Find out how to plan your meals to maximize your 57142
Discover How To Plan Your Meals To Maximize Your
Learn How To Strategy Your Meals To Free Up Your Time
Meal preparation and bulk cooking are both terrific techniques you can make use of and customize to fit your households requirements. The concept behind this is simple. The principle is that you cook and or prepare your meals ahead of time and after that maintain them by either freezing or fridgerating them. Likewise, meal preparation you can prepare one big meal and get 2-3 other meals out of it! The key here is to make every meal you prepare count!
When you are going to prepare a household favorite, double, triple, even quadruple the recipe if it will keep in the freezer. Sound fantastic doesn't it? Why not offer yourself a much-needed break-- cook ahead today so you can unwind tomorrow!
The initial step in meal planning is always the most difficult. To make it less challenging I recommend that you grab the following materials: Pen, paper, your personal recipe collection or your preferred cookbook and a comfy chair.
Start by making a note of a list of your favorite meals and plan on preparing a grocery list that will accompany your list. Now, since we are talking bulk cooking here if you typically would serve up one pot of spaghetti plan to serve 2 (that would mean that you will have to double the dish so make certain to alter your shopping list appropriately) It will take the exact same quantity of time to cook simply a little extra planning is needed.
Next you can utilize a blank calendar and simply write the meals down on the day you will serve them. I personally post my meal strategy up on my fridge for the entire house to see. This likewise helps to prompt me for the next day of meals that will be served.
The crucial tool in meal preparation and bulk cooking is your freezer. If you have a little freezer, do not stress; you can fit many meals in that small freezer space it will simply call for a bit more creativity on your part. With the use of freezer bags, that you can stack flat and using some freezer evidence containers you will be shocked at the number of meals your freezer can hold.
Here are a few important and commonly used meal preparation techniques and suggestions:
Multi-recipes ~ Using this strategy requires you to prepare lots of main dish meals in one day. For instance, on a Sunday early morning you might prepare a roast in your Crock pot, some spaghetti on top of the stove, a residential plumber Baxter baked Chicken in the oven and maybe a good salad. You also could quarter and boil some potatoes, prepare some rice and some veggies (either fresh or canned). What you now have is 5 different meals that you can utilize throughout the whole week. You can eat among the meals that extremely night and you might Freeze or cool the rest. This method works very well for some people and it supplies a wide array of meals that you can utilize. I personally use this technique from time to time. I typically do my multi-recipe cooking on a Sunday and it can take up to 5 hrs to complete but what you are entrusted to is 2 weeks worth of food that you can delight in. And notice that the meals that I use in my Multi-recipe list are simple to prepare.
One Prepare Wonder ~ With this technique you would prepare one main dish recipe that can be utilized for different meals. For Instance, lets say you simply baked a large turkey. You might slice some of the turkey off and serve the breast with gravy, dice some of the turkey and prepare a turkey gumbo and utilize the rest for either a soup or turkey salad. Mind you, you do not have to prepare all of those meals on one day. After the Turkey has been prepared and cooled, you can freeze and cool the turkey that you cut off the carcass and prepare your other Turkey related meals at a different time.
Quick and Easy meals ~ Be sure to integrate those quick and simple meals into your preparation process. If your family likes Sloppy Joes cook up the sloppy joe meat wholesale and freeze it then all you need to do is defrost the meat, get some buns and viola.
What about Hamburger Helper? Why not cook 2-3 boxes of it, separate it into 3 different large containers and freeze them. That concept alone allows you to prepare 3 meals in simply 30-minutes.
Designate a meal for a specific night ~ Every Friday night in my house is either Pizza or burger night. The idea here is to pick any night of the week and just designate a meal to go with that night. I always make sure that I have lots of Frozen Pizzas with a variety of toppings on hand in my freezer. The same opts for those Turkey hamburger patties (my family does not eat much hamburger). The idea behind this process is that you now have one nights meal already planned. You can likewise stockpile on that meal when the items are on sale. If you see Frozen pizzas being offered in bulk, grab them up!
Love your leftovers ~ This is among my preferred parts of meal preparation as it allows you to use your imagination. A minimum of every other week or so make sure to go through your refrigerator and take inventory of what you have in there. When you integrate 2-3 leftovers, you may discover that you have a meal right there. You can use left over pasta from spaghetti to prepare a pasta salad, remaining spaghetti sauce and just a couple of pieces of chicken can be a fantastic meal to top with cheese and location in the oven. Again, with a little imagination you can make your leftovers work for you!
Use the sales paper ~ everyone loves an excellent sale and I use the sales paper to assist me in my meal planning. When I see our Family favorites on sale instead of purchasing one, I will acquire 3-4 of the same items and simply come home and prepare the meals or freeze the food that I bought. My family and I like Chicken. When I identify entire chickens on sale Ive been understood to acquire as much as 5-6 at a time. Remember that I have a household of 6 and in my household of six; there are 3 teenagers (and you know how much they can consume). By shopping like this, I in fact save hundreds and hundreds of dollars a year in food alone!
Helpful supplies
Labels/ freezer bags/Freezer-proof containers: Make certain that you have all of your freezing and refrigerating needs on hand. When keeping food in freezer safe containers make sure to place a label on the container with the name of the meal and the date the meal was prepared.
Crockpot: This helpful home appliance is my friend in the cooking area. When using a crockpot you literally prepare the meal, place it in the crockpot, Set it & Forget it. It is a hands free cooking experience. I prepare whole chickens in my crock pot and then slice the chicken up to freeze and use for sandwiches, enchiladas, chicken salads, chicken soup, chicken stew. as you can see the possibilities are endless.
As you can see, meal planning is a cash, sanity and time saver-- what else might a hectic mom ask for?
Now, lets get Cookin!