Meal Prep Tips to Help You Eat Healthy

Meal Prep Tips to Help You Eat Healthy

There are many benefits to cooking at home. The meals you make are healthier, you’ll consume less sodium, calories, and preservatives, and you’ll save some money too. Unfortunately, a lot of people eat at restaurants or take out places because it saves time and it’s easier than cooking. The solution to this issue to meal prep. If you do some advance preparation when you have the time (such as on the weekend) then you’ll be able to make your meals more quickly and easily when you don’t have as much time (such as during the work week).

Here are some meal prep tips that can make cooking at home and eating healthier much easier.

Create a Schedule

One of the keys to meal planning is to write down what you’re going to eat for each meal and what ingredients you’re going to use. Come up with a plan at the beginning of each week and try to use similar ingredients in subsequent meals. For instance, if you bought a lot of red peppers on sale and chopped them on Sunday, try to use them in recipes on both Monday and Tuesday.

Using your schedule to form your shopping list (or your shopping list to form your schedule) is a big time-saver as well. Schedule your meals so that you use everything you purchased so that nothing goes bad. This will save you time at the grocery store as well, since your schedule will tell you exactly what you need to buy.

Chop in Advance

It’s a lot easier to make a stir-fry or a salad when all of your vegetables are already chopped up. When you have a spare moment, cut up the vegetables you’re going to be using in the next day or two. Then save them in the fridge in containers until you need them.

Use Leftovers

Leftovers can be used for lunches the next day or for part of the following day’s dinner. For instance, if you cook extra meat on Monday, you can use it in meals on Tuesday as well. This doesn’t mean you have to have the exact same meal two days in a row either. To avoid getting bored, for example, have a chicken breast with a side of vegetables on one day and then use the leftover chicken in a salad or a wrap the following day.