A Student Meal Plan With One Pot and a Rice Cooker

One ring, one cooker, five dinners

Picture the hostel kitchen at 7pm: two hobs, six people, someone's pasta already hogging the good pan. A student meal plan has to survive that, which means it cannot depend on three burners or an oven.

This plan assumes only two things: one pot with a lid, and a rice cooker. Everything comes from our own recipe library, and the times below are the ones listed on those recipe pages. If your rice cooker is a basic one-switch model, that is fine; it only ever needs to cook rice or, in one case, a khichdi.

What the plan looks like

Khichdi, daal and chana are all vegetarian, and the plan uses eggs on two nights, so it works for most flatmates. Nothing here is halal-sensitive, but if you buy meat later, check the label.

Monday: khichdi, because it needs no attention

Khichdi is 150 g rice and 150 g moong lentils (about 0.75 cup each) for four servings, with turmeric and salt. For a single student that is a lot, so either halve it or make the whole batch and take two portions to the fridge.

The rice-cooker method most people use: wash the rice and lentils together, add roughly 4 to 5 times the volume of water, turmeric and salt, press the button and walk away. Our recipe page cooks it in a pot for 30 minutes; a rice cooker will usually finish in a similar window but may stop as soon as the water is absorbed. If it is still a little firm, add a splash of hot water and let it run once more. <!-- VERIFY: 4 to 5 times water for khichdi in a rice cooker is a general guide; check against the recipe's own liquid amount. -->

Finish with a spoon of ghee or oil and fried cumin if you have the energy. Plain yogurt on the side makes it feel like a meal.

Tuesday: daal, then use the cooker for rice

Moong daal is 200 g (1 cup) washed lentils, 5 minutes of prep and 30 of cooking. Cook it in the pot while the rice cooker handles plain rice. This is the night two appliances run together, which is the whole reason you bought the cooker.

Cook only what you will eat tonight. Cooked rice is best chilled within about an hour and eaten within a day, so Tuesday's spare rice should be lunch on Wednesday, not Thursday's fried rice. Thursday gets its own rice, cooked on Wednesday.

Wednesday: egg curry, with a second batch of rice

Anda curry uses 6 boiled eggs for four servings, 10 minutes of prep and 30 of cooking. For one or two people, boil only 3 or 4 eggs and keep the same masala amounts; there is more sauce for the rice that way.

While the curry simmers, the rice cooker makes the batch you will fry tomorrow. When it finishes, spread the rice on a plate or baking tray so it cools in minutes instead of hours, then box it and chill it.

Thursday: fried rice in 25 minutes

Egg fried rice asks for 300 g (about 2 cups) of cooked, cooled rice, "preferably a day old", with 10 minutes of prep and 15 of cooking. Day-old rice is firmer and fries in separate grains instead of sticking. Soft, just-made rice turns gluey. Use whatever veg is going soft in the fridge: half a capsicum, a handful of frozen peas, a limp spring onion.

This is the cheapest night of the week for hob time, so it is the best night to cook while someone else is hogging the other ring.

Friday: chana masala for the weekend

Chana masala has the longest cook of the week at 45 minutes, which is exactly why it goes on Friday, when you are not racing a lecture. Use two tins of chickpeas, drained, rather than soaking dried ones overnight, unless you planned ahead. The recipe lists both options.

The leftovers become Saturday's lunch in a wrap, or on toast with a fried egg.

The shelf list: one shop, five dinners

• Rice (basmati or any long grain), moong lentils, red or yellow lentils
• Eggs (about 12), 2 tins chickpeas
• Onions, tomatoes, garlic, ginger
• Turmeric, cumin seeds, red chilli powder, garam masala, salt
• Oil or ghee, yogurt

That is the same core pantry used across our student posts. For a deeper look at the shelf, see desi cooking for students from a shared kitchen and the housemate rules that come with it.

The shared-hob routine

1. Cook at 5:30 or after 9, not 7. Everyone else has the same idea at 7.
2. Wash the pot while the rice cooker finishes; do not leave it "to soak".
3. Label leftovers with the day. A box with no date is a gamble.
4. Reheat until steaming hot all the way through.

If you want to check what you already have before the weekly shop, the Degchi pantry tool lets you tick Have, Low or Out without signing up.