27 Insanely Easy Dinner Recipes To Make For Your Family
Are you out of ideas on what to cook for dinner? Whether you need easy dinner recipes for your family, for two, or for kids, this post shows you 27+ recipes that are incredibly tasty.
I included dinner recipes for all types of cuisines so you never get bored of cooking the same kind of food. Most of these dishes are all very healthy and I snuck in a few that are more of a comfort food but it’s so easy to make.
Tasty & Easy Dinner Recipes
1. One-Pot Pasta
Whipping up a pasta dish is one of the easiest things you can make for dinner. This specific recipe only takes 20 minutes and you most delicious and nutritious meal.
You can also sneak in a ton of veggies in the pasta. The best part is – you pretty much just dump all 5 ingredients into one pot and call it a day.
Recipe: One-Pot Pasta With Tomato Sauce
2. Sheet Pan Chicken and Vegetables
Sheet pan dinners are so simple to make. For this recipe, you just need to season your vegetables and chicken and place it on a baking sheet.
To allow the sweet potatoes to cook all the way through, you’ll just pop those into the oven before adding the rest of the vegetables and the chicken in the oven.
The sweet potatoes can act as carbs but if you need more, you can add a side of rice, noodles, or bread.
Recipe: Sheet Pan Chicken With Rainbow Vegetables
3. Vegetable Stir-Fry
If you’re a vegetarian, you’ll love making this dish. You throw everything onto a wok or pan, add your seasoning and sauces, and you’re ready to eat.
For this recipe, the recipe owner uses more Asian inspired flavors like shaoxing wine, oyster sauce, sesame oil, and white pepper for that extra umami taste.
These sauces make plain vegetables taste insanely good.
Recipe: Everyday Vegetable Stir-Fry
4. Taco Night
For Taco Tuesday or just any taco night, it’s so easy to make especially when you have all the right ingredients.
It’s highly nutritious too because you have tomatoes and corn for veggies, chicken for protein, and corn tortillas as a healthier carb option.
Recipe: Taco Night, Simplified
5. Quesadillas
If you want to cook an easy but very flavorful dinner, quesadillas are the way to go.
The hardest part of creating this dish is to be careful not to burn the tortillas but other than that, this recipe. makes it super easy to follow.
Try to sneak in some more veggies in the quesadilla to add more nutrients.
Recipe: Quesadilla Recipe
6. Grilled Cheese and Tomato Soup
I must admit – this isn’t the healthiest dinner on this list but we all have those days where we’re craving our comfort foods.
The grilled cheese and tomato soup combo is literally perfection and one cannot go without the other.
If you’re not feeling the canned tomato soup for dinner, this recipe shows you how to make it from scratch using canned real tomatoes or fresh tomatoes.
Recipe: Tomato Soup and Grilled Cheese
7. Salmon Rice
Salmon is incredibly healthy and luckily, it’s very simple to make.
This recipe teaches you how to sear the salmon, cook the rice, and combine it with the right type of seasoning.
The rice is packed with flavor and after you learn how to make it, you’ll want to eat this everyday.
Recipe: One-Pot Salmon Rice
8. Pesto Pasta
Here’s another easy pasta dish. Sometimes, when you’re craving that creaminess of pesto, this pesto pasta dish will really hit the spot.
The best part about this recipe is it uses only 9 real whole ingredients and half of them you probably already have in your kitchen.
So tasty and easy to make.
Recipe: Creamy Chicken Pesto Pasta
9. Chipotle Burrito Bowls
During times when you’re craving a Chipotle bowl but don’t want to spend the money to get it or you just want to make it at home, you need to check out this recipe.
They use the exact same main ingredients as Chipotle and it literally tastes like Chipotle.
The adobo seasoning on the chicken is the most important part of this recipe.
Recipe: Chipotle Burrito Bowl
10. Egg Fried Rice
Fried rice is incredibly easy to make and especially a simple egg fried rice.
For this recipe, they use 12 ingredients but you can omit a few if you want to go less heavy on the seasoning.
The most important part of the recipe is to use day old rice because it will come out tasting even better.
Recipe: Egg Fried Rice
11. Caprese Salad
Caprese is more like an appetizer but if you’re feeling a very light dinner that day, it can be your go-to light dinner meal.
All you need is some sliced tomatoes, sliced mozzarella cheese, basil leaves, and some balsamic vinagrette. That’s it.
The tomato and mozzarella cheese combo is super tasty.
Recipe: Caprese Salad
12. Pulled Pork Dish
Pulled pork isn’t necessarily easy to make on the stove because it requires a lot of attention and constantly watching it over.
But with your handy dandy slow cooker, you can just set it and forget it. Make sure you get the seasoning and sauces right so it tastes absolutely delicious after many hours in the slow cooker.
Recipe: Slow Cooker Pulled Pork
13. Chicken Shawarma
Craving something super fast and easy? Try chicken shawarma wraps.
All you need lots of chicken, shawarma spice mixture which you can find in their recipe, pita bread, and some veggies.
You can even make more and pack it for lunch the next day.
Recipe: Chicken Shawarma
14. Chicken Caesar Salad
If you’re trying to eat healthy or eat a very light meal, a chicken caesar salad is an easy go-to meal.
Just remember to not use too much salad dressing which will defeat the purpose of eating healthy.
Recipe: Chicken Caesar Salad With Homemade Croutons
16. Tuna Wrap Sandwich
Tuna wraps are another very easy dinner idea. All you need is some canned tuna, your choice of vegetables, a tortilla wrap, and assemble!
You can easily save the extra tuna for lunch the next day too.
Recipe: Tuna Wrap Sandwich
17. Beef Stir-Fry with Noodles
I love a stir-fry meal because that means I’m dumping everything in one pan only.
This beef stir-fry noodle recipe uses ground beef and a ton of vegetables. The seasoning is also very important because it uses lots of Asian flavors like soy sauce, chili oil, and sesame oil.
Recipe: Beef Stir-Fry Noodles
18. Mediterranean Couscous Salad
Sometimes, eating just a plain salad doesn’t leave you feeling satiated enough. So you can try adding couscous which adds some carbohydrates to the dish, leaving you feeling more full.
This dish also uses a lot of healthy vegetables too.
Recipe: Mediterranean Couscous Salad
19. Honey Garlic Shrimp
Craving shrimp? Try this easy honey garlic shrimp recipe that only takes 10 minutes to make.
The honey glaze for this dish is easy to make and so delicious.
Serve it with a side of white rice to complete the meal.
Recipe: Honey Garlic Shrimp
20. Mushroom Risotto
If you’re craving something a little heavier but not too much, this mushroom risotto recipe is so yummy and it only takes 30 minutes to make.
If it’s your first time making risotto, it may take a little longer but you’ll quickly get the hang of it.
Recipe: Mushroom Risotto
21. Teriyaki Chicken Bowls
Chicken terikayi is always so delicious and tastes amazing when served with rice and some vegetables.
This recipe takes only 25 minutes and it’s super easy because all you need to do is cook the chicken and vegetables in one pan and you’re done.
Recipe: Chicken Teriyaki Bowl
22. Lemon Garlic Butter Chicken
Lemon butter chicken is so delicious and is an amazing source of protein. This recipes serves it with some green beans and the combination of the two together is so perfect.
The green beans soak up the flavor of the lemon butter but also doesn’t feel too heavy.
Recipe: Lemon Garlic Butter Chicken
23. Thai Peanut Noodles
Peanut noodles are the perfect dish for tasting both savory and sweet flavors. For this recipe, the main peanut sauce only uses 5-6 ingredients and you can blend it all together before adding it in.
After you have the sauce prepped, the chicken cut, and the noodles cooked, the rest of the dish is so easy to cook.
Recipe: Thai Peanut Noodle
24. Baked Stuffed Bell Peppers
Stuffed bell peppers are so tasty and actually so easy to make. This recipe recommends cooking the bell papers slightly before stuffing it and baking it again.
This ensures your bell peppers are soft when you eat it and also saves on cooking time.
Recipe: Baked Stuffed Bell Peppers
25. Tofu Stir-Fry
Here’s another vegetarian dinner dish. Eating just vegetables can be a little bland so adding tofu to the dish makes it more tasty and adds more texture to the dish.
Serve it over some rice and it’s ready to eat.
Recipe: Tofu Stir-Fry Dish
26. Caprese Chicken
Earlier, we showed you a caprese salad. But if you want to add more protein, you can add some grilled chicken to the salad.
Recipe: Caprese Chicken Skillet
27. Lemon Garlic Butter Salmon
Another way to cook your salmon is to add lemon butter as the main sauce. This sauce combined with the fattiness and creaminess of the salmon is a great combo.
