Fast Food in Finals Week

By Colleen Walsh Fong and Nanette Littlestone

It’s the week before finals. The pressure is up. I can almost feel the tension in the texts from my two college kids. Papers are due. Exams are scheduled. They are starving, but have no time for cooking. And, in typical college fashion, the school year’s last social activities are calling out like Siren songs. So much to do. So little time. What to do?

Like almost everything else these days, the answer lies in the palms of students’ hands. Specifically, in the phone that almost always sits in the palms of their hands. Let us show you how, by taking a page, literally, from the first “smart” cookbook, Easy Weekly Meals for College Students.

This e-cookbook is designed to take all of the thinking out of healthy eating by providing 15 weeks (approximately 1 semester) of menu plans, grocery lists and recipes that are quick to make, healthy, and use all food to prevent waste of food and money. Students can download it to their smart phones, (or computers, tablets or e-readers,) pull up the grocery lists in the store, shop from their phones, and do the same with recipes in their kitchens.

And in the future they will be able to download grocer and manufacturer coupons—right from their phones—right in the store, if they wish—through the book. Here’s another “smart” thing:  Easy Weekly Meals for College Students is hyperlinked to a cooking glossary and technique demos too.

Each week of menus, grocery lists, and recipes is organized around a college life theme to make cooking more fun. Just a few of them are: Orientation, College Rave, Football Tailgate, and Finals, which brings us back to where we started.

Check out this recipe from the book’s last week, Finals. It’s just one of the seven 5-minute meals featured in that week’s menu plan.

Best-Ever BLT’s

Ingredients

• 1 lb Bacon (may substitute with turkey bacon to reduce calories and fat.)
• 2 T Mayonnaise
• 8 slices Whole Grain Bread
• 4 leaves Romaine Lettuce, washed and dried and halved horizontally
• 2 vine-ripened Tomatoes, sliced into 12 rounds
• 8 oz Potato Chips

Equipment

• Measuring Spoons
• Serrated Knife
• Cutting Board
• Kitchen Knife for spreading
• 12” Frying Pan
• Tongs
• 2 Paper Towels

Preparation

• Cook bacon over medium heat until crisp. Remove to paper towels and drain.
• Spread mayonnaise equally over 1 side of each piece of bread.
• Put 1 piece of lettuce on each piece of bread.
• Set 3 slices of tomato on top of lettuce on each of 4 slices of bread.
• Distribute three-fourths of the cooked bacon among those same 4 slices of bread, and cover with remaining 4 pieces of mayonnaise-coated bread. Refrigerate remaining cooked bacon for use in scrambled eggs later this week.
• Serve with potato chips.

And if you like it, you'll be able to download Easy Weekly Meals For College Students to your mobile device soon.

Not a college student? Don’t fret. An edition of Easy Weekly Meals, designed for your demographic, is in the works, including: Moms on the Go, Singles, Working Parents, and Empty Nesters.

Is there a situation we've missed, and you'd like us to cover? Let us know.

Got any recipe ideas you'd like to share? Please leave us a comment and let us know!

And, good luck on finals!