Top 5 Things to Meal Prep Each Week

This week on Mastering Meal Prep with Elyse Kopecky, we’re talking about the five things you should meal prep each week to help you get ahead for the week. Watch the video below.

Read the transcript:

ELYSE KOPECKY:

We are going to talk about the five things you should meal prep when you’re short on time.

It can be overwhelming to see all the different things that I’m making. And if you’re new to cooking, it might take you a lot more time as you get better at it. You’re going to get a lot faster and you’ll be more comfortable with multitasking in the kitchen.

When I’m meal prepping, I often have three or four things going on at the same time, which can be overwhelming for a beginner cook. So if you only have a couple hours to set aside on a Sunday to meal prep, and you want to maximize the amount of dishes that you’re going to be able to get out of what you prep, here’s how I think you should do it.

What I would prioritize is, one, making a big batch of a protein that has multi-uses.

Number two, is the sauce. Making a sauce or a salad dressing is going to add so much more flavor to your meals. You’ll be able to cook something really bland and turn it into something really, really interesting and exciting. And there’s a lot of different sauces.

And then if you have a little more time, I would also prioritize making a hearty grain salad in the summer or spring. In the colder months, I would swap this for making a big batch of your favorite soup.

And then I would prioritize cooking a batch of your favorite grains for bowls. So that could be rice or quinoa or whatever your favorite grain is. If you’re avoiding grains, you could do lentils. Anything that could be a base.

If you have children make sure that you do a baked treat. So we like to do oatmeal chocolate chip cookies or muffins. Something like a sweet tree is always nice for packing for school lunches or for having for a mid morning snack or an afternoon snack.

So have a lot of variety in your meal prep routine.