It can be helpful to prep food ahead of time so that you will have meals ready to serve throughout the week. If you are trying to make weeknight meal prep a little less overwhelming, there are some things that you can do to simplify the process.
Have Groceries Delivered
One of the best ways of simplifying the meal prepping process is to take out the work of actually walking through a store and shopping for your groceries. Consider shopping through services like Cartly to get your groceries delivered so that you can spend more time in the kitchen and less time driving and shopping.
Make Meals That Are Similar to One Another
Choose to make all pasta meals one week so that you can cook a large batch of noodles and use them for the meals that you are prepping. Choose to use chicken or beef in multiple of your meals so that you can cook up a lot of meat at once and spread that out between your dishes. Make things less overwhelming by cooking foods that are similar to one another and simple to prepare alongside one another.
Buy Some Foods That Have Been Prepared for You
It is okay if you do not take the time to actually cut your rotisserie chicken from its bones. If you can find one that is deboned, buy that to simplify your cooking process. It is okay to buy precooked sides and other food products that make meal prepping simpler.
Purchase Dishes That Make Food Easy to Store
The easier that it is to store and heat your prepped meals, the more that you will take advantage of all that meal prepping offers you. You should have dishes that you can use for the food that you prepare that fit well in your refrigerator or freezer and that make it easy for you to store your food.
Set Everything You Will Need Out Ahead of Time
When it comes time to start cooking, go through the recipes that you will be using and find all of the ingredients and tools that you are going to need. Set everything out on your counters so that you can grab things easily when you are in the cooking mode.
If you take a little time to plan things out and prepare, you can prepare delicious and healthy meals for your family without getting overwhelmed.
About the author:
Emma is a freelance writer based out of Boston, MA. She writes most often on health and education. When not writing, she enjoys reading and watching film noir. Say hi on Twitter @EmmaSturgis2