Meal Prep - How do YOU do it??

MrsJoeProGolfer

Hi All,

Looking for any and all tips/make ahead meal recipes/etc.

For those of you that spend one day per week prepping/planning your meals, how do you do it?

Do you cook all of your proteins, grains, etc and then just reheat them? Or do you just prep the meals by chopping the veggies, marinating proteins, but not actually cook?

As I said, looking for ALL suggestions on what YOU personally do

Thanks!!

xcalygrl

I cook all of my breakfasts. (Spinach, kale, mushroom, and tofu scrambled with eggs).
I also cook most of my lunch. I cook the chicken and sweet potatoes. I use frozen broccoli, so I put it in a tupperware every evening. I grab everything in the morning and head to work.

stephen_msg

I buy frozen quorn fillets (cheaper than chicken, doesn't need to be cooked in advance, avoids the risk of food poioning, less fat, less hormones, ethically responsible and good for veggies etc), frozen green beans, frozen spinach and red kidney beans.
Split between 5 tuppaware boxes and freeze them (no cooking needed is a big benefit, it takes max 10 mins to prepare all this). Each day microwave from frozen and I add a tin of tuna. You get high protein, cheap and clean carbs and lots of fibre all for about £2 a day (with tuna).

Doing this for 6 months and lost 9 % body fat with minimal muscle loss.

Other meals include oats and whey protein for breakfast, cottage cheese for supper and whatever I fancy for dinner because I have spare calories to use up and can afford to hit heavy carbs post workout.

Cheers

JoRocka

Both.
Some things I prep in advance and they stay separated.
Some meals I prep and then cook and measure out as a dish that can be reheated- ti totally depends on the object.

Sometimes I actually crack eggs into containers and shake them so I just can open a mason jar or tupper wear and throw it in a hot pain- eggs in like 2 minutes which is great.

I usually chop my favorite omelette veggies in advance- so I can make bacon and eggs in less than 20 minutes.

It really depends on what exactly I'm prepping. Anything I can prep or pre-portion out in advance I will. standardized tupperware is a must in my house- I can tare the scale and move quickly from one portion to the next- that's been a life savor.

Also mason jars are amazing.

hollywrigh

we cook the weeks meals on sunday....grill chicken, steak, pork chops/loins, and the salmon. Place in tupperware containers and take a bit each day and just reheat it for lunch/dinner. We also scramble up a dozen eggs on sunday and then use them all week for our burritos along with some of meat if we desire in them. Saves time in the morning when you can just grab and go.

hig17

Bumping for ideas

AlliSteff

Sunday is our food prep day. We make all of our breakfast egg muffins, and package them up separately for each day. We usually cook all lunches and reheat at the office- we usually also package them up for the week (I weigh them here and log them ahead of time).

We also wash and package up any fruits or veggies for the week. This really limits our 'during the week' food needs.

dnmoehring

Also bumping for ideas

amunet07

bumping for ideas/motivation

Sweet_Pea4

Good thread ????

Zoe_lifts

I cook 2 or 3 'freezer friendly' meals.
I weigh everything before cooking it and calculate how many portions it will make.
Spaghetti is nice for freezing, also stir fry with rice and chicken, or rice and beans with chicken.. One pot meals basically

PikaKnight

I try to make meals that I can cook everything on Sunday and just reheat (if needed) through the week.

There are some exceptions - like this coming week I'm planning on doing a Salmon Stuffed Baked Potato for 3 days and a Meatball Sub for the other 3 days.

I'll be cooking the salmon on Sunday (along with some asparagus and other roasted veggies for sides for the meal) but I won't actually bake the potato and mix the salmon and other filling into it until the day I plan to eat it.

Even though it's hours of prepping/cooking and cleaning up, it makes the rest of the week just easy breezy. Plus it keeps me from giving into temptation to sidetrack myself.

marieamethyst

I sit down and draw up a weekly plan for three meals a day. I make the grocery list at the bottom of it (usually by aisle/section at the store so I'm not browsing too much to limit impulse buys :laugh:), and then match up coupons and offers on what I'm getting. After purchasing the food and sorting it out at home, I chop up the fresh fruits and veggies and put them into baggies so I can just toss the ingredients into whatever meal I'm making without spending 5-10 minutes chopping. I also try to combine meals that use the same meat so I only have to cook it once. (example: I'll cook some beef for quesadillas for lunch, and use the leftover beef in my homemade mac n cheese for a little extra protein for dinner, or I'll cook an extra chicken breast with dinner, and use the chicken in a chicken alfredo dish for lunch the next day)

I've also started experimenting with casserole dishes since those usually last us two or three lunches in a row, and they're easy to make and freeze.

I'm going to start making pancakes in a batch one day and freezing them, so I have something for those mornings where I don't want to get up early to cook breakfast for everyone. :drinker:

kessler4130

I do mine the previous night, I was doing it all on Sundays but was finding that I was throwing away alot of bad salmon and chicken and questionable mashed potatoes/sweet potatoes. I know its more time consuming but at least I am not throwing away money, and eating clean isn't cheap.

Brenda_1129

I sit down and draw up a weekly plan for three meals a day. I make the grocery list at the bottom of it (usually by aisle/section at the store so I'm not browsing too much to limit impulse buys :laugh:), and then match up coupons and offers on what I'm getting. After purchasing the food and sorting it out at home, I chop up the fresh fruits and veggies and put them into baggies so I can just toss the ingredients into whatever meal I'm making without spending 5-10 minutes chopping. I also try to combine meals that use the same meat so I only have to cook it once.

My sister and I do something similar to this. Her plan is a bit more in depth because she plans meals for 5 whereas I only plan for 2! Her plan is this: On Saturdays she goes on to pinterest and finds some easy meals that can be frozen and cooked either in the crock pot or in 1 pan. She then makes her grocery list to include how many pounds or bags or boxes of whatever she will need. On Sunday, she does her grocery shopping and preps for the weeks meals. In her house Sundays are big breakfast day, so she has recently been making enough "big breakfast" to have left overs to make breakfast burritos for the week. This will be a life saver for her when the kids go back to school. She also makes homemade waffles by the dozens to keep in the freezer for an easy go to breakfast. If you need meal plans start with this website: http://whoneedsacape.com/2012/11/crockpot-freezer-cooking/ . It makes life so much easier and with a crock pot, you can leave it on warm while you are at work all day and have a meal cooked as soon as you walk in the door. Meal planning is worth the time it takes to do it!! Good luck with your planning.

F00LofaT00K

I usually get about 5-8lbs of chicken breast, cut it into strips, season them various ways, and cook them. I weigh out 5oz. portions ahead of time and keep them separate on the baking sheets. I let them cool and stick them in baggies for freezing. The night before I plan on chicken, I put it in the fridge to thaw. I'll stick the strips in wraps with veggies or cook some rice or pasta for a weekend dinner. Crock pots are awesome for make-ahead meals. You can find a ton of recipes on pinterest for freeze-ahead recipes that you thaw and stick in a crock pot before heading to work.

marieamethyst

I sit down and draw up a weekly plan for three meals a day. I make the grocery list at the bottom of it (usually by aisle/section at the store so I'm not browsing too much to limit impulse buys :laugh:), and then match up coupons and offers on what I'm getting. After purchasing the food and sorting it out at home, I chop up the fresh fruits and veggies and put them into baggies so I can just toss the ingredients into whatever meal I'm making without spending 5-10 minutes chopping. I also try to combine meals that use the same meat so I only have to cook it once.

My sister and I do something similar to this. Her plan is a bit more in depth because she plans meals for 5 whereas I only plan for 2! Her plan is this: On Saturdays she goes on to pinterest and finds some easy meals that can be frozen and cooked either in the crock pot or in 1 pan. She then makes her grocery list to include how many pounds or bags or boxes of whatever she will need. On Sunday, she does her grocery shopping and preps for the weeks meals. In her house Sundays are big breakfast day, so she has recently been making enough "big breakfast" to have left overs to make breakfast burritos for the week. This will be a life saver for her when the kids go back to school. She also makes homemade waffles by the dozens to keep in the freezer for an easy go to breakfast. If you need meal plans start with this website: http://whoneedsacape.com/2012/11/crockpot-freezer-cooking/ . It makes life so much easier and with a crock pot, you can leave it on warm while you are at work all day and have a meal cooked as soon as you walk in the door. Meal planning is worth the time it takes to do it!! Good luck with your planning.

I saved the link with the 40 crockpot recipes from the website - thank you! I've got three crockpot meals planned for this week, and always on the look out for more to try. :flowerforyou:

bodytoblood

Prepping meals has helped me lose 3lbs in 4 days. For me, the first step is admitting that I am lazy, which is an ugly word. I don't spend hours prepping or any of that nonsense, seriously it took about 30mins. Make Tupperware your best friend. When I come home tired it's so nice to go into the fridge and grab my already prepped cucumber salad or whatever. Not like making a salad or any of that takes long, it doesn't. But I think we all make excuses to eat something processed or stop at a fast food joint other than come home and start a healthy meal. Also, if you wanna cook veggies or meat, invest in a George Foreman grill....it will cut your cook time down by about 45mins depending on what you're making. That thing is gift from the God's.

*IF* you are lazy, admit it, own it. Then do something about it.

ajax041813

Meal prep and planning has been such a great tool for me! I talk to my fiancée on Saturday before I go shopping and we talk about what we are going to have for the week. We see what we already have in the fridge that needs to be used, as homemade foods are good for about a week so we don't waste anything we will use up what is there in salads, wraps, or omelets. We talk about what we are going to have for lunch for the week, snacks and dinners. I go to the store and get what we need. We use the crockpot as much as possible these days. We have two, different sizes and we use them both. We use mostly frozen veggies so I find no need to divide this up. I cook the proteins for us and store them in portions. Here's what we did today

Boiled 5 eggs --for snacks, we will cut these in half
Bacon--fiancée made up 2 pckgs, and portioned them so we only have up to 2 slices a day.
Bone Broth--I am making this in the crockpot right now using lamb bones I had in freezer and got some beef bones to supplement
Breakfast--we have bulletproof coffee so nothing to portion here.
Smoothies--I will make this sunday evening and we make enough for us each to have 2 snacks, so it lasts 2 days.
Dinners-- I am going to make burgers tomorrow evening that will last us for the week. Tonight we have more lamb in the fridge to use up.
Lunches--we have pork we made in the crockpot a couple days ago that we will have with mixed greens and olive oil dressing.
Snacks--I will also portion out nuts into 1oz baggies for us. I will also make a chocolate mousse dessert treat for us to have a few bites of when we need. I also got a bag of broccoli slaw that I will make a dressing for and have that as well.

We used to take everything to work at the start of the week but realized we weren't leaving ourselves options when we were at home. So now we portion everything out and take some to work and leave some at home. We use the small Tupperware containers, mason jars 6oz and pint size, as well as sandwich baggies. I'll reuse the baggies for the same thing, like nuts until they get too dirty.

Hope this helps!!

ShinyFuture

I try to have a green salad every day. On Sundays I wash/spin a three pack of romaine. Three salad's worth goes into separate salad plates, the rest goes into a baggie. I prep all my veggies (chop green and red onion, cucumber, beets, carrots, whatever I have on hand). I make the 3 salads, the rest of the veggies go into individual bags/small bowls. On Wednesday evening I make the rest of the salads. It's made it impossible to make excuses.

I buy 15 lbs of yellow onions at a time. I chop or slice and freeze so I always have recipe-ready onions on hand. Same with bell peppers. I add grated carrots to everything I can, so buy 10 lb bag and grate up a bunch and measure them out in 1/2 cup portions and freeze them. Beets also freeze really well. (I add frozen beets to smoothies.)

I learned to make soup for a crowd but there's only 3 of us, so I freeze the extras in single servings; they're really great for a work lunch.

Most meals I make double and freeze the second one. It only takes a couple more minutes to make 2 meals than it takes to make the one, but the time savings of just having to take it out of the freezer in the morning is huge.

My hubby cooks up 5 lbs of ground beef at a time. He splits it up and seasons it for whatever he has it planned for (tacos, spaghetti sauce, etc.) and freezes it so it's all ready to go. He doesn't precook the chicken breasts, but does cut them up for soup, fajitas, whatever. Chicken cooks so quickly precooking isn't an issue. I make triple batches of chicken fajitas and all one has to do is dump a thawed bag into the skillet, cook until the chicken is done and heat up some tortillas. So easy. And it's great to be able to pull stuff out of the freezer, toss it in the crockpot, and come home to dinner. Makes it effortless.

IllustratedxGirl

I cook dinner every night, so I on't really prep in advance.

I do chop and prepare all of my veggies first as part of my food prep before cooking

Once a week I do a big meal plan for the week. I pick out 5-6 recipes, plan each one on each day, make a list of ingredients, and then go to the store and buy everything. That way I have everything already planned out, and I have everything I need

Confuzzled4ever

On sundays.. I take the entire huge package of chicken and do with it what I will and them put it in smaller containers for lunches/dinner etc.. I have also grilled up a bunch of turkey burgers on Sunday and stuck them in the fridge. Just add cheese and nuke. Viola dinner. It works with some veggies too, although they are crispy and fresh tasting as they are the day you do it. Soup and crock pot are awesome for this.

Stripeness

I like to cook a family-value pack of boneless skinless chicken breasts at 450 in a pan of water, with a bit of garlic and jalapeno. The water seems to help keep the chicken from drying out, and the spices make it bearable to eat as-is, but I rarely do that. After they cool, I take them out of the water, trim, and put in plastic to eat throughout the week as needed.

The chicken breasts as prepared don't have so much flavor that they overwhelm other things. So it's a perfect blank slate and I weigh out however much I need as I go:

--House of Tsang makes some very nice sauces: Hunan, peanut, Korean BBQ, etc. The ingredient lists don't hurt me to read, and they're few calories for a lot of flavor. 30 sec in the microwave to take the chill off the chicken and it's done.
--Homemade kung pao sauce
^^both of these applications are awesome with veggies, too. Which I really need more of on any given day!
--New Mexico or Chipotle chili powder - throw in some cumin if I'm feeling chili-ish. Perfect addition to quesadillas.

Basically, I lean on chicken to see me through the "what's easiest" times without reaching for bread. Not that there's ANYTHING wrong with bread, but not as 90% of your daily intake - which I could do, since it's right there & ready!

If chicken doesn't happen, getting sliced deli turkey can save me, although I do get tired of it. If you look at my diary, the current 5-day streak shows what happens when I get OUT of the prep habit. If you look back ~March, it was pretty dialed in. HTH!:drinker:

Stripeness

For me, the first step is admitting that I am lazy, which is an ugly word. I don't spend hours prepping or any of that nonsense.

*IF* you are lazy, admit it, own it. Then do something about it.

YES!! This took me years to figure out :flowerforyou:

codycsweet

Great ideas bumping for reference

erockem

This sums up my Sundays. 3lb+ bag of chicken breasts, 1-2lbs of cod, pot of small red beans. Chicken will be cubed, shredded, and left whole. Shredded will be sauteed in taco seasoning. Everything will be weighed and portioned out. I'll have a general game plan for on what I will be grabbing for lunch and dinner for the next 5 days.

EmilyStopFlying

bump

slimmingfairy

Thanks for this - it was really helpful

Mof3wc

I meal plan and prep 2 weeks at a time but don't actually cook much of it. I cut (if needed) and bag meat in ziplock bags for each meal, then label and freeze, that way I can take out just 2 chicken breasts, or 1/2 lb hamburger instead if an entire package when I need it for that nights dinner and it's ready to use.

I also make up 4 slow cooker freezer meals (we're home late every tues/thurs) so I have to do thaw/put in crockpot.

Veggies get chopped, ready to eat/use.

And I make muffins, pancakes and waffles for the kids and freeze them for easy breakfasts.

jar819

bump!

slimsteelerfan

I do the same thing! I prepare all my breakfasts and lunches on Sunday. Family knows the Tupperware is MINE! If I don't prep ahead of time, I will not stick to my food plan! Being prepared ahead of time helps out....ESPECIALLY if you have hectic mornings!