Meal Prep how?

WernerZiegler1

Hi everyone,

Because of work and limited time, I’m wondering if meal prepping for 5 days in advance is a good idea. How do you usually store your meals—fridge or freezer? I’m especially curious about foods like chicken or ground beef—do they go bad if they sit too long in the fridge?

Also, what’s the best way to store cooked pasta? I’ve read that it can get mushy after a few days. And what about soups—are they safe to keep in the fridge for several days, or should they be frozen right away?

Lastly, I track my calories, so I’d like to know: when meal prepping, do you calculate the calories for the whole batch first and then divide by the portions, or do you do it different?

Regards

rms62003

I love meal prepping. I work on average 10 hrs a day and hate having long prep times at night.

But, meal prepping doesn't mean that you have to cook all your meals on the weekend and pull them out of the fridge. I do cook most nights, but keep it to 20 minutes or less. Also try to do stuff that takes little prep at night, just needs to be in the oven (last night did other stuff while my Mediterranean chicken cooked for20 minutes). This week I had stir fry with air fried tofu, cauliflower 'grits' with shrimp and kale, mediterranean chicken, and tonight will be veggie burgers. All four meals are made in 20 minutes.

I use an app called Plantoeat. It's, I think, $70/year. I look at my week, plan my dinners/lunches that need to be prepared. Then, I'll get online and curbside shop at my local grocery store. This all takes about 30 minutes. It takes only about 15-20 minutes to pick up the groceries Friday on my way home. SO much easier than going in!

I will meal prep some on the weekends - make my Marinara sauce, sometimes other sauces. This weekend I need to make my frittata for two lunches next week. I'll pre chop veggies on the weekends as well. I've also sous vide my meats to partially pre cook them - chicken for salads, just finished with a pork tenderloin (sear it for 3-4 minutes when I use it). I use dried beans/legumes so will often pre cook them on the weekends (need to do that for my Quinoa and black bean stuffed peppers this week.)

As far as logging, that is one thing that meal prepping really helps. I can actually sit down and log a weeks worth of meals at one time. I do log each meal separately - so for instance, I'm doing frittata twice this coming week. I'll log it on Monday for lunch, then on Friday for lunch (have it as one of my recipies since I do it often, and have it logged as a single portion in the recipe section.) This allows me to see the week's worth of calories, and I can make adjustments as needed on Monday. The new food diary page is the bomb for this - can't wait until they make it the default!

Strudders67

Most meats will go off after a few days in the fridge, especially once the packaging has been opened. I have no idea about pasta being left in the fridge as I don't do it but, once cooked, you can freeze it.

I freeze a lot - every so often I have a spate of batch cooking (all sorts of different curries, bolognese, chilli, different stirfries, cottage pie, fish pie, lamb tagine, Moroccan chicken, roasting a joint of meat and more). Some times I may cook more than one dish in a day, other times I cook one on a Saturday, one on a Sunday and do something different the weekend after. I make a huge dish, divide it into portions and freeze either in bags or takeaway containers. In the MFP Recipe, I 'edit' and update the weight of each ingredient (I rarely add new recipes these days, as I have my favourites and mostly stick to them) and then edit the number of portions that it made. MFP then calculates how many calories, carbs, fat, protein etc per portion. When I next eat x, I just select it from the Recipe list and indicate that I'm having 1 portion.

I now have a large variety of things in my freezer that I intersperce with a quick pasta dish, a chicken dish that doesn't freeze (but is my favourite meal), a pork chop & veg, a steak, an omelette with salad etc. Once I've finished all my chilli, I'll plan to cook another one - it'll be my dinner on the day I cook it and then the remaining portions go into the freezer.

When I make soup I find it's usually good for 3 days, but again it's freezable (use a container not a bag though!). I'll put three portions into jars that I store in the fridge and put a couple of portions into takeawy containers that'll go in the freezer for later.

acpgee

I don’t meal prep formally, but whenever I make a dish that freezes well will make a quadruple batch and freeze in portions. It is not four times the work to do big batches of braised dishes especially if you use the food processor for tasks like chopping onions. This way I always have a bunch of partial meals for days I am too busy to cook. Here are some of my go to dishes to batch cook:

Bolognese sauce for pasta, uncooked lasagna, meat loaf, meat balls, uncooked vegetable lasagna.

Dutch split pea soup, chilli con carne, cassoulet.

Potato gratin or scalloped potatoes (potatoes must be fully cooked before freezing). Soft taco shells (masa harina or wheat).

Coq au vin, chicken cacciatore, dak dori tang.

Beef rendang or other curries, meat stews such as boeuf bourgignion and daube de boueuf.

If you don’t have enough casserole dishes for freezing dishes that reheat in the oven, buy some aluminium take out trays available at restaurant suppliers or on amazon.

I also have a sous vide wand to do large batches of slow and low cheap cuts of meat in a big bucket, that get browned in the air fryer after defrosting. It’s great for difficult cuts that can dry out otherwise. I do duck confit, roast topside or silverside (eye of round in the US, I think), pork tenderloin char siu, and lamb shanks with sous vide.