Easy Meal Prep Hacks to Save You Tons of Time

Meal prepping is one of those things you often overlook, but can save you a lot of time if you actually do it. Sometimes, the thought of eating leftovers from a few days ago doesn't sound too appealing, but neither does spending hours in the kitchen after a long and busy day. Luckily, we've rounded up a few hacks that can help you avoid both situations.

Firstly, to avoid those soggy leftovers, try prepping the ingredients, and not the whole meal. This will leave your food looking and tasting a lot fresher by the time you eat it. Also, when prepping your ingredients, be mindful about what it is you're including in the meal - don't spend time on foods that will go bad quickly. For example, focus on the grains, proteins, and veggies, and worry about preparing the salad dressing and sauces later. Besides, it only takes a few minutes to add those last-minute finishes to your meal, which will definitely taste a lot better if it's fresh. However, if it's absolutely necessary to prep the dressing along with your salad, be sure to put the dressing at the bottom of the container so that the veggies stay fresh on top!

Another hack that could potentially save you tons of time is to buy frozen, chopped veggies instead of fresh ones. Although they may taste slightly different, doing this will save you the trouble of washing, cutting, and, depending on the vegetable, sometimes even cooking! Another time-saving hack is to look for cross-over ingredients in recipes. For example, if two of your planned meals for the week include potatoes, you can boil a batch & use for more than one meal! If you can think of other ingredients that could potentially be used for more than one recipe, be sure to include those as well to save more time!

Finally, labeling your containers makes it easier to understand which ingredients you have prepped and what you could possibly cook up with them. You can also add dates to the labels, indicating which of them were cooked and need to be used first. So be sure to keep these tricks in mind the next time it's looking like a busy week ahead!