my kid's

my kid's bestie is over and I just found out it's their birthday I want to make them a fun little lunch well my partner's 85 year old mom and lower sodium food and lower sodium food so I need to make a lunch that works for everyone so here's how I make a fun little meal using frozen and prepped ingredients that makes everyone happy so I'm starting off steamed buns they're just nice to keep in your fridge and they're just super fun who doesn't love little buns so we're going to make little sandwiches and then for an easy soft protein frozen edamame this makes a great healthy side and then if you just cook it longer it works for an aging parent who needs soft food moving on so we need something to put into those buns so I like to plan ahead for very busy days like this and I make chicken salad and then just freeze it because we like to work smarter not harder around here cooked chicken salad and thaws out really nicely but our aging parent Lola is just not a huge fan of sandwiches but she does love steamed buns so she will get one of those so again nice and easy I do prep ahead and I'm just going to give her some of this rice arroz caldo that I had prepped for the week which is just a chicken rice porridge she's Filipino it's one of her favorite dishes and I just prepped soft vegetables at the beginning of the week to make my life very easy so it could just be easily added to meals this just goes in the microwave the rest of the family needs more vegetables as well so again I have them prepped sprouts air fried eggplant I'm just going to heat them back up to crisp them back up a little bit eggplant reheated sprouts or a quick sauce teriyaki jazz it up with a little toasted sesame oil sesame seeds scallions mix her up and we've got vegetables when the buns are done take those off I take out the edamame for the rest of the family first that way it does not overcook and then I just let Lola's cook longer so they can get softer chicken salad goes in buns Sriracha Mayo because it's delicious some scallions and then Lola gets her bun chopped up too that way she can just add it to her meal that's the way she likes it buns for most of the family soft and lower sodium arroz caldo for Lola it normally gets topped with an egg so we have marinated eggs that I've been using as an easy breakfast normally this dish gets topped with scallions and fried garlic but it's a little difficult for Lola to chew so I make this calamansi scallion drizzle that way she gets the flavor and it's easy for her regular edamame soft edamame everyone is fed everyone is happy