking dinner on weeknights could be a challenge when coming home late from work and already hungry. Add kids that need attention and a partner with allergies to the mix and stir, what do you get? a soup of obstacles to cooking weeknight dinners!<\/p>\n

We all have different situations, different cooking skills and a different palate of recipes we are familiar with. The reason I started working on IngredientMatcher was mainly because I had a problem with my own weeknight cooking. I found myself staring into the fridge searching for inspiration on what to make, but after a long day at work, the creativity was not on top.<\/p>\n

I was inspired to write this blog post after a conversation thread on The Kitchn where people were sharing their greatest obstacles in cooking dinner<\/a>. What I did was to summarize all the obstacles mentioned and then doing some research to verify and complement this list of top 9 obstacles in cooking weeknight dinners (in no order of priority):<\/p>\n

    \n
  1. Lack of time\n
      \n
    • Preparing vegetables<\/li>\n
    • Thawing<\/li>\n
    • Heating up water, etc<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n
    • Lack of energy<\/li>\n
    • Not knowing what to cook\/no plan\n
        \n
      • Using leftover ingredients<\/li>\n
      • That will satisfy everyone in the family (taste, allergies, diets)<\/li>\n
      • Not knowing what ingredients are at home<\/li>\n
      • No inspiration for eating something new and healthy<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n
      • Cleaning up afterwards<\/li>\n
      • Hungry before starting to cook<\/li>\n
      • Missing the skills to cook without a recipe or adapting one (e.g. which ingredients go well together, cooking time of vegetables, possible substitutions, basic sauce recipes)<\/li>\n
      • Not getting the timing right<\/li>\n
      • Shopping for groceries<\/li>\n
      • Distractions like kids, phone calls, etc<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n

         <\/p>\n

         <\/p>\n

        Having these obstacles could lead to:<\/p>\n

          \n
        • Eating same old meals over and over<\/li>\n
        • Eating processed food<\/li>\n
        • Eating out<\/li>\n
        • Eating something really simple and quick (cereals, sandwich, etc)<\/li>\n
        • Taking an extra trip to the store<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n

           <\/p>\n

          Solutions to 9 of the greatest challenges and obstacles in cooking weeknight dinners:<\/p>\n