The average American spends 37 minutes a day cooking meals and cleaning up. If you want tasty and delicious meals but want to spend less time in the kitchen look no further.
Take a look at these five meal prep hacks that will make sure you have more downtime in the evenings and morning. Read on to find out more.
1. Plan Out Your Meals The Week Before
When it comes to meal prep, you need to make sure you have given yourself plenty of time to plan out your meals and get all the ingredients from the grocery store. You can even knock up a calendar which designates which meal you will be having for breakfast, lunch and dinner on each day.
You don’t have to go big or fancy in terms of your meal prep, stick to manageable batch cooking recipes at first and then slowly branch out. Take a look at these recipes for some meal prep inspiration.
2. Get Airtight and Reliable Containers
There is no point meal prepping and batch cooking your food if you have nothing to transport it in. If you are on the go you will need to have a container that is resistant to knocks and bumps and wont end up breaking or tipping out your meal.
Store them in the fridge or freezer for maximum freshness and simply take them out when you need them. It’s a great way to ensure that you are getting the right portion of food and you don’t even need a plate or bowl!
3. Work Your Meal Prep into Your Routine
Nobody wants to spend all of their free time cooking and cleaning up. So if you can, choose a time in the week where you do all your meal prep at once so you get it out the way in one allotted period.
Sunday afternoons can be a good opportunity to get yourself set up for the week ahead.
4. Mix up Your Vegetables
If you are getting a little bored of having the same meal every day, swap out some of your vegetables for different ones. Or you can even alternate the days so you are getting a better range and more variety of food and healthy sides.
You can even switch in different sauces such as sweet chili, hummus and hot sauce to give your meals some extra flavors.
5. Use Frozen Fruits and Vegetables
Frozen fruits and vegetables are the best things to use when meal prepping. They still contain all of the goodness and flavor but they last for long and are usually much cheaper.
It also means they should already be pre-cut and portioned out so you don’t have to spend extra time prepping them and chopping. All you need to do is tip them into sauces or a pan of boiling water and they are ready to eat!
Take a Look at These Meal Prep Hacks
We hope that this article on meal prep hacks has encouraged you to take a look at how you currently make and cook your food. Why bother spending hours in the kitchen each day when you can prepare delicious meals quickly and easily for the week?
If you enjoyed this article, have a look at our other blog posts!
