What to Cook Tonight: How to Decide Dinner in Two Minutes
Three questions in a fixed order, then a format, then the dish: a way to answer what's for dinner tonight in two minutes, and how to stop asking it every evening.
By Eatpace 10 min read 
Deciding what to cook tonight is not hard because you lack recipes. You have hundreds within reach: the ones you grew up with, the ones saved on your phone, the ones you could make with your eyes closed. The hard part is that at six o'clock, tired, hungry and standing in front of an open fridge, you are being asked to choose from all of them at once, with no criteria, and to do it before anyone starts complaining. That is a decision problem, and decision problems are solved with a procedure, not with more options.
Here is a procedure that takes two minutes. Three questions in a fixed order, then a format, then the dish. You can run it tonight with whatever is in the house, and at the end of the post there is the part that stops the problem coming back every evening.
The 6pm question is a decision problem, not a lack of ideas
Think about what actually happens at the fridge door. You open it, look at the shelves, and wait for an idea to arrive. One does, and you reject it: too long, no rice, he will not eat that. Another, rejected. Within a few minutes you have been through eight possibilities and committed to none, and the kitchen is no closer to smelling of anything. Then someone asks what's for dinner and the answer comes out sharper than you meant.
What is missing is not a ninth idea. It is a way of narrowing the field before any idea is allowed in, so that the first thing that fits is the thing you cook. Good cooks do this without noticing. They have a few questions they ask of every evening, and the answers rule out most of the options before they have thought of a single dish.
The two minutes below put those questions in order. The order matters more than the questions do.
Three questions, in order, then a format, then the dish
Ask these one at a time and do not skip ahead to the dish. The moment you start thinking "I could do that chicken thing" you have gone back to browsing, and browsing is what got you here.
- What in the fridge dies first? Open it and look for the thing with the shortest life: the half pepper, the bag of spinach going soft, the mince that was reduced. That ingredient is tonight's starting point whether you fancy it or not.
- How much energy do I honestly have, in minutes? Not how long dinner should take, but how long you are genuinely willing to stand at a hob. Say a number. Fifteen, twenty-five, forty. Be honest, because an optimistic number here is what ends in a takeaway at eight.
- Who is eating and what will they not eat? Count the people, name the one thing each of them refuses, and rule out anything that would need two versions.
- Pick a format, not a dish: something on rice, something on pasta, something in a wrap or on toast, or something in one pan.
- Now, and only now, name the dish. It will be the first one that fits the ingredient, the minutes, the people and the format. Stop looking once you have it.
Two minutes is generous for this. Once the first three questions are answered the field is usually down to two or three dishes, and the format question settles it.
Pick the format before the dish
Choosing a format first is the step people skip, and it is the one that does most of the work. Four formats cover nearly every weeknight dinner, and each has a known cost in minutes and washing up. Once you know which one tonight is, the dish almost names itself.
Something on rice. Rice goes on first and takes care of itself while you make the topping. If the ingredient that dies first is chicken, Honey Soy Chicken & Broccoli Rice is 28 minutes and children tend to eat it without negotiation, which answers question three on its own. If the ingredient is eggs and a few vegetables, the rice format gives you fried rice, and that is covered below.
Something on pasta. The water goes on first instead of the rice, and the sauce is built in the time it takes to boil. Tuna Olive Spaghetti is 25 minutes from a tin of tuna, a jar of olives and a handful of cupboard things; Tomato Chickpea Penne & Spinach is also 25 minutes, uses up a bag of spinach that is on its way out, and comes from the cupboard apart from that spinach.
Something in a wrap or on toast. This is the format for the lowest honest number of minutes. Tortillas, pitta or a thick slice of bread carry whatever is left in the fridge, and there is usually no pan to wash beyond the one. Smoky Black Bean Tacos take 25 minutes from two tins and a few spices, and they feed a mixed table because everyone fills their own.
Something in one pan. For the evening when you want a proper hot dinner and one piece of washing up. Spiced Shakshuka & Pita is 28 minutes: a pan of spiced tomato with eggs cracked into it, bread to drag through, and nothing else to think about.
Notice that none of these required an idea. The ingredient chose the protein, the minutes chose the format, the people trimmed the list, and the dish was simply what was left standing. On a different night, with a different fridge, the same procedure gives you a different dinner. The recipes change; the two minutes do not.
You do not need a better idea at six o'clock. You need a shorter list, and the questions are what shorten it.
The dinners that are always possible from a cupboard and a freezer
The procedure above assumes there is something in the fridge worth saving. Some nights there is not, and the fallback has to come from the cupboard and the freezer. Keep a short list of dinners that can always be made from what is permanently in the house, and the "nothing in" evening stops being a crisis.
From the cupboard alone: pasta with a tin of tomatoes, garlic and whatever cheese is left; a tin of chickpeas warmed with curry paste and a tin of coconut milk over rice; tuna, beans and lemon stirred together; noodles with soy, a spoon of chilli crisp and a soft egg. From the freezer: peas, spinach and prawns go into fried rice, a curry or a pasta without thawing, and bread toasts straight from frozen.
Eggs are the hinge of all of it, because they keep for weeks and turn a cupboard into dinner in under twenty minutes. Egg Fried Rice is 20 minutes with leftover or pouch rice and a bag of frozen peas, and it is a dinner children ask for rather than tolerate. Chilli Crisp Eggs Toast Sandwich is 15 minutes and is the answer when the honest number from question two was "fifteen, and that is being kind to myself".
Write your own version of this list and stick it inside a cupboard door. Five dinners is plenty. The point is that when the fridge offers nothing, you are choosing from five rather than from everything.
Stop deciding every night: decide the next few once
The two-minute procedure fixes tonight. It does not stop tomorrow from being the same question, asked in the same state, at the same hour. For that you have to move the decision out of the evening altogether, and the way to do it is smaller than most people think.
Do not plan a week. Plan the next few dinners, starting with tonight. Two, three, four, as far ahead as you can see clearly. Run the same three questions, but for several evenings at once: what in the fridge dies first goes into tonight, what you have the least energy for goes on the night you know will be hardest, and the people question is answered once for the lot.
Then let the shopping follow the dinners rather than the other way round. You buy for the dinners you have named and nothing else, and the fridge stops filling with ingredients that were bought on hope.
Starting tonight matters. A plan that begins next Monday is a plan you will not keep, because every evening between now and Monday is still an open question.
This is the shape of the problem Eatpace is built for. It keeps your next few dinners ready, two to seven of them, starting tonight, and plans more when the plan runs low. The dinners add up into one grocery list, sorted by aisle or by meal, with the staples you already have marked as in stock. On the night the plan does not fit, Swap gives you three alternatives: Like it for something close, Quicker when the honest number of minutes has dropped, Lighter when lunch was big. Rate what you cooked Loved it or Not for us and the next few dinners lean towards what worked.
If you want the longer version of planning done well, Weekly Meal Planning: A Complete Guide for Real Life covers it properly, including how to shop for what you have decided. The two-minute method here is the smallest possible start, and it is enough to break the nightly loop.
The 6pm question is not going to disappear from your life. There will always be evenings when the plan is thin or absent, and the two minutes are for those. But if the next few dinners are already decided, those evenings become rare, and the question becomes "which pan" rather than "what on earth".
For the nights when even two minutes feel like too many, Dinner Ideas When You Don't Feel Like Cooking After Work starts from a lower bar, and the easy dinner recipes are a good shelf to pick the next few from. Decide tonight, then decide the next few, and the problem gets smaller every evening; a planner like Eatpace just keeps it that way.
What should I eat for dinner when I have no idea?
Ask three questions in order: what in the fridge dies first, how many minutes you honestly have, and who is eating and what they refuse. Then pick a format (rice, pasta, wrap or toast, one pan) and take the first dish that fits all four.
What can I cook tonight with almost nothing in?
Eggs, rice, pasta, tinned tomatoes, tinned beans and tinned tuna cover most of it. Egg fried rice, tuna pasta, beans on toast with a fried egg, or tacos from a tin of black beans all take 15 to 25 minutes and need no shop.
How do I stop asking "what's for dinner" every single night?
Decide the next few dinners once, starting with tonight, and shop for those and nothing else. Two or three evenings ahead is enough; a whole week is more than most people can see clearly.
Should I plan dinner by recipe or by ingredient?
By ingredient first. The thing in your fridge with the shortest life decides the protein or vegetable, your energy decides the format, and the recipe is the last thing you choose, not the first.
How long should a weeknight dinner take?
As long as you honestly have, which is often less than the recipe assumes. Say a number before you choose the dish, and pick a format that fits it: toast for fifteen minutes, rice or pasta for twenty-five, one pan for about thirty.
The dinners in this post
Every one is in the Eatpace catalogue, with the time and nutrition on the recipe. Add it to your plan in the app.
