Sometimes you just don’t feel like cooking. That doesn’t mean that you’re relegated to fast food or a frozen dinner. If you are willing to turn on the oven, throw some stuff into a metal pan and cover it with foil, you’re in business.
You can make some terrific meals that will impress even your most critical guests.

Ingredients
- 1 rack of pork ribs, separated
- 1 bottle of hickory and brown sugar barbecue sauce
- 1-2 bags of fresh small Brussel sprouts
- 1 bag of Yukon gold potatoes
Preparation
- Preheat the oven to 340
- Toss the ribs into a baking pan
- Drizzle with barbecue sauce ( don’t go crazy with it. Just squirt a squiggly line of it over the top of the ribs)
- Cover with foil
- Pop it in the oven for 3 hours
Pull it out - Flip the ribs over
- Squirt another small amount of barbecue sauce over the other side of the ribs
- Pour the Brussel sprouts and potatoes around the ribs
- Cover it with foil again and stick it back in the oven for another hour.
- Done
- Pluck out the sprouts and potatoes with tongs
- Throw them on two separate plates and plunk the ribs on a serving plate
- Ring the bell because dinner is served
- * if you object to soft Brussel sprouts, you can add them later but everyone loved them this way

Ingredients
- 2 pints of sliced mushrooms ( we used one pint of white mushrooms and one pint of baby portobellos)
- 1-2 onions, quartered
- A 2 inch squirt of chunky garlic paste from the refrigerated herb section of the supermarket
- Frozen breaded chicken tenders about 4 per person
- 3 slices of sharp cheddar from a 1 inch square brick
- 1-2 Tbsp olive oil
Preparation
- Preheat the oven to 350
- Barely cover the bottom of an baking pan with a thin sheet of olive oil
- Just pour a dash of oil into the pan and swirl the pan around
- Dump the mushrooms in
- Toss in the onions
- Squeeze a 1-2 inch ribbon of the garlic paste on top
- Cover in foil and put it in the oven for 45 min
- (In all honesty, we did that the day before just because we didn’t want the mushrooms to go bad. Once they were done, we pulled the pan out of the oven, let it cool and threw the whole thing in the refrigerator ,as is.)
- Preheat oven to 425
- Place the chicken tenders on foil and put them in the oven about 20 min
- While the chicken is heating pour the mushroom mixture into a sauce pan and heat it on med low. Give it an initial stir to break up the onions. The extra liquid will evaporate
- Just before you’re ready to take the chicken out, place the slices of cheddar on top
- Let it melt- 1-2 min
- Pull it out, plate it and cover with mushrooms
- Voila!

Ingredients
- 1 mandarine Orange, segmented
- 2-3 Tbsp roasted cashews
- 1-2 Tbsp chopped cilantro
- 3-4 frozen breaded chicken tenders
1 slice of mozzarella, thick cut - 1 head butter lettuce, torn into pieces
- 2 Tbsp dark sesame oil
- 1 Tbsp honey
- 2 tsp soy sauce
Preparation
- Preheat oven to 425
- Place tenders on foil and heat for 16- 20 min
Toss the orange segments, cashews, cilantro and lettuce in a bowl. If you want to plate it more decoratively, go for it - Combine the sesame oil, honey and soy sauce in a dish and mix with a fork
- Taste to adjust the flavors to your palate
- Just before pulling out the chicken, top it with the mozzarella and let it melt 1-2 min
- Place the warm chicken on top of the salad and drizzle with the sesame honey dressing
- Delicious.
Enjoy these easy but impressive meals
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