Prepping your meals ahead of time is a great way to streamline your week and make sure you have healthy food ready to eat each night. It's normal for it to take some trial and error for you to narrow down what you like to prep and how to best prep it. However, you can avoid some headaches and challenges by following these tips for more efficient meal prep:
1. Shop on the same day you prep.
A good strategy is to plan what meals you want to prep, go shopping, and then prep the meals. Do this all in succession on one day, if possible. This way, you don't have to worry about ingredients spoiling or being forgotten before you use them. You'll also be less tempted to skip meal prep because you haven't shopped. If you struggle to fit both shopping and meal prep into one day, consider having your groceries delivered. Start prepping once they arrive.
2. Choose ingredients you can use twice.
When selecting your meals for the week, try to choose ones that call for some of the same ingredients. For example, if you're already making one dish that calls for white rice, you might as well make a second dish that calls for white rice, too. This approach allows you to cook larger batches of the same items instead of smaller batches of more items, which helps simplify your whole prep process.
3. Invest in good containers.
You'll be able to meal prep more efficiently if you have good containers. Glass containers tend to work best since you can fill them, store them in the fridge, and then put them directly into the microwave or oven to reheat the food. Glass also does not hold onto flavours or stain, so you can use it for meals like curries and tomato pasta without worries.
4. Keep a meal prep service on standby.
Look for meal prep services in your area, and keep the contact information of one of them handy. This way, if there is a week you don't have time to meal prep yourself, you can order pre-prepped meals instead. This will still cost less than eating out or eating takeout every night.
Meal prepping can be really efficient and affordable. Follow the tips above and you'll have a far better time prepping your meals for the week. All there's left to do is enjoy those incredible dishes!
Contact a meal prep service like Batch Food to learn more.