March 09, 2013

A Dietitian's Weekly Meal Prep Tutorial

I have been wanting to share my weekly meal prep with my readers for awhile now and was finally able to show an example of foods that I like to prep.

Every Saturday (or sometimes Sunday) mornings, I prepare a bunch of food for the following week. This way, I have healthy food ready to eat when I am tired or busy during the work week. I like to make the food in bulk so that it lasts us a couple of meals at least. This is such a lifesaver during the week when I do not feel like cooking.

What I make every week changes a lot depending on what I feel like. This is what I made this past week. If this type of post interests my readers, I will write more of them. I read a couple of blogs that do weekly meal prep and I find them so helpful.

Also, this is not all of the food that I eat or cook for the week. It is just some of the food that I make ahead of time to make life easier.

Here is the general types of foods I try to prepare each week:
-A breakfast for Troy for the week (usually some type of muffins or egg English muffins)
-At least one kind of vegetables
-Some type of whole grain
-Protein
-Something for me to take for lunches at work



This is what was on the menu this past week: 

-A breakfast for Troy for the week- Whole Wheat Peanut Butter and Chocolate Muffins

-At least one kind of vegetables- Roasted a tray of chopped beets, a tray of halved brussel sprouts and a tray of green beans. The brussel sprouts and butternut squash are from last week. It was pretty so I had to include a picture.

-Some type of whole grain- Sundried tomato quinoa (a packaged mix)

-Protein- Chickpeas made from dry and baked veggie burgers (Dr. Praegers- they were pretty good)


-I microwaved 2 sweet potatoes for me and made mashed potatoes for Troy.


How I complete my meal prep:
I start this whole process the first thing when I wake up on a weekend morning. The dogs usually wake me up around 7 or 7:30 AM and Troy sleeps until around 9 AM. This is a good time for me to get all my cooking done (or at least partially done).

The night before, I set out all of my shelf stable ingredients. In the morning, I pull out everything that I need from the fridge or freezer. This week, I had to soak the beans the night before so I did that.

I cook everything at the same time to save time and money (oven usage). I cooked all of the vegetables in the oven at once. When they were done, I cooked the muffins and veggie burgers. The potatoes were both cooked at the same time. Meanwhile, the beans and quinoa were cooking on the stove.

I like to try to identify which items will be done the fastest, which need the most attention while cooking, etc. This helps me to know which order to cook the food in.

After all of the food is done cooking, I let it cool on the counter while I eat breakfast with Troy. After breakfast, I wash all of the dishes by hand and put the food away. I like to get everything done right away because I know that after I sit down, I am not going to want to wash those dishes later!

All together, everything usually takes me 2-3 hours and provides a ton of delicious food to eat through the week.



Do you do any weekly food prep? If so, what types of foods do you make (I would love some new ideas)? Do you have any questions about food prep? I would be happy to answer any questions.

Also, do you want to see more of these meal prep posts? 

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Comments

  1. Wow, that is so smart! I do a*teensy tiny* version of meal prep, by which I chop veg that I know I'll be using during the week. I tend to do these on Mondays, and stick 'em in the fridge for meals during the week. But I'm talking carrots, onions, potatoes...not actual finished meals or snacks! I'm impressed with your organization! :) Maybe I'll try doing something like this myself. Thanks for the inspiration!

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    1. You should definitely try it! It only takes 2 hours max and saves many hours during the week. Plus, I only have to turn the oven on once and clean up everything all together. Let me know if you decide to try it.

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  2. You really do a great job, and everything looks tasty. My husband is the cook in the family, and I hate to admit it but I am a pain, really picky, but I have been trying more and more each day. We adopted my grandaughter and she wants chicken strips every single day and for a snack before bed it's campbell's princess chicken noodle soup. I do not know how he does it but he will fix 3 meals every day and loves it. If I don't feel like eating he goes in and makes something like a grilled cheese and makes me each at least half. I have been disable due to fibromyalgia among lots of other things, and have high high high cholestrol (I take 3 meds for this alone and my trig. are still over 300). Anyways I told my hubby I don't care what he cooks but he has to start including at least some type of veggie and fruit. He is 70 and his cholestrol is perfect almost low, he loves gravy, fat from meat, bacon, sausage etc Most of this I will not eat. I wondered if you have any suggestions to help with my medical issues mainly the fibro and cholestrol, between all my issues I take approx 20 pills a day and would love to get rid of some of these. Any suggestions would be great and sorry this is so long.

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    Replies
    1. Laura, thank you for contacting me. Please give me a couple days and I will email you back with some suggestions. And thank you very much for the compliments!

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  3. I enjoyed this... many of the same foods I love and meal prep. What do you do with the chickpeas? What other meals do you meal prep for the week. Any tips on keeping food good/safe in the fridge?

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  4. I love this, please do more. What other foods do you meal prep? What do you eat the chickpeas? Any tips on storing meals?

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