Meal prepping can be quite the daunting task. I remember when I first started my Tone It Up journey, the thought of meal prep Sundays was terrifying. Spending hours in the kitchen making meals for an entire week and feeling like I had completely lost my day to meal prepping. I didn’t know how to efficiently meal prep in order to reduce my time spent in the kitchen while still having food ready for the whole week. Soon enough, I also realized the food didn’t taste as fresh near the end of the week (go figure) so I would end up not wanting to eat it. All of this is not to make you run away from meal prepping. Quite the opposite. Over the years, I’ve learned to master the art of meal prep to the point where it is second-nature. Thus, today I’m sharing tips on how to meal prep like a pro.
Plan Before Grocery Shopping
Before visiting the grocery store, plan the meals for the week. You can use a plain paper, digital meal planners, or print one out. Just make sure you have a plan before going shopping. Not only will you know exactly what you need to buy, you’ll also avoid mindless shopping. Believe me, I know what it’s like to go to the grocery store without a plan and come back full of snacks and foods I can’t really use to make a hearty meal. Now, how exactly do you go about planning meals for the whole week?
Start With Your Fridge and Pantry
Before buying more things, check what you have in the fridge and pantry. Don’t let food go to waste and avoid spending unnecessary money by starting out with what’s already available to you. Plus, it’ll help you figure out what you can make for the week much more easily.
Find Common Ingredients
Another great way to reduce food waste, time spent in the kitchen, and money spent shopping is to find meals with similar ingredients. Let’s say you want to make chicken and steamed veggies for dinner, try finding other recipes you can use with chicken and those veggies for lunch. Perhaps it’s a stir-fry or even chicken noodle soup. Just figure out what you’d like to eat and what ingredients it involves so you can reuse those for other meals.
Pick Two Days to Meal Prep
When I first started meal prepping, I only did it on Sundays. Not only did this consume most of my day, it also didn’t keep my food fresh at the end of the week. Now I meal prep on Sundays and Wednesdays. I do most of the prep on Sundays but leave a few things to cook on Wednesday evenings so I can have it fresh for the rest of the week.
I hope you found these tips helpful and now you know how to meal prep like a pro. Just remember to enjoy the process and most certainly enjoy the food. I promise it gets easier the more practice you have with meal prepping. It truly only took me a few weeks to learn how to meal prep efficiently so don’t get discouraged.
