Yes, Writin' Rations™

This one only takes a few minutes to assemble, and then it cooks mainly by itself. And it's pretty cheap, especially if you use store-brand coconut cream.

Coconut Rice and Vegetables

• Two cups of rice (I use jasmine)


• One large can coconut cream


• One cup shredded coconut (if you're in America, the coconut will have sugar clinging to it — oh, so good, but it means you must slightly reduce the amount of brown sugar called for below)


• One quarter cup brown sugar (or palm sugar if you've got it)


• One teaspoon salt


• One tablespoon powdered turmeric (or I guesss you could use grated fresh, but I've never used the fresh stuff myself so I don't know what the equivalency is)


• A pinch of saffron if you've got it, but don't stress if you don't


• A big double handful of chopped vegetables, whatever you've got, except for lettuce, ew, no


• Water

Put everything except the vegetables, coconut cream, and water into a rice cooker or pot-with-lid.

Measure how much coconut cream you've got, dump that into the rice (make sure you take the lid off the pot first!), and add enough water so that you've got four cups of liquid (maybe five if you like your rice moister). Please don't guess on this, actually measure. It's really easy to get wrong. Ask me how I know.

Stir the pot so that everything (except the vegetables, they're still waiting on the cutting board) is all mixed up, and cook according to how you normally cook rice.

When it's nearly done, chuck the vegetables in on top and let them cook in the rice steam (don't forget to replace the lid).

When the rice is fully done, stir the now-fairly-steamed vegetables through and let them sit for a minute to finish cooking.

Eat. Tastes great, very subtle and rich, which is nice considering it's so frugal to make. Leftovers will microwave well for tomorrow's lunch when you're in the middle of that chapter where the plot is stuck and all your characters have suddenly become fatuous and feebleminded and you can only spare a minute to grab some food before returning to the absolutely time-critical and vital work of sitting at the computer and staring at the last paragraph you wrote for another hour. Stare! Stare, and eat coconut rice!