Thursday 10 January 2019

MEAL PREP TIPS AND IDEAS FOR EVERYDAY COOKING


Meal preparation, which sometimes called "meal prep," is the process of planning and preparing meals. It can mean preparing meals ahead of time for a short extended period of time. When it comes to meal preparation, the food may be fully cooked, precooked or even just set out in readiness for the preparation. People often do meal preps for different reasons which include but not limited to those who want to maintain a healthy lifestyle, those who want to lose weight, those who want to gain muscle or even as a recommendation by their doctors for certain diets based on their illnesses. Meals may eb prepared in small quantities and store in containers to be cooked at a later date or even cooked just waiting to be warmed up.


For me meal, prep comes in whenever I want to prepare meals and I have to set out the ingredients to be used in the recipe for easier management of time and space. It is so easy when you have all your ingredients laid out so that you do not have to keep running up and down or into the pantry to pick ingredients as you roll here, stir there, knead here… too hectic!


 When preparing meals for eating, it usually requires a selection of ingredients, measurements of the said ingredients and combining ingredients together to create your desired meal. Meal preparation is not just limited to cooking, as I have stated earlier, it can be gathering ingredients together at a particular place to prepare the cooking process


Meal planning is personal to every individual, and they can be done days, months or even months in advance. When it comes to meal planning you first need to consider your budget for the food you want to prepare, the occasion and even the diet that you are looking towards following.

ADVANTAGES OF MEAL PLANNING

Meal planning will enable you to save money as you will be able to know what to budget for in advance. It also saves you on time, if for precooked meals, it means you will have food to go anytime you want to eat without thinking too much on what to prepare.

Meal planning is great because it will create healthy eating habits. There is nothing as great as knowing that you have some ready meals in the fridge that you can just whip up in a few minutes or just heat up to eat. You won’t have any cravings for unhealthy food because you have ready meals just waiting to be devoured.
Meal planning will definitely reduce food wastage.  Any time you want to meal prep, you usually measure out the ingredients to use of any meal therefore there will be no wastage. When you meal prep you have food ready to be eaten so there will be no need to shop haphazardly and in the end throw out food because it went stale for not being cooked or used

Meal planning will reduce stress. There is nothing as satisfying as knowing that you have ready food at home that will take you literally a few minutes to be ready. I know how it feels to get home and you are so tired you cringe painfully at the thought of deciding what to prepare. You check your fridge or pantry and find nothing you want to eat. What is the solution? Pick your phone and dial-a-delivery for pizza, burger or even fried chicken! Junk! It can be stressful sitting at the office and several hours before going home, you are busy racking your brain on what to prepare, so meal prep is the way to go.


The ideas for planning meals is that you will become well organized in terms of the food you eat with your family and thinking ahead of time on what you want to eat for the day, week, and even month will bring out your creative juices and inspire you to come up with delicious meals and get you to try that recipe you have been seeing on YouTube that you always wanted to try.
There is never really a right or wrong way to meal prep. It all depends on your dietary needs, food lifestyle choices, the need to be organized, wanting to be creative and adventurous in the kitchen or just having peace of mind when it comes to making food and actually enjoying it.


Have you done meal prepping before? What are some of your best meal prep ideas that have worked for you. Share your thoughts below and will be very happy to try out some of your great ideas on making meal prep fun and functional

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Maira Gall