Easy Supermarket Dinners

Make the leap from the usual to the ingenious by taking prepared supermarket foods and creating something amazing.

Our first hyperspeed dinner is Spinach-Artichoke Pasta with Vegetables. An appetizer favorite becomes a silky, creamy sauce for this quick weeknight pasta dinner full of cheesy, veggie, nutty goodness.

Shortcut Ingredients: frozen spinach-and-artichoke cheese dip, precut asparagus, precut yellow bell pepper

Korma is a creamy, mild curry and a great way to introduce complex and fragrant spices to your cooking to make meatless mains more satisfying. Blend some of the hot cooking liquid with the yogurt first so it won't separate in the finished dish. Look for prechopped onion and cauliflower florets in the prepared produce section. Frozen peas and precooked brown rice are ready in minutes; keep these staples stocked.

Shortcut Ingredients: prechopped onion and cauiflower, frozen peas, precooked brown rice

This Middle Eastern-inspired bowl is all about big flavor with minimal effort. A garlicky, tahini-spiked yogurt brings all the elements together and takes just minutes to make. Assemble a few bowls at the beginnings of the week for easy make-ahead lunches.

Shortcut Ingredients: rotisserie chicken, canned chickpeas, precooked farro

With ricotta cheese and spinach already tucked inside each ravioli, this is a shortcut way to a well-rounded lasagna. Classic meat sauce makes it über family-friendly.

Shortcut Ingredients: lower-sodium marinara sauce, bag frozen whole-wheat spinach and cheese ravioli

The browned veggies lend color and flavor to the sauce; be sure to keep them moving in the pan so they don't get too brown.

Shortcut Ingredient: frozen potato and cheddar mini pierogies

When using flour as a binder for things that are not baked, such as these pan-seared fritters, the finer grade of cake flour yields a creamier texture in the cooked product. If you don't have it, don't sweat it: You can just use all-purpose.

Shortcut Ingredients: precooked packaged brown rice, prepared traditional hummus

To get an extra-crispy crust on the fish, we bake the sticks at a higher temperature than called for on the box.

Shortcut Ingredient: chopped chipotle chile, canned in adobo sauce, packaged cabbage-and-carrot coleslaw, sustainable frozen fish sticks

Prepared mashed potatoes tend to come packed with a lot of sodium—too much for a side dish. Here we stretch them out into an entrée-sized soup that's creamy, cheesy, and brightened with fresh herbs.

Shortcut Ingredients: prepared traditional mashed potatoes