It’s meal plan time! 🙌
Here are your recipes for the week – 7 cosy, family-approved dinners, a dreamy dessert and two lunchbox snacks to keep everyone happy. There’s a good mix of slow cooker meals, quick weeknight pasta and a couple of weekend winners, so you’re all sorted!
Bookmark this page so you can come back to it all week. Happy cooking! 🍽️ x
Monday: Slow Cooker Butter Chicken
Set it in the morning and come home to the most incredible creamy, fragrant butter chicken. Serve over rice with naan!
Tuesday: Easy Beef Lasagne
Layers of rich bolognese (beef mince, tinned tomatoes, tomato paste and Italian herbs) with fresh lasagne sheets and melted mozzarella and parmesan – no béchamel needed, just tuck in!
Wednesday: Taco Pasta
One pot, 20 minutes: beef mince and taco seasoning cooked up with pasta shells, beef stock, canned tomatoes, milk and a double hit of cheddar and mozzarella for the creamiest, cheesiest weeknight dinner.
Thursday: Slow Cooker Beef Stroganoff
Rump steak strips slow-cooked for 8 hours with Worcestershire sauce, Dijon mustard, sweet paprika, mushrooms and sour cream – serve over egg noodles, pasta, rice or mash.
Friday: Chicken Fajita Casserole
Just 5 ingredients – chicken breast, fajita seasoning, red, yellow and green capsicum, onion and a Mexican cheese blend – all baked together in one dish for 30 minutes.
Saturday: Noodle & Beef Chow Mein
Old-school beef mince chow mein with cabbage, carrot, curry powder, oyster sauce, soy sauce and hokkien noodles – on the table in 30 minutes and even better reheated the next day.
Sunday: Steak & Mushroom Pie
Chunks of slow-cooked beef chuck with mushrooms, bacon, Worcestershire sauce and rich gravy, all nestled in a blind-baked shortcrust base and topped with golden flaky puff pastry.
🍰 Dessert – Easy Apple Cake
A moist butter cake layered with fresh Granny Smith apple slices, topped with flaked almonds and raw sugar that caramelise into a beautiful crunchy crust – ready in under an hour.
🥪 Lunchbox Snack – Famous 100 Cookie Recipe
Just 4 ingredients – butter, caster sugar, sweetened condensed milk and self-raising flour – mixed together and customised with any add-ins you like (chocolate chips, Milo, Smarties!), making a whopping 100 soft cookies in 20 minutes.
🥪 Lunchbox Snack – Apricot Coconut Slice
A completely no-bake slice made from crushed Marie biscuits, chopped dried apricots, butter, brown sugar, desiccated coconut and condensed milk – just press into a tin, refrigerate for 4 hours and slice.