Hello!
As if life isn't stressful and busy enough, now we have to find time to eat?! ;)
Do you ever find yourself thinking this? Or, even something like: "I don’t have time to make food. It takes too long!" I tend to hear this a lot. A few others are: "I don’t like to cook.", "I don’t know how to cook.", and "I'm bored with the same meals all the time." Does this sound like you? It’s ok! Meal planning to the rescue.
A few questions to first ponder: Do you have useful utensils in your kitchen to make meal prepping more efficient and less stressful? Do you set time aside to meal prep? It’s not as difficult as you may think.
As humans, we make everything SO complicated sometimes! It doesn't need to be - I'm here to help to pass along helpful tips and tricks to you so that meal prepping isn’t stressful.
My goal is to pass along helpful tips and tricks to you so that meal prepping isn’t a major pain point. And, how removing that particular daily pain point can help out in many other areas of your life. I don’t want you frustrated!
Making our meals is therapeutic. What? Yes. It may not seem like it when we’re caught up in the hustle and bustle of this world; our schedules are so busy that they don’t lend themselves to getting back to basics. Eating. Preparing our own food. That’s basic stuff.
There’s an importance to making our own food. That doesn’t mean you have to make food every meal of the day at home, however, we gain so much healing from growing and handling our own food - even if it's just making these meals ourselves.
Are you asking how that helps? Well, it doesn’t ALL hinge on meal planning and prepping, but having that structure and knowledge of planning definitely takes a load off of your shoulders.
Prepping Tips:
- Set a time aside per week to plan out some recipes and a grocery list for those recipes; if you don't prefer to shop, consider a grocery delivery service
- Plan meals that will freeze well so that you can place your meals in separate storage containers, then thaw in refrigerator the day or two before you need it
- Make multiple meals ahead of time, label and date them, then place in refrigerator and freezer, depending on how quickly you will use them
- If purchasing meat and a certain cut is needed (such as chicken cubes), ask the butcher at the grocery store to cut it for you - this is typically free of charge
- When recipes call for vegetables or fruits to be cut a certain way, check out the pre-cut vegetables and fruits in the produce section to save you some prep time
- Get a group of friends together for a meal prep workshop to prepare multiples of different meals, and swap; each person makes multiples of 1 specific meal (no one person makes the same meal), and then everyone swaps so each person goes home with multiple meals
- Make sure you have the right-sized knives and cutting boards for whatever it is that you are preparing (as an example: a Chef knife for cutting an onion or a paring knife to cut an orange, non-slip wooden cutting boards)
Hugs + Health,
Annette