Meal prep ideas

mholland0

Need some meal prep ideas. What do you guys make for the week that is easy and tastes good and doesn’t take a ton of time to prep? I have two little ones and they don’t give me much more extra time in the kitchen. TIA!

Jackie9003

I invested in a slow cooker and it was the best thing I ever did, our favourite is a chilli but I've done bolognese, sausage casserole and even a whole chicken. I just shove the ingredients in before I go to work, put it on a timer and it's ready when I get home.

amgreenwell

Yes, crock pot is the mother's best friend. I use mine multiple nights a week. I also have an instant pot for those times that I don't get the crock pot going before I head to work.
I make just about everything in mine; soups, various meats with different sauces for shredding and using in all kinds of recipes, casserole dishes, etc. Check out allrecipes.com or even pinterest has a plethora of ideas.

christys03

Brown rice bowls. Egg white/bacon muffins, tri tip in the crockpot, frozen veggies, quest bars, pre hardboiled and peeled eggs. All staples of my meal prep. Super easy. Im not a good cooker. By any means. 😁

TribeHokie

I'm a lot more likely to make and take salad for lunch if I take 20 minutes one night to wash and chop everything. I usually do enough for 3 days and by then I'm ready to switch back to sandwiches for a couple days, which are a throw together.

My coworker and her hubby frequently prep up a week worth of taco bowls by cooking up a big batch of ground Turkey with taco seasoning, a batch of brown rice or rice cauliflower, and a bunch of peppers and onions that they buy frozen and pre sliced. All these are kept separate in one of those portioned lunch containers until they heat it up to eat. They also will include some salsa or home made pico.

In general I am becoming a big fan of either cooking up a big protein on Sunday, like a roast or batch of chicken, or shredding up a rotisserie chicken and building up lunches around that.

As for family dinners, I'm not sure about meal prepping for multiple days over just finding simple recipes and taking shortcuts, but I would highly recommend roasted meats and veggies in a single dish, and frozen prepped veggies all around.

churchim808

I think these are all great ideas but I get tired of eating the same thing several days in a row. My method is when I cook something like a bean curry or veggie chili, I put the leftovers in a silicone muffin cups, pop out when frozen and store in a zip loc bag. I’ll do this with cooked brown rice and couscous aw well. I still find myself wishing for more variety and fresh crunchy stuff.

scaye103092

Curry with brown jasmine rice, chicken fajitas (no tortilla), or chicken with a side of sautéed broccoli/spinach/onion that I added a little cheese and almond milk too. I’m on a pretty high calorie deficit and my meal preps usually hit around 300 calories.

mrsallenmoore

Buddha bowls

lyzxyzzy

Steamer bags work for making a quick vegetable. Cooking beans in the pressure cooker works well (when you don't make paste out of them like I did in this pic). I also throw extra meat on the grill when I make dinner so it fits with time I'm already spending.

300 calories per dish
35g carbs
7g fat
34g protein
16g fiber