Weekly Prep Work

I’ve referenced in several posts that I do prep work each week for meals. This is essential for our family. Yours may be different.

Math that shows why we do prep in our house:

4 people to feed for 21 meals each week 

2 of the 4 people also eat a fair amount of snacks (blaming the kids here!)

2 people work full time

2 people are in school full time and don’t cook for themselves

2 people have homework 5 nights each week

4 people work out at the gym 3-5 nights per week

2-4 people have school / church activities

When we have free time in the evenings or on the weekends we like to spend it together, and not always in the kitchen (minus what I spend on Sundays for prep). With the above tasks broken down daily it leaves little time daily for putting good meals on the table and in lunch boxes. On gym nights we may not get home until 7pm and we are hungry by that point. With prep done earlier I can have dinner on the table in 15 minutes which puts a smile on everyone’s face.

Here’s what a weekly menu looks like with what the red being what I prep in advance:

Snacks:

Pumpkin Muffins *Bake muffins and store in fridge

Italian Meatballs *Pre bake and store in fridge; can be eaten cold or hot

Sausage & Carrot Patties *Double this recipe so it can be used for Breakfast Sandwiches below

Breakfast:

Sausage & eggs *Precook the sausage then reheat and add eggs for breakfast

Smoothie w/ hardboiled eggs *Hard boil eggs and store in fridge

Cereal *Prebake and store in fridge

Breakfast Sandwich with Sausage and Egg *Prebake the sausage & carrot patties from above that are used as the ‘bread’ on this recipe. Additionally you can pre cook the sausage patties and reheat in the morning

Lunch:

Apple Squash Hash *Pre bake and reheat

Ham wraps w/ salad & veggies

ABJ sandwiches *Precook the Fluffy Coconut Flour pancakes that are used as the ‘bread’. Then make sandwich the morning of.

Chicken Fried Rice *precook the cauliflower rice and prebake the chicken; combine when you reheat to eat

Steak Salad w/ Cauliflower Salad *Prebake / grill the steak and pre-make the cauliflower salad. At the very least for the salad pre chop the cauliflower if you want to assemble fresh the morning of

Dinner:

Stuffed Winter Squash

Apple Sliders w/ Roasted Sweet Potatoes *Apple sliders you can pre mix and make patties to store in fridge to cook the day of. The sweet potatoes I will peel and dice then assemble recipe day of.

Tuna Cakes w/ Coleslaw *Chop the cabbage then assemble the recipe the day of

Cod w/ baked veggies *Chop all veggies that will be baked

Family Frittata

As you can see there is very little that you can’t do in advance. The above prep would take about 3-4 hours on the weekend. I’ve gotten more efficient over the months. In the beginning this might have taken about 6 hours. 

If for some reason I’m unable to prep on Sunday then I’ll break the prep over several days. Meaning I’ll cook that nights dinner then while Kevin’s doing dishes I’ll do the prep for the next day. Each week is different. We strive to get prep done on Sundays but it doesn’t always work. Planning ahead for the week starts when I make the menu. If it’s an especially busy week then I’ll pick simple meals. If I have the time to do prep on Sunday meals can be more in depth. So when I sit to create a menu I always pull out the family calendar at the same time.

Another thing to note for prep is that you will need containers, both big and small. I try to keep the same brand of containers as they stack better in the fridge. You also may have to move your shelves around to maximize your space in the fridge. The traditional placement of shelves may not work for your new diet and the containers needed for storage.

Here are a few photos of prep:

 

Chicken baked with olive oil, salt and pepper (grill it if it's nice!)

Scotch eggs, sweet potato hash, egg muffins, pancakes, chicken salad, egg salad, hard boiled eggs, mayo, hamburgers pre mixed and formed, and a chicken and sun dried tomato casserole (the picture is months old so i can't tell all that we prepped - below is the same).

The baked chicken turned into chicken salad, cubed chicken for green salads for lunch. In the 9x13 is sweet potato and carrot patties along with squash patties. 

I am the master at making everything fit in the fridge. The first few days after shopping people won't touch it for fear it will tumble :) lol. Prepped food is on the top and middle right shelf, nuts and seeds are on the middle left shelf, then all the other shelfs and drawers are un prepared items. There is a separate, very large bowl, on the counter that holds sweet potatoes, onions, and other fruits and veggies that don't need to be refrigerated.

Give prep a try and see how it works for you!

Enjoy!

Yvonne