Meal prep is one of the simple things you can do to make your life easier all week long. Just cook once and eat three or four times. If you’ve never meal prepped or mastered it, read on to see how meal prepping can make your life easy-breezy.
Why Do We Meal Prep?
Meal prepping is one of the simple things you can do to make your life easier all week long. Just prepare your meals in advance so you won’t spend time and energy thinking about what to cook for lunches or dinners. You can cook once and eat three or four times, and you will save time AND money.
Whether you are going back to school, university, work, or sending the children to school, meal planning and making can be a bit daunting. Our goal: make varied meals, healthy and tasty recipes, not spend hours in the kitchen or run to the shop every evening.
Plan & Prepare
What I have found works best for me is to prepare in advance, cook once, and eat three or four times. No more leftovers, mouldy herbs forgotten at the bottom of the fridge, or sad carrots that went all brown and soggy.
So now I like to prepare a big pot of something, or prepare multiple items and put them in boxes, in order to assemble later. It takes me an hour or so when I make everything, and 5 minutes on the day.
What I do is identify the staple that I can cook or prepare that will still be edible three days later. For example brown rice is not really on this list. It doesn’t keep well once cooked so I keep this one for eating on the day.
Quinoa is my go-to choice because it can keep for days, and you can mix and match with so many different foods, cooked or not. I’ll genuinely have it every day without a problem. It has a nutty flavour that goes well with pretty much anything, and is packed with vitamins and proteins. For more reason to add quinoa into your diet, check out this blog post on the topic.
Ideally you want to prepare lots of veggies for vitamins, antioxidants and loads of nutrients; grains or quinoa for fibre; healthy proteins and fats for your brain, muscles, energy levels, sleep, heart health, … I could go on.
So make a list of ingredients that you want to prepare and head to your supermarket, or ask when your farmer’s market is on so you can get fresh, seasonal and local produce.
Batch cook
Once you have bought enough ingredients for the equivalent of three or four meals, you can cook and / or prepare them. I like to do this on Sunday so I’m ready to tackle the week. But you can choose the day that makes sense to you. If you have a day off or a late start on Tuesday for example, it might be worth meal prepping on that day.
We want to make this fun otherwise this will become a chore and won’t last long. I usually get everything out and put on some music. I have all my pots and pans ready, the storing boxes are out, the kitchen is tidy, ready to get messy.
An hour should be enough to make these meals. You can decide to make the same meal three or four times if you don’t mind eating the same thing. Or you can prepare a big pot of grains like buckwheat or millet. Then chop all your veggies and starchy veg and store them separately. You’ll then be ready to assemble differently at the last minute.
Ideas
- One-pot chili
Heat up an onion in 2 tbsp of olive oil, add 1 red onion. After a few minutes, add 2 cans of kidney beans, 2 sliced bell peppers, 2 cans of chopped tomatoes. Also add chili spices, cumin, ginger powder, minced beef or alternative (I use Qorn). Let simmer for 30mn. Stir regularly, especially towards the end so it doesn’t stick to the bottom of the pan.
There is enough for 6 meals, so eat your portion and box the rest up !
- Quinoa & greens
Cook 3 cups of quinoa in double the amount of water for 12mn. Get 1 and 1/2 cup of frozen peas, 1 courgette, cubed, 1 block of goat’s cheese feta, crumbled, 1 fennel, finely sliced. Once the quinoa is cooked, mix all the ingredients together and divide into portions. On the day, drizzle with your favourite homemade dressing.
- My go-to dressing every day of the year: 1 tbsp of Dijon grain mustard, 3 tbsp of a good olive oil, 1 tbsp apple cider vinegar. Mix it all in a jar, close the lid and shake vigorously. You should have enough for 3 or 4 portions.
- Big batch of wintery soup
Slice 1 red onion, garlic cloves, fresh ginger. Heat up in a big pot for a few minutes, add 2L of water with vegetable stock, a cubed butternut squash, 2 carrots, 2 celery branches, 1 tsp cumin.
Bring to the boil and then let simmer for 30mn. You can eat as such or blend it with coconut milk, my absolute favourite. It makes the soup creamy and taste like velvet. You must try that.
These items are ready to be boxed up for your lunches and dinners. You can also freeze portions into reusable containers so they’re ready to be re-heated when needed.
Are You Ready to Meal Prep?
Meal prepping has to be easy and enjoyable, and you will save time and money, while making your life easier.
Do you have ideas for meal prepping? Do you find this helps with your meals? How do you organise your week? Let us know in the comments !
For more meal prepping recipes, check out:
Healthy Banana Bread Recipe for Breakfast
Pecan and Cacao Ball Energy Balls
Another Quinoa Salad (can’t get enough of them)
