Preparation Is Key

Save Time, Money and Energy with Meal Prepping

Posted On: May 25, 2020

Whether you’re staying home more often, eating out less or balancing work and educating your children remotely — or all of the above — cooking for yourself and your family these days is a challenge. Meal prepping helps take the stress out of mealtimes by condensing the amount of time, money and energy you spend in the kitchen. Making meals ahead of time doesn’t require any special tools or complicated recipes — all it takes is some good, old-fashioned planning. It can also help you save in a number of ways.

Save Time
Wouldn’t it be great to just grab a pre-made lunch out of the fridge or have dinner already waiting for you? Dedicating an hour or two on the weekend to prep a week’s worth of meals at once ends up saving you a lot of time in the kitchen.

Save Money
Planning ahead to prep meals means you shop with a complete grocery list for the week. This allows you to purchase more items in bulk at a lower cost. It can also save you costly trips back to the store, where impulse purchases might chip away at your budget.

Save Energy
When you prepare a week’s worth of meals ahead of time, you only have to heat up your oven or use your stovetop once, then reheat prepped food as needed in your microwave or slow-cooker. The resulting energy savings can help lower your electricity bill.

Meal Prep Ideas
You can approach your meal prepping in a few different ways:

• Full meal prep: Prepare entire meals for multiple days of the week so everything is ready when you are.
• Partial meal prep: Prepare your main dishes ahead of time so all you have to do each day is add a quick side, like a salad.
• Batch cooking: Double, triple or quadruple one or more recipes, then portion and store them in the freezer and simply reheat when ready.

Whichever method you choose, you’re sure to benefit from meal prep.