30-Minute Meals: Quick Recipes Timed Start to Finish

How we cook 30-minute meals on a weeknight

Most of these recipes save time by doing two things at once: the pasta boils while the sauce comes together, or the rice cooks while you sear the beef. The method steps are written in the order that makes that overlap natural.

Hot pans are fast pans. Give your skillet a full two to three minutes to heat before anything goes in; food that hits a properly hot pan browns in half the time and does not stick.

Buying a few shortcuts is fair game on a busy night: pre-cut broccoli florets, peeled shrimp, rotisserie chicken and day-old rice all appear in these recipes, and each one is noted where it helps.

Short on time? Classic Chicken Salad is the quickest here at 15 min, with 15 min of hands-on work.