Cooking w/o planning

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I am terrible at planning out anything. I've learned ways to compensate in many areas of my life. One area I have not been able to compensate well in is cooking. Here are the steps to cooking something:

Decide what to make -> list necessary ingredients to buy -> buy ingredients -> wait for mealtime -> prepare dinner -> eat meal -> clean up

I get screwed up at just about every step. Here are the ways this usually happens. Any particular problem winds up serving as a stopping point in itself.

Cannot settle on what to eat or want something that's too complicated to make -> Too busy to go shopping or just forget till too late -> Wait for mealtime is too long and no longer want to eat what I decided on -> get confused or burn something in the process of cooking, or realize I screwed up step 2 and can't make food, or decide too tired to cook -> not hungry -> fail to clean up and get yelled at by roommate

The big problem, I think, is my inability to come up with a plan and stick with it. It's usually steps 1 or 4 that trip me up. Has anyone else had similar experiences? How do you compensate?

I usually compensate by heating up leftovers in the microwave.

I was the same way until I dedicated some time into learning how to cook. Today cooking is one of my favorite things to do and I'm quite good at it.

If your problem is not the actual preparation of the food (since its #5) but the 'prep' stage of it then perhaps you could try scheduling one day of the week to do all your 'prep' cooking. It will not only save you time but also make your food taste a lot better.

For example, in that one day you could:

- marinate beef/pork/chicken and store it in a plastic container. If you use a splash of vinegar before you marinate it, it will *Really* absorb the flavor of the marinade if you leave it in the fridge for 3 to 5 days.
- Chop all veggies you may use. Onions, bell peppers, herbs, tomato, potatoes,etc,etc into small individual containers.
- If you eat salads a lot, cut large chunks of lettuce and any other leafy veggies (spinach,etc) and put them into its own plastic container.
(note: you can use ziplock bags instead of containers..they work just as well and tend to save more space)
- If you're into soup/stews then have your soup stock made and stored.

If you have spare time you can even 'prep' all the above for the next 2 weeks in that same day by putting those ziplocks/containers in the freezer (if its big enough).

All the above should not take you more than 2 or 3 hours really.

Things like beans and soups/stews you can make and just freeze as well.

Once you have that, you have the freedom of getting home every day and just picking whatever you feel like eating and mix&match. beef and salad? take out the marinated beef, put it on the pan and while it cooks you mix the veggies you want along with your lettuce and make your own salad combo. You get the idea.

If you're having issues with the actual cooking of things...you mentioned it getting burnt...but I'm guessing its because you leave something cooking and lose track of it since you're busy chopping veggies or deciding what else to go along with what you're cooking...but if its not that just say so I think I can also provide some tips on it.

I started cooking as a tedious 'I must do this' thing but it quickly became my most enjoyable interest. Hopefully once you get the hang of it it will too! Saves so much money and you eat so much better and healthier

Get a crockpot cookbook and a crockpot -- they are simple and easy. Just toss everything in, turn it on, and let it do its thing.
Or, get a cookbook that focuses on simple meals so there isn't a lot of overwhelming work involved (that's what I do).

This is why I eat a lot of frozen chicken filets and frozen vegetables.

Meat takes 30-40min in oven at 150c. And vegetables takes 10 min in microwave.

Healthy, boring but it makes it self. Has 2 steps.

For me eating is like going to the toilet. Something you gotta do.
Just want simple easy healthy food you don't have to look at constantly or turn every x minutes.

any luck?