Snacks are one of the most fun things to eat. There’s such a big variety, and they’re convenient. No one wants snacks that take forever to prepare, because it defeats the whole purpose of a snack being a quick and convenient food!

That’s where air fryers come in. You can toss just about anything into the air fryer for a few minutes and have the perfect snack for whatever mood you’re in, like crispy seasoned chickpeas.

Everyone knows that one of the worst things about leftovers is when you reheat them in the microwave and they come out mushy or soggy. It often makes you not even want to eat them.

The air fryer, however, will make you feel like you’re eating your leftovers fresh, and it’s especially good for fried or crispy foods, like pizza or french fries (because microwaved french fries are awful!). So now, there’s no need to worry about taking leftovers home.

It’s so frustrating to pull something delicious out of the air fryer just to discover that it’s stuck to the tray despite the non-stick coating. But, there’s an easy way to avoid that happening, and it involves oil.

You can use an oil with a high smoke point, like safflower oil, to grease the bottom of the basket a little bit. Doing this ensures you won’t be wasting time scraping your food off and can get straight to eating.

Did you know there’s a scientific reason your kids don’t like to eat vegetables? Back when we relied on smell to forage food, bitter tastes (which veggies often have) signaled things were toxic for us.

While we don’t forage anymore, that veggie aversion has stuck around. But you can find sneaky ways around it by air frying them, which gives them a unique texture and makes even the pickiest eater more likely to try them.

Have you ever tried to pack as much beef or chicken into your frying pan as you can, only to realize that your meat is cooking unevenly? Most of us have, and quickly learned that meat needs breathing space.

The same principle applies to air fryers. Make sure to give that meat the space it needs to not only cook evenly — but to also get that crispy and delicious texture that only air fryers can achieve. It’s worth it!

One of the best parts of summer is bringing out the grill and making some nicely roasted corn on the cob. But, what if we told you that you could have this tasty treat year-round without needing to buy charcoal or propane?

Yep, even corn on the cob comes out great in the air fryer. You just have to coat the outside of your corn with a bit of cooking spray and seasoning before chucking it in the air fryer. Be sure to flip it halfway through.

French fries are amazing when they’re fresh, but they never keep well beyond a few hours. Despite that, many of us find ourselves with leftover french fries and dread having to putthem in the microwave.

The air fryer brings this amazing form of potato back to life, and on top of that, it’s great for making homemade fries! So, get to cutting those potatoes and enjoying fries without the oil-fried guilt that comes with actually frying them.

Dry rubs — AKA applying seasonings without oil or butter — work fine when using an oven, but air fryers work by cooking food with air circulation. That means loose seasoning is more likely to get blown right off your food.

Mix your seasonings with a little bit of oil before cooking, and do a wet rub for your food instead. Your taste buds will thank you for not giving them something bland, and your air fryer will thank you for not dirtying it with loose garlic powder.

Speaking of seasonings flying around in your air fryer, some things may not be quite right for air fryer cooking. Lightweight foods — as in foods that are literally lightweight — don’t exactly do well with air flying around them.

The food itself starts flying around, and then you open your air fryer to a disaster scene of epic proportions. So, even though your air fryer is great, remember that you do have more appropriate kitchen tools at your disposal for something like… toast.

Another popular food that turns out pretty great in an air fryer is grilled cheese sandwiches (although perhaps we need to give them a new name since they aren’t grilled this way). But, how do you stop the cheese from flying right out of the bread?

You break out that random jar of toothpicks you’ve got stowed away somewhere, and you stick a few of those puppies through your sandwich. Now, you’ve both got a delicious sandwich and gotten rid of some clutter. It’s a win-win.

Bacon is an extremely popular breakfast food, and most people like their bacon nice and crispy. Sometimes, that’s hard to achieve without a lot of unhealthy grease, but the air fryer does a pretty great job.

All you have to do is put some slices of bacon in, cook for two to three minutes at 375 °F, flip, repeat, and voilà! You’ve got nice, crunchy bacon without having to use a bunch of paper towels to soak up the grease.

Cooking chicken at high temperatures can result in really juicy chicken, but it can also cause your poultry to start smoking or even burn. There’s a really easy way to avoid this in an air fryer, though, and it’s free.

Simply add a cup of water to the bottom of your air fryer before you use it. All the grease and fat that normally starts burning will be caught in the water.

Most of us have heard about using flour to create a batter for chicken, but why not try cornstarch? It’s super easy to do using the air fryer, and comes out great every time.

Just cut up that chicken into chunks, and cook it for 7-9 minutes at 400 °F. Then, simmer it in your favorite sauce for a few minutes — and you’ve got some super tasty air fryer chicken.

Sure, raw nuts are good, but toasted or roasted nuts are great — and it’s yet another thing the amazingly versatile air fryer can do! There’s no need for unhealthy supermarket versions.

Lots of people swear that air fryer roasted cashews are incredible, but you can use just about any nut to make a healthy, delicious snack. Don’t eat raw nuts like all the other lame people out there.

Hard-boiled eggs are delicious, but it’s easy to overdo them. It’s also annoying to sit and listen to them bouncing around in the pot while the water jostles them around. This is where the air fryer comes in.

“Boiling” eggs is yet another thing the air fryer does and does well. Cook them at a lower temperature for around 15 minutes. Once you find that magic air fryer time, you’ll never need to worry about underdone or overdone eggs again.

While preheating isn’t a mandatory step with an air fryer like it is with an oven, sometimes it’s still a good idea to preheat, especially when it comes to cooking meat.

Preheating your air fryer can make sure it’s hot enough to keep your chicken nice and juicy while cooking and also make it easier to make sure that it’s cooked thoroughly. No one wants dry or underdone chicken! But, there’s no need to worry about that with preheating.

We all know that the air fryer is great for cooking meals, and we’ve even seen a few handy snacks that it’s great for as well. But, don’t limit yourself — you can make desserts in this handy little contraption as well!

There are tons of recipes online for air-fryer cookies, brownies, and everything in between. You don’t need to skip dessert just because you’re skipping the oven!

Eating a whole roast potato is delicious, but it takes ages to cook — and unfortunately, that’s no different when doing it in an air fryer instead of an oven. That’s why it’s recommended to parboil first.

Parboiling means “partially boiling,” so cook your root vegetables in boiling water for around five minutes before putting them in the air fryer. It’s a little more involved, but you still save time over using an oven to roast them!

Sure, the invention of nonstick cooking sprays made our lives so much easier. We don’t have to waste time scraping food off of pans anymore. However, nonstick cooking spray isn’t appropriate for every scenario.

It’s not recommended for use in an air fryer because it could damage it. Go the DIY route and just put some olive oil in a spray bottle, and then give your basket a light spritz before cooking for the best results.

You know those little silicone trays that are used to make things like muffins or breakfast egg bites in the oven? Well, we ask you this — if they’re great for the oven, why not use them in your air fryer?

You can use them to make so many different things, from mini air fryer pancakes to tiny cheesecakes to… well, egg bites! The possibilities are endless and cleanup will be a breeze.

Much along the lines of the egg bite trays, silicone muffin cups are another great way to cook things that need to be kept contained or separated. They’re useful for more purposes than you would think.

You can use them to cook boiled eggs, various desserts, or even chicken wings (it’s a great way to stop the sauce from getting everywhere!). The possibilities are endless when you don’t limit yourself to just the air fryer basket.

Most common air fryers these days have a lot of nifty settings that their users ignore. One of those is the option to dehydrate food, but you can do this even if your air fryer doesn’t have that setting.

Dehydrated fruits can be used as snacks, toppings for desserts and oatmeal, or however else you see fit. It’s a great way to make eating fruit a bit more interesting and give it more texture.

Parchment paper is useful in that it makes cleanup a breeze and saves you the trouble of scraping food off of the pan, but it can be a bit tricky to use inside of the air fryer.

You can get around smoking or burning by poking a few holes in the parchment paper here and there, but if the idea still makes you nervous, you can just skip it altogether and use aluminum foil instead!

Tofu is a staple in most vegetarian and vegan diets, but cooking it so that it doesn’t turn out mushy or flavorless can be really tricky. Thankfully, that’s where the air fryer comes in.

After seasoning it properly, cooking it in the air fryer gives the tofu the perfect texture. It’s enough to convert even the biggest tofu hater into a fan, assuming you remember to pack in the flavor!

Have you ever tried to roast something in the oven, just to realize that it’s not cooking properly because you tried to cram way too much onto the oven tray? Most of us have.

The same idea goes for air fryers — don’t overpack the basket. The air needs to be able to circulate through and cook the food thoroughly, and putting too much in will prevent that from happening. Make sure you leave some space for the best results.

Have you ever desperately craved McDonald’s chicken nuggets or a whopper, but couldn’t be bothered to drive down there? Or maybe you have some leftovers but aren’t looking forward to how soggy they get in the microwave.

Well have no fear, the air fryer is here! Pop those nuggies or that half-eaten Whopper in the air fryer and watch true magic happen. You won’t need fast food anymore when you can make such tasty copycat fast food at home.

Casseroles are a very American food. They became super popular during the Great Depression, when families just gathered whatever bits they had into a pan and stuck it in the oven. They’ve been a staple in American households ever since.

Next Thanksgiving, instead of hogging valuable space in the oven with your green bean casserole, try cooking it in your air fryer! And you can cook it in any material pan you want, even silicone.

We’ve already talked about using egg bite trays, silicone cups, and even casserole dishes in your air fryer, which leads us to our next point — don’t be scared of using pans inside your air fryer!

As long as they aren’t touching the heating element, it’s perfectly safe and gives you a wider variety of dishes you can prepare. It also saves you from having to scrub the basket down afterward.

It’s a step that lazy cooks often skip, but it’s important — when baking, use a spatula to flip what you’re cooking halfway through. Well, the same idea goes for air fryers, except you don’t need a spatula.

About halfway through the cook time, take the basket and give it a few shakes. This will help shift around what you’re cooking to make sure all sides are getting cooked evenly so that your food turns out perfect every time.

Remember how you can save space in the oven on Thanksgiving day by preparing your green bean casserole in the air fryer? Well, you can do the same thing with your glazed ham!

You’ve just got to cook the ham at about 300 °F for about 10 minutes for every pound of meat. Your guests will be raving about it and will never know that it wasn’t baked for hours on end.

It’s common to see air fryers shoved into a corner on a countertop, and also directly underneath a cabinet. That’s not a great place to place your air fryer, and here’s why — your air fryer is a mini oven.

It needs space around it for the heat to dissipate, and placing it in a corner, especially if it’s near meltable objects, is a sure way to enter the kitchen to the smell of burnt plastic. Make sure your air fryer has some room to “breathe.”

Most air fryer owners know that making a “grilled” cheese inside their air fryer is pretty darn delicious, but they may not know that there’s something better to coat the bread with than butter — mayonnaise!

Since mayo is made with egg yolks and oil, it gives the bread a crispy, golden brown layer that you just can’t achieve as well with butter. You can even use garlic mayo if you want to get fancy.

Want to save time cleaning up messes in your air fryer but don’t want to buy extra pans and silicone trays? You can use a household kitchen staple instead — aluminum foil.

The foil will preserve juices and oil if you want to make a gravy, but it will also prevent them from building up on your basket and making cleanup more difficult. There’s a reason every kitchen has this beautiful silver miracle product.

People in southern Europe are lucky because they have cheap and easy access to great-quality olive oil. In other countries, people aren’t so lucky, having to spend quite a bit of dough to get good olive oil.

The great thing about air fryers is that thanks to the method of cooking, you can use so little oil that you’ll actually end up saving money! So, that means your olive oil bottle will last longer and your wallet will thank you.

As much as we’ve been raving about how incredible the air fryer is and how it can do anything and everything, you should remember that you have an entire kitchen at your disposal!

Other cooking methods, like boiling or searing, are still really useful and shouldn’t be forgotten just because you’ve got a snazzy new gadget. Use these “old school” methods in combination with your air fryer if you really want top-tier home cooking.

You know how when you air fry chicken, you end up with juices and drippings down in the bottom of the basket? Don’t just throw it away. You can use it!

No matter what kind of meat it is, you can use those juices to make gravy or sauce for your meal. Not only will it be packed with flavor but it’ll also ensure that any meal has some tasty moisture.

You may think of your air fryer insert as one unit, but most air fryer inserts that are basket-style have two pieces — a drawer and a basket that goes inside. Make sure you detach the basket before you dump out your cooked food.

If you don’t, any juice or oil that has gathered in the bottom will end up dumped all over your food, which isn’t exactly ideal. So don’t forget to take the basket out and dump the food out that way.

Look, butter is great and all, but it can’t be used for anything and everything. One example is roasting vegetables. Butter can burn quickly at high temperatures, making your veggies burn.

It’s true for ovens and frying pans, and it’s true for the air fryer too. Cut down on the butter when roasting your veggies to prevent burning, and if you want to use a lot of something, use oil instead.

When you deep fry food, you usually make the breading layer by using egg and flour. And while that works well for actual frying, it’s not so great in the air fryer.

The crust doesn’t turn out as well that way, so instead of just egg and flour, use breadcrumbs and oil. That’ll make it easier to get the perfect crisp you’re looking for in your “fried” food — plus it’ll be so much healthier than deep frying.

If you’re still using your eyeballs to judge whether your meat is cooked, or overcooking your chicken for fear of food poisoning, then you should join the loads of people who have upped their cooking game with a simple tool.

Buy a meat thermometer. It’s the most accurate way to make sure your meat is fully cooked and to prevent over or undercooked chicken. Both your stomach and your tastebuds will thank you.

Like microwaves, sometimes the air fryer beeping gets super annoying. It can be really loud and jarring, and go off for way longer than it needs to. But, what if you could turn it off?

It turns out that on some air fryers, you can. Usually, it’s achieved by pressing the minus keys down for around three seconds. If your air fryer can’t do this, maybe you’ll want to buy a new one that can (or invest in a pair of earplugs)!

Manuals and recipe cook times are great and all, but just like ovens, each air fryer is different and may need slightly different cook times to achieve the same results.

Trust the experience of those who share recipes with you, but also trust your own experience. With time, you’ll be an expert on what your own air fryer needs to produce food exactly how you like it, and you’ll no longer need to even glance at the manual!

Since cooking with the air fryer doesn’t need very much oil, it can be easy for food to dry out if you aren’t careful. So, don’t avoid adding oil completely — just time it right.

Add a little bit of oil in the beginning, but also add a little bit of oil in the middle of the cooking cycle. It will help prevent your food from drying out and sticking to the basket.

There’s nothing worse than buying a bag of amazing croissants from a nearby bakery, only to forget about them and realize that they’ve gone stale. But, what if you could bring some life back into them?

You can with the air fryer. Add a little bit of water to the drip pan, and then throw your stale pastries in for a few minutes. The moisture will bring even the hardest croissant back from the dead.

Don’t neglect cleaning! It’s easy to think that our microwaves and dishwashers and air fryers are invincible and don’t need to be cleaned, but it’s just not true.

You should wipe down the bottom of the air fryer frequently to avoid extra smoking, and you should also clean the basket when it’s warm as that’s the easiest way. Don’t wait until it’s too late to really remove the grime.

If you’re anything like us, then you hate to cook but love to eat. Unfortunately, in order to enjoy a delicious meal, it’s necessary to pay your dues in the kitchen. Luckily, there are some genius cooking hacks that can make food prep a lot easier and go a lot faster. Here are 40+ brilliant tricks for the shamelessly lazy chef who still wants quality meals!

Sometimes, you just can’t be bothered to make a proper snack. Or maybe you’re rushing to work and don’t have time to cook a nutritious breakfast. Either way, this hack will have you covered!

Simply pour some oats into an almost-empty jar of peanut butter. It’s delicious, healthy, quick, and easy to make, and it’ll ensure that you’re not wasting those last peanut butter drops. If you’ve got some extra time and you’re feeling fancy, you can add fruit or nuts to the jar, as well.

Most tasty dishes require fresh garlic, which can be a total pain to peel and chop. Not to mention that your hands will smell like garlic for the remainder of the day. This hack requires some prep work at the get-go but it’ll save you tons of effort later on.

Get a whole bunch of garlic, peel and chop it, and simply throw it all into an ice tray before popping it into the freezer. That way, the next time you need some garlic, it’ll be ready to go!

In order to have enough chicken for all sorts of dishes, simply buy one large rotisserie chicken. You can then cut off chunks of it and use them for several days — even a week! Want a chicken salad? No problem, you already have the chicken ready to go!

Fancy some chicken soup? No need to cook the chicken chunks, just throw them in with some broth and your favorite soup vegetables! Why prepare separate food each day when you can just get one big, multi-purpose chicken once a week?

If you love the flavor of barbequed food but don’t want to spend hours by the grill, there’s one simple spice that’ll solve that problem. Cooking smoked paprika into your food will give it that rich and heavy flavor reminiscent of a BBQ.

Is it exactly the same thing as a meal that’s been on the grill? Unfortunately, no. Is it an excellent substitute for someone who doesn’t like barbecuing or lacks the space for a big grill at home? Absolutely!

Oftentimes, frozen goods can be shockingly tasty and they’re certainly a lot less time-consuming than making your own pastries from scratch. If you still want your desserts to have a bit of a unique flavor, you can always give them your own personal touch

Add some vanilla extract or chocolate powder to your pastry before putting it in the oven. Really, there’s no limit to what you can do to make a basic pastry your own.

Instant foods, such as instant mashed potatoes, are popular for a reason! There may be a bit of a stigma against them, but, let’s be honest, sometimes you really want mashed potatoes and can’t be bothered to spend hours slaving away in the kitchen for them.

You can always add a secret spice or sauce to your instant food in order to personalize it and make it seem like you prepared it from scratch. Or just let everyone know it’s instant — there’s no shame in that!

There’s no need to spend hours preparing the dough if you want to make pizza. You don’t even have to defrost a big pre-made pizza dough — especially if you’re just one person.

Instead, use a flour tortilla or pita bread, spread marina sauce on it, add a bit of cheese, and whatever toppings you want, and put it in the oven for five minutes. There you go, you now have a personal pizza!

There may have been a time when cooking had to take hours upon hours, but not in this day and age. Nowadays, we have tons of technology to help us out. So, are you using all of your kitchen gadgets to their max?

For example, it’s no longer necessary to stand there pulling apart chicken if you need it shredded. All you have to do is use a mixer and your chicken will be shredded in seconds. To think we once believed that mixers were just for mixing!

Potatoes are extremely versatile and can be used for meals at pretty much any time of the day. Dedicate a bit of time, every now and then, to cut and boil potatoes and then keep them in the fridge.

That way, half the work will already be done when you need to make something quickly. In fact, you can always just throw them onto a pan with some butter or oil and spices for a super quick and easy bite.

Turn your popcorn to the next level and make it into a once-in-a-blue-moon snack by using instant macaroni and cheese packets to season the popcorn. Pop your popcorn in the microwave, as you normally would.

When you put it into a bowl, sprinkle the macaroni and cheese powder on top and then mix it in. Once you do that, you’ll be ready for a proper movie night, Netflix and chill, a quick snack, or all three!

Cleaning a blender can be tricky, as you run the risk of accidentally hurting yourself on the blade. However, there’s a much quicker, easier, and — most importantly — safer way to clean the blender, simply by letting it do its thing.

Fill your blender a little less than halfway with warm water (not too hot), add a touch of dish soap, put the lid on, and run the blender for a few seconds. Pour the dirty water out, rinse the blender, and you’re done!

Peeling garlic can be a serious task that leaves an even more serious odor on your hands, but it doesn’t have to be. Heating the garlic up a bit can save you a lot of time and energy.

Just toss a head of garlic into the microwave for 20 seconds and then the peels will slip off with ease. This method will ensure that you won’t have to deal with juices, messes, or smelly hands — just some ready-to-cut garlic!

Fish can be cooked even while frozen, meaning that you can skip the stage of waiting for it to thaw. This might increase your cooking time but you’ll save more on all the time you would have waited for it to reach room temperature. So it all depends on how urgently you need it ready.

What’s nice about this method is that not only do you not need to decide in advance if you want fish, but, since it’s frozen, the spices and sauces will stick to the outside and the fish won’t get overcooked inside.

Whipping cream by hand can leave you feeling like you’ve just grown an extra bicep. Save that energy for the gym, instead, and shake your whipped cream. Pour heavy whipping cream into a jar, add powdered sugar and vanilla, close the jar tightly, and shake it until it’s nice and fluffy.

Feel free to blast some music and dance around the house while shaking your whipped cream like a maraca — it sounds like a soon-to-be TikTok trend, doesn’t it?

De-seeding pomegranates is often messy, frustrating, and seemingly impossible. Luckily, there’s a trick to getting those pomegranate seeds out efficiently and without any messiness involved.

First, cut the pomegranate in half, and then soak it in some water. Pick out the seeds and let them drop to the bottom of the bowl. The pomegranate membrane and rind will then float to the top. Just drain the seeds and you’re ready to go!

Making a dish like polenta or grits can take quite a bit of time and energy. However, there’s a quick trick to getting these meals ready in half the time: add baking soda. The baking soda will get your food to the right consistency and texture, without all the effort.

Just make sure not to overdo it — you don’t need more than a pinch. For polenta, mix the baking soda with water before adding it in and your dish will end up perfectly creamy.

Certain foods, like casserole or lasagna, take ages to heat up in the oven. However, if you heat them up in the microwave, they’ll lose their original texture.

The solution to this dilemma is to defrost your food in the microwave first, and then finish warming it up in the oven. The microwave will quickly heat the insides of the dish and the oven will heat up the outside, while still maintaining the texture.

Very few things taste as good as some warm apple pie. Unfortunately, very few things require as much time and effort to bake as apple pie does. That being said, there’s a lazy option for this classic dessert.

Cut an apple into small cubes and place it into a cup or bowl. Add butter, sugar, cinnamon, and salt. Then, put it in the microwave until the apples get mushy. Finally, sprinkle crushed graham crackers on top. There you have it — five-minute apple pie!

If a recipe calls for squeezing lemons or lime, you can save yourself some time by using bottled lemon or lime juice. It’s a lot less messy, a lot easier, and won’t leave you trying to fish out the seeds.

We’ll be honest, the flavor won’t be as fresh as it’d be if you squeezed lemons or limes yourself. Therefore, you should really just use this hack for recipes in which the food is being cooked or mixed with a lot of other flavors anyway.

Leftover food doesn’t need to go to waste and you certainly don’t need to prepare a new meal every single day. But, don’t think that means you have to eat the same food every day, either! Instead, recycle your leftovers and use them for a different dish.

For example, leftover mashed potatoes can become tater tots. Leftover rice can be used for a buddha bowl or even rice pudding. Pasta can become a casserole or a pasta salad. You get the idea…

Boxed dessert mixes are often looked down on but no one can deny that they’re a true time-saver and taste just as good as something baked from scratch. You can even add your own touch to these mixes in order to personalize them.

Throw some ground coffee into a chocolate cake mix in order to give it a mocha flavor. Or splash a bit of milk into a brownie mix to make it creamier. Add chocolate chips, coconut flakes, nuts, or whatever you want!

We’ve all been in that dreaded situation in which we’ve spent time and energy baking a cake, just for it to break and ruin the whole aesthetic.

Not all hope has to be lost, though, as you can easily turn the broken cake into a trifle. Just layer in some fruit and whipped cream and… voilà! No one ever has to know that your perfect trifle was once supposed to be a cake.

Believe it or not, any pizza can be made into a deep-dish pizza — without all the effort of making the dish from scratch. Whether or not you live in Chicago, you can still enjoy a deep-dish pizza — even from home!

Buy a pre-made supermarket pizza, let it thaw for roughly 20 minutes, toss it onto an oiled pan, add whatever toppings you want, then bake it for an additional 10 minutes.

If you’ve ever cut your finger on the lid of a can, don’t worry, you’re not the only one. Lifting a can’s lid can be a dangerous task if you’re prone to clumsy accidents.

For those who are maybe a bit less agile, we suggest using a strong fridge magnet on top of the lid to lift the lid completely off the can. That way, you won’t end up hurting yourself when trying to reach the can’s contents.

Believe it or not, potato skins actually add a lot of texture and flavor to most spud-centric dishes. Given that mashed potatoes can be quite monotonous, potato skins are a great way to break up the flavor and add a little something extra.

Furthermore, you’ll be saving yourself tons of time by not peeling all the potatoes before boiling them. You’d be surprised how being “lazy” about making potatoes can actually result in a unique and delicious dish. Just make sure to still clean them before use!

We’ve all been guilty of forgetting to put a drink in the fridge and then being stuck with having it at room temperature. Sure, you can try to put it in the freezer for a bit but that never works as quickly as you’d like it to.

However, there’s an easy way to make the freezer work much more efficiently. Wrap the bottle in a wet paper towel and then put it in the freezer. It’ll be nice and cold in just a few minutes!

Pico de gallo, aka salsa fresco, can be used instead of fresh veggies as a huge time-saver. If you have a recipe that calls for onions, peppers, and tomatoes, you can just throw in store-bought pico de gallo instead.

It contains all those ingredients already chopped and ready to go, and it’ll taste exactly the same as fresh veggies when cooked into a dish. If you’re more of a DIY person, you can always make your own every once in a while, and keep it in the fridge.

Trust us when we tell you that it’s entirely possible to make a delicious dish from instant ramen noodles. Yes, we know how that sounds but stay with us here. Add peanut butter and sriracha to instant beef-flavored ramen and your mind will be blown by how simple, yet tasty, it is!

Of course, if you’re not a fan of sriracha or peanut butter, you can add other ingredients instead. The point is that you can create a delicious ramen dish without starting from scratch.

Cooking spaghetti in a skillet, rather than a pot, will reduce the time it takes for it to be ready as the water will boil much faster. Furthermore, the leftover water is the perfect base for making a sauce.

It’ll be concentrated and starchy, so you don’t need to start creating a sauce from zero. When the spaghetti’s finished cooking, put it on a plate and use the same skillet to make the sauce, which you’ve already started with the water.

Separating egg yolks from the whites is no easy task… unless you know the trick to it, that is! All you need is a water bottle in order to easily extract egg yolks. Crack the eggs into a bowl, hold the mouth of the water bottle over the egg yolk, and slowly release your grip.

When you release the squeeze, the bottle will suck up the yolk. You can then deposit the yolk into a separate bowl, as needed.

Despite being absolutely delicious, many people don’t have hollandaise sauce on a regular basis because it’s such a pain to make. This sauce requires endless whisking and perfect timing, in order to come out just right.

However, if you don’t mind cheating a bit, there’s a much easier way to get this sauce. Simply mix the ingredients in a blender and, at the click of a button, it’ll be ready. Feel free to keep this trick a secret so your guests admire your expert “whisking” abilities.

Not everyone loves the taste of anchovies but if you use them sparingly, they can elevate a dish without giving off that fishy flavor.

For example, dissolving one or two anchovies into a bolognese sauce will give it that extra oomph that makes it taste like it’s from a gourmet restaurant. It’s also a wonderful alternative to salt! If you’re cooking for other people, just make sure they’re good with eating fish as they won’t taste the anchovies in the dish.

Who doesn’t love French toast for breakfast in the morning? However, who really wants to spend their whole morning cooking? That’s where French toast in a mug comes in. Rip up pieces of bread and place them in a mug.

Then, create a French toast batter (eggs, milk, sugar, cinnamon, and vanilla) and pour it into the mug. Put it in the microwave for one minute. Take it out, pour maple syrup on it, microwave it for another 15 seconds, take it out again, and enjoy your breakfast!

Remember, leftovers never have to go to waste while there’s still no need to eat the same thing every day. Making a quiche or frittata is a great way to utilize any savory foods that may need repurposing.

This whatever-goes type of cooking is also a great way to use up vegetables that are going to go bad soon. Use them in any sort of baked egg dish — it’s pretty much impossible to go wrong with those.

Cooking bacon can make you feel like you need to wear a full-body shield. Frying this delicious food will leave grease splatters all over your kitchen — and all over you.

In order to avoid the mess but still enjoy a bacon-filled breakfast, bake your bacon in the oven rather than frying it. Line a baking pan with tin foil (you can also use a cooking sheet), put the bacon on it, and pop it into the oven. There you have it!

Peeling eggs can be pretty frustrating and time-consuming — if you don’t know the trick to it, that is. In order to peel hard-boiled eggs quickly and painlessly, put them in a jar of cold water.

Then put the lid on (make sure it’s screwed on tight), and shake the jar. When you go to take the eggs out, the shell will come right off! This trick should cut down your egg salad prepping by half!

Peeling onions isn’t really anyone’s favorite task. It’s difficult to do, it stinks up your hands, and most people get teary-eyed from it. A simple solution is to soak the onions in hot water for a few minutes before starting to peel them.

This trick will make peeling the pesky vegetable much easier and help a bit with the crying (sadly, it won’t completely eliminate the tears). Another trick to help with tears when cutting onions is to put the onions in the freezer for 10-15 minutes before cutting them.

We all want people to be impressed with our amazing cake-decorating skills. That being said, not all of us have those abilities handy. Luckily, you can fake it by placing cookies into the cake, making it look like you’ve drawn the design on with frosting yourself.

If your conscious can handle cheating even further, you can buy several different-sized cakes and pile them on top of each other. That way, it’ll look like you’ve baked a huge three-tiered cake!

A true first-world food problem is reaching for a handful of popcorn only to discover that you’ve eaten a mouthful of bitter kernels. Apparently, the bag that microwavable popcorn comes in is designed to prevent that very instance — but no one uses them properly!

The bag is meant to be opened just a small bit, at first, so that you can shake the kernels out into a bowl. Once they’re all gone, you can open the popcorn bag all the way and enjoy without fear of a bad bite.

Everyone loves taco Tuesday — except for when all of the contents of our taco fall out of the tortilla and onto our hands, that is. In order to keep your taco whole, place the tortilla in a microwave-safe cup.

Then, fill the tortilla with whatever you want in your taco. Microwave it, and only take the taco out of the cup when it’s ready to eat. That’s how you get an (almost) mess-free taco.

Most people use butter on their grilled cheese. While delicious, it’s pretty easy to burn if you’re not careful or willing to keep a close eye on it. An alternative, and equally tasty, option is to use mayo instead.

It’s a lot less likely to burn and needs less attention when being grilled. Bonus points for the fact using mayo saves you the time of needing to soften the butter so you can spread it.

When it comes to onion and garlic, powders are just as good as the fresh stuff. We admit that, at first, they’re a bit less flavorful. However, that can easily be fixed by simply mixing the spices with a touch of water.

Anyway, you won’t really notice if the recipe in question calls for the onions or garlic to be cooked into something. Powders will save you the time you would’ve spent peeling and chopping, and they’ll also save you a whole lot of mess.

Certain ingredients can make any basic dish seem fancy. For example, sun-dried tomatoes have the magical power of always feeling gourmet. Figure out what your “fancy” ingredients are and make sure to always have them on hand to quickly spruce up a meal.

If you’ve got excellent culinary skills, you can make an actual fancy meal. However, if you’re in a rush or cooking just isn’t where you shine, fake it with a “fancy” ingredient.

Who says egg slicers have to be exclusively for eggs? This useful tool can be used for pretty much anything that’s soft and needs slicing. You can use egg slicers for strawberries, mushrooms, soft cheeses, olives, and so on.

Why sit there, spending your time chopping all sorts of foods, when you have an egg slicer that can be used for so much more than its original purpose? Feel free to find multiple uses for your other kitchen appliances as well! Get creative with it!

Caramel sauce can be a true pain to make, as it requires endless whisking, quite a few ingredients, and will burn unless you keep an eye on it. However, there’s a way for even the laziest chef to cook caramel sauce — and it only requires two ingredients.

Mix condensed milk with boiling water, let it sit for roughly three hours, and you’ll have caramel sauce! The best part is that there’s no need to stand over it while it cooks.