Meal Prep - How do YOU do it??

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

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.

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.

bumping for ideas/motivation

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

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:

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 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:

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!!

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

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:

Great ideas bumping for reference

bump

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.

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!