30 Incredible Weeknight Dinners In Under 20 Minutes

This post may contain affiliate links. For more info, please read our full disclosure here

Time is often a factor we consider when it comes to preparing dinner, especially on those really busy weeknights.

After all, the last thing you want to do after a long stressful day at work, is to spend another hour or two in the kitchen, all in the name of making dinner.

Sure, takeout is great in these kind of situations, but it can often get pricey over time, and if you’re working with a budget and trying to save money, or trying to eat healthier, then regular takeout might not be the best option.

Essentially, you want to be able to enjoy tasty meals that are super easy to put together, tasty, and ready in a short period of time. If that’s what you’re looking for, then you’ve come to the right place.

In this post, we’ll share some tips that could help you get dinner ready a bit faster, as well as 30 amazing weeknight dinner you can make in under 20 minutes from scratch.

That’s 20 minutes from start to finish, prep and cook time included. These quick and tasty weeknight dinners will satisfy your cravings easily.

From delicious casseroles, to pasta dishes, to soups, stir fries, tacos, and much more. Busy weeknights just got a lot less stressful with these.

Let’s get right into it.

Tips on cooking faster

Before we get into the yummy stuff, let’s take a look at some tips that could help you actually cook the same or similar meals, but in a faster period of time.

1) Prep Your Ingredients Ahead Of Time

I’ll never get tired of talking about meal prep, because the benefits are just too good to ignore. One area we tend to spend a reasonable amount of time when cooking, is in prepping.

Dicing the veggies, grating the cheese, marinating the chicken, and so on. If you want to save some time, doing these things ahead of time can be a really great idea.

If you have a little extra cash to spare, you can shop for already pre-processed ingredients, like grated cheese for diced frozen veggies. Either option works fine, and will save you some prep time.

2) Use Leftovers

Leftovers are an unpopular gold mine when it comes to cooking. If you learn to repurpose leftovers, not only will you save yourself time, you’ll also save some money too.

For example, instead of bothering to cook some chicken all over again, making use of the already cooked leftovers from the previous days or couple days would be a great idea.

Plus, if you store your leftovers well, they’ll taste as fresh and flavorful as the first day, so you won’t even feel like you’re missing anything.

3) Multitask

Multitasking can also be a great way to shave off some prep time. When I say multitasking, I don’t mean dicing the veggies, while simultaneously taking care of the kids, handling a phone call, while cleaning the house or something.

That’s mission impossible right there. A good case of multitasking, would be making use of multiple burners if you have them.

Let’s say for example, you’re making some teriyaki chicken, and want to serve it with some rice. Cooking both simultaneously on multiple burners, instead of one after the other can help you reduce cook time.

4) Make It All In One Pan/Dish

If you want an easy and stress-free weeknight, one pan/dish meals are the way to go. Since you end up cooking everything in one pan, everything comes together a lot quicker. Not to mention you’ll also spend less time doing cleanup.