How often do you cook? Have the same few things in rotation? Cook for anyone else too? Prep multiple days at a time or cook every day? I personally work a weird schedule so I prep food 5 days at a time. Also only eat one big meal a day. That could be anything in my dozenish meals rotation. I prep for my girlfriend too but shes simple. For her I cut up some vegetables (bell peppers, cauliflower, celery and carrots usually) then cook up a couple pounds of seasoned meat (chicken breast or 90/10 ground beef). What about you?
As someone who had a poorly-paid yet high-stress job for 6 years straight (thanks grad school!) and still recovering, I have a lot to say on this!
I honestly don’t know if what I did could even count as cooking, especially since cooking standards where I grew up is quite high… I just go to the store and buy a bunch of meat + random assorted vegetables and throw them in a pot. Meat is almost always chicken since it’s cheaper, and the local supermarket used to sell massive packs of chicken legs for just $5. Veggies… used to be just some type of cabbage or cauliflower. Recently I’ve been switching things up a bit, but it’s mostly still just these. Usually somewhere between 30-60 minutes is the sweet spot where things don’t cause food poisoning, so within 60-90 minutes of very easy prep, I can get food that would be good for a long time, depending on how big the pot is. Back when I lived in an apartment with a big fridge I sometimes store up to 3-4 weeks of food… Current accommodation only has a mini-fridge, so 4-7 meals max. I cook whenever I run out of food. This is usually the “meal prep” part, which I can then store in the fridge/freezer.
For eating. I’d just make some type of carbs, reheat the mix a bit, and just place them together and eat. Throw in some spices and olive oil (or one of those funny Asian spices if you are into it!) and almost everything would taste just fine. The entire prep almost never exceeds 10 minutes, half of which can be spent showering which cuts down on the morning routine. Probably even faster (1 min?) if one pre-cooks rice, but unfortunately I really don’t like badly cooked rice so it is mainly spaghetti for me…
Recently I did start to cut down on the total number of meals that are prepped though. Recently for breakfast I’ve started to make fried eggs + bread + mayo (which is also 3-5 min cap, although a bit less hands-off), and have been going to the workplace canteen for lunch. But yeah, still pretty much depression meal so to say