Meal Prep - does it last all week without going bad/soggy?

It will depend on the dish, most casseroles and soups will last a week with no issue. Some things you may want to keep the parts separate and have more containers and assemble when you eat. If you have fresh food or crispy elements you will likely want to keep them separate and add them at the time you eat. But it is still much easier than cooking a whole meal every time.

I freeze a lot of things. I cook fresh vegies every day just because I don't like reheating food (and we don't have a microwave anyway)... I chop them and portion them during prep.

Soups, casseroles, stews, chili, baked goods, frittata, rice/Quinoa, cooked meat for times we eat it cold (salads, wraps, sandwiches etc) etc can all be frozen.

I use glass containers. Don't like using plastic...

How do you guys do it? It's never as good as the fresh, except maybe chili or stew.

People who precook bulk chicken breasts. UGH. By the following day it's already weird, and reheating it just makes it dry. Same with eggs.

Really it's experimentation to see how long things last. It all depends on what you are making. I wouldn't think you'd want to keep meat around for more than a few days though. I'm vegetarian and do a lot of freezing of my different types of vegetable stews, soups, fillings for enchiladas and chillies. Many of my fresh stews and soups etc last a good four or five days, but I often freeze large batches because I get tired of the same thing. Cooked tofu lasts a really long time. A good week or so.

I will make a salad and not add dressing to make it last a few days. Kale salads last longer with dressing in them. I cut a lot of veggies ahead of time to have them ready for quick snacks or steaming/roasting. I'll keep quinoa and rice up to about five days. Old rice becomes fried rice very quickly. Quinoa, barley, wheat berries and bulgur go in my salads. Tofu gets cut up and put in salads, wraps, and main dishes. Over time you learn how long you can keep things.

I like my meat fresh cooked too. I usually prep about 3 to 4 days ahead but cook my meat the day I will eat it. For vegetables, I cut them up and have them ready to go in baggies in the fridge but not cooked. I have a multipurpose cooker with timer so I can throw my meat and veg in and come home to a ready dinner.

When we cook meats they last all week easily without problems. Grilling veggies they tend to last a few days before getting kind of soggy or limp to the point of being unappetizing.

spittingpink wrote: »

stmokomoko wrote: »

People who precook bulk chicken breasts. UGH. By the following day it's already weird, and reheating it just makes it dry. Same with eggs.

I've heard the same thing. I'm very interested as I want to use chicken.

The only chicken we cook in advance is the stuff we're going to eat cold. It gets frozen....

I portion out other meat and freeze it in individual bags so all I need to do is grab out a bag ready to cook for the meal...

I meal prep every Saturday or Sunday for the week. I've done it for years because my son has food allergies. Can't order pizza if mom doesn't feel like cooking. My salad lasts all week, if I add chicken I keep it in a separate bowl.

I like to just do it day by day. While I'm making dinner I'll work out what I'm taking for breakfast and lunch the next day and just get it all prepped while dinner is cooking. Clean up everything afterwards and bam, dinner on the table, breakfast and lunch ready to go for the next day, and a clean kitchen. I generally am not the planner of dinner at my house so I just wait til i know what's being made and I weigh out and separate my portions while i'm getting (or helping someone else) everyone else's dinner started.

I am one of those, I don't really eat leftovers and if I do eat them I'm SUPER picky. So no way would you catch me prepping an entire weeks worth of meals. I'd just waste them. Some kind of weird mental block, we all have our things. I generally just put my stuff in a plastic square container I found at the grocery store, it has 2 good sized, completely separated rectangle sides on teh bottom of the container, then the "lid" is a separate container for like a sandwich or what have you. Works pretty good for me.

It honestly depends on what you are prepping. In restaurants once you prep an item most things can maintain freshness for 3 days after being manipulated. Most meats you do not want to prep until the day before you use them. I know most people do not work in the food industry or have to follow health and safety regulations in their home, but to help make sure people are not getting sick it is good practice to brush up on sanitation laws.
to the person who was looking into reheating chicken, use a skillet on a stove top and make sure to add liquid, either chicken stock, or even plain water will help to keep the chicken hydrated. Also make sure to not over cook the chicken on the first round of cooking. Also once an item has been cooked cooled and reheated it is not longer safe to cool and reheat again. Also when reheating foods make sure to reheat to an internal temperature of 165 degrees, for a minimum of 15 seconds to ensure it is safe to eat.

Myself, I'll wash and chop salad veggies once a week, and place into bags separately, so if I want to throw a salad together it's just a handful of this and that and voila! I'll also portion out certain things like fruit/berries. I do pre-cook chicken that we'll eat cold in a wrap. I make sure that it's JUST cooked, not over-cooked, so that it isn't dry. What type of chicken you buy makes a big difference too. We've tried Walmart and Super Store bulk chicken breasts, and they're gross - very spongy. I much prefer the Costco box of frozen chicken breasts, or the fresh stuff from an actual grocery store. I often make a crockpot of steel cut oats and portion it out into meal-size containers. My hubby likes to makes stews, so that we don't have to cook all the time.