You know what?  Sometimes, there’s just not enough time to really cook.

I get it.  I’m a parent with two small kids, a full-time job, a blog, a serious choral singing commitment, and a couple of occasional side projects/contract jobs here and there.  It’s amazing that we eat anything at all when I step back and think about it.  It’s also amazing that we have clean clothes and have not yet drowned in our own clutter.  So it’s not a shock to me when people say that they don’t have time to cook.  It is, however, not an excuse I accept for myself on a regular basis.

Yes, of course, there is the odd night — very odd, in our house — when I just CAN’T.  On such occasions, I turn to J. with my very best imitation of Puss in Boots from Shrek (you fellow parents know the scene, right?  With the eyes?  The cute little kitty?), and he quite astutely offers to grab a take-out order from the local cafe down the street.  Wise man.  But these nights are not a habit by any means.  I don’t need to channel my inner pathetic kitty cat very often, largely because I realized years ago that assembling a really, really good sandwich is, in fact, an acceptable amount of “cooking” on a busy evening.

Ham and cheese might not do it, but something a very slight bit fancier, preferably hot, can easily make everyone at the table forget that you “just” made sandwiches.  Better yet, a well-planned sandwich night can use up miscellaneous leftovers brilliantly, and gets food in front of a hungry family super fast…even, possibly, less than 15 minutes.  That’s much quicker than take-out.

Barbecue turkey sandwiches

Cuban-style Waffled Panini

Tonight’s sandwich menu:

Barbecued Turkey Sandwiches
Cuban-Style Waffled Panini