A little meal prep can go a long way when the goal is spending less time in the kitchen, making it easier to reach for home-cooked food or a wider variety of vegetables. Prepping sets future you up for success in reaching your goals.
There’s a wide range of home cooks and creators on TikTok, Instagram and Facebook sharing tips to make food prep faster and more efficient, plus hacks to add more plants to meals you already enjoy. Below, we’ve gathered some of the best ones circulating, crediting the specific cook or creator behind each idea when we could trace it.
Prep faster
- Make your own meal kits. Measure, chop and group all the ingredients for a future meal in one container or designated section of the refrigerator. When it’s time to cook, the decisions and most of the cleanup are already handled.
- Prep slow-cooker meals without cooking them first. Add the uncooked meat, vegetables, sauce and seasonings to labeled freezer bags, freeze them flat and cook each meal in the slow cooker when needed. Write the cooking time and any ingredients that need to be added later directly on the bag.
Source: Kelly McNelis, The Family Freezer - Build the meals while the food is already out. If you make four servings each of chicken, potatoes and green beans, line up four containers and distribute each component immediately. Future you gets four complete grab-and-go meals. Keep sauces separate when appropriate.
- Cook meal-prep pasta for only half the package time. Tom Walsh boils pasta for approximately 50 percent of the recommended time, then finishes it in the sauce. This gives the pasta time to absorb flavor without becoming mushy when portioned and reheated.
Source: Tom Walsh and the Stealth Health Kitchen Staff, “Garlic Butter Chicken Alfredo: Comfort That Keeps You Going,” Stealth Health Life - Freeze cooked grains in portions. Pack rice, quinoa or other grains into silicone muffin or storage cups and freeze, then store the individual portions in a freezer bag.
- Freeze chopped garlic in break-apart squares. Flatten minced garlic inside a freezer bag and score it into individual portions before freezing. Break off only what you need.
- Freeze ginger and butter before grating them with a microplane. Frozen ginger grates cleanly and lasts longer, while finely grated frozen butter distributes quickly and evenly through dough, mashed potatoes and other dishes.
- Plan five meals around one batch of chicken. Cook the chicken with seasonings that work across several flavor profiles, then change the sauces and supporting ingredients for each meal. Alma Knows Food turns one chicken prep into BBQ chicken mac and cheese, chipotle ranch chicken salad, a chicken Caesar wrap, chicken and esquites salad and a chimichurri chicken bowl.
Source: Alma Knows Food, @almaknowsfood - Strip and shred a rotisserie chicken faster. Place the warm chicken inside a tightly closed bag and shake it vigorously to release much of the meat from the bones. Transfer the meat to a stand mixer, partially cover the bowl with plastic wrap to prevent splatter and run the paddle attachment on low until shredded.
- Bake eggs without the shells. Crack a batch of eggs into a greased loaf pan or baking dish and bake them together. Chop the cooked eggs for egg salad without boiling and peeling individual eggs.
For freezer breakfast sandwiches, Tom Walsh of Stealth Health Life takes the idea one step further. He blends whole eggs and egg whites with cottage cheese and a little cornstarch before baking the mixture on a sheet pan. The cottage cheese helps the eggs stay soft, while the cornstarch helps them set and slice cleanly.
Source: Tom Walsh and the Stealth Health Kitchen Staff, “Sausage Egg & Cheese Breakfast Sandwiches,” Stealth Health Life
Sneak in more plants
- Blend cauliflower or carrots into marinara. The puréed vegetable disappears into the sauce, adding another plant to the meal.
- Blend cooked carrots, butternut squash or cauliflower into mac-and-cheese sauce. Purée the cooked vegetable with milk, then add the cheese. The vegetable becomes part of the sauce.
Source: Andi Anne, Hidden Veggie Macaroni and Cheese - Replace some of the basil in pesto with spinach. The basil creates the recognizable pesto flavor, and spinach increases the vegetable volume.
- Blend spinach and eggs into a wrap. Blend 1 cup fresh spinach with 2 eggs, then cook the mixture in a lightly oiled, covered skillet like a thin crepe. The spinach becomes the wrap.
Source: Emily Grace, “2-Ingredient Wrap,” Emily Grace Food - Add grated zucchini to meatballs or burgers. Mix approximately 1 cup grated zucchini into 1 pound of ground meat. This vegetable addition also keeps lean meat from getting too dry.
Source: Beef Loving Texans, “Beef & Vegetable Meatballs“ - Use finely chopped mushrooms to stretch ground beef. Pulse mushrooms in a food processor, brown the beef without draining it and cook the mushrooms in the rendered fat. They collapse into the meat and can be used in taco filling, meat sauce, burgers or meatloaf.
Source: Nicole McLaughlin, “I Learned This Hack to Stretch Ground Beef,” Allrecipes - Turn cauliflower rice and cottage cheese into tots. Jasmine Mays combines cooked, seasoned cauliflower rice with blended cottage cheese, light mozzarella and Parmesan, then rolls and bakes the mixture. It turns a bag of frozen cauliflower into a batchable tater-tot-style side.
Source: Jasmine Mays, cauliflower-rice and cottage-cheese tots - Replace some of the frozen fruit in a smoothie with frozen cauliflower rice. Cauliflower rice thickens the smoothie and adds a vegetable and fiber.
Source: Kashmir Brummel, “Bulk Up Smoothies With This Nearly-Tasteless Vegetable,” Tasting Table - Turn eggplant into meatballs. Roast cubed eggplant until browned and tender, then pulse it in a blender and combine it with eggs, seasoned breadcrumbs, Pecorino and parsley. Roll the mixture into meatballs, brown them in a skillet and finish them in marinara. Joanna Moeller’s version, shared via Appetito, turns roasted eggplant into a meatless meatball for a plant-forward pasta night.
Source: Joanna Moeller, @spaghettiroots_nyc, “How to Make the Eggplant Meatballs That Went Viral,” Appetito - Turn zucchini into an apple-free crisp. Barefoot Mimosas cuts zucchini into small chunks and cooks it in a pan with lemon juice, sugar, cinnamon and nutmeg before adding a crumble topping and baking it. The zucchini takes on the flavor and texture of apple filling.
Source: Barefoot Mimosas, zucchini apple crisp, Instagram
Use rice-paper and wonton-wrappers
- Dip rice paper in beaten egg instead of water. The egg adds protein and creates a crispier wrapper.
- Double-wrap rice-paper dumplings. A second wrapper helps contain the filling and makes it less likely they’ll break apart.
- Make the rice-paper Big Mac inspired spiral. Spread seasoned ground beef over softened rice paper, add the burger fillings, roll it into a spiral and cook until crisp.
- Make dumpling lasagna with wonton wrappers. Alternate seasoned pork filling and wonton wrappers inside ramekins. Add water, cover and steam until the pork is cooked and the wrappers are silky. Nicole Modic’s version of the viral trend delivers the layers and flavors of dumplings without the folding and pleating.
Source: Nicole Modic, “Viral Dumpling Lasagna,” Kalejunkie
