We recently asked members of the BuzzFeed Community for their favourite food hack they'd recommend for lazy people. Here are some of their responses!
1. Bake butternut squash on a low heat for twenty minutes if you're struggling to peel and chop it raw.
2. Embrace one-pan meals, even for things you might usually cook on the stove like stir-fry and fajitas.
3. Instead of using water in ready-made brownie mixes, use coffee.
4. De-seed pomegranates by cutting them before soaking them in water.
5. If you want egg in your instant noodles, crack one in while the noodles are part-cooked, and by the time they're done you'll have a perfectly cooked egg.
6. For quicker mashed potatoes, cut the potatoes up and leave the skins on.
7. After you open a can, the easiest way to pull the lid out is to use a small fridge magnet.
8. Weigh up whether something is really worth making from scratch.
9. Seriously consider getting an Instant Pot so that you can put all your ingredients in it, leave it for hours, and then open it to find a delicious dinner.
10. As well as a Silpat, which can be used for more than baking.
11. If your fresh vegetables are a hassle to prepare or just go to waste, try buying frozen ones instead.
12. Make bacon in the oven to avoid the mess and smoke of cooking it in a frying pan.
13. If you don't have a good food processor, grate your garlic, ginger, etc when a recipe calls for it to be finely chopped.
14. Place onions in hot water for a few minutes to make them easier to peel.
15. Or if you're through with peeling and chopping them, get pre-chopped frozen ones.
16. Get yourself a garlic mincer.
17. Cook courgettes in the microwave – it takes under 10 minutes!
18. Don't throw your pasta water away. Use it to *enhance* the dish.
19. If you're using something sticky like black treacle or molasses, coat the spoon with vegetable oil beforehand so that the treacle will slide right off.
