Meal Prep Made Easy: Batch Prepping Techniques to Save TIME
Let’s be real-literally all of us want to save time in the kitchen. Am I right? I enjoy time in the kitchen but even I feel the time crunch and want to save time so I have more time to play Sorry! With my kids; read a book; go for a walk or any of the other ba-zillion things that I love spending my time on.
Today we’ll talk about batch cooking; what it is; how batch cooking can be a major time saver and how to get started. Woo, hoo, this one is fun and nitty gritty.
Transcript of the Episode
Andrea Heyman 00:00 Hi friends, it's Andrea Heyman here with another episode of Adventures In Feeding My Fam. Let's be real. Literally every single one of us wants to save time in the kitchen. Am I right? And I enjoy time in the kitchen. But even I feel the time crunch and want to save some of that precious time. So I have more of it to play board games like sorry with my kids, read a book, go for a walk or any of the other bazillion things that I love spending my time on. Today we're going to talk about batch cooking, what it is how batch cooking can be a major time saver, and how to get started. Woo hoo, this one is fun and nitty gritty I can't wait.
So if after listening to this episode, you are still unsure where to start, I can absolutely help you get started. I can help guide you through the process of setting up a week's worth of menus that take into account your family's preferences, your time constraints. And if you mama have a particular need for let's say it's weight loss or anything else you can account for that in your meal planning. Isn't that cool? Hey, I think is really cool to accommodate your health and wellness goals, all while making meals that are appropriate for your entire family. So you can set up a free 30 minute discovery call with me. And I'll link that in the show notes. But you can find it at adventuresinfeedingmyfam.com/work-with-me.
Adventures In Feeding My Fam is a weekly podcast discussing the challenges and fun around feeding your family healthy meals. I'm Andrea Heyman, and I've been a registered dietitian for over 25 years. So I know the importance of good nutrition. But I'm also a mom of three so I understand the challenges and humor that comes along with trying to make this happen. In this podcast, I'll share my tips, tricks and menus, but also share the stories and food prep failures that come along the way to interview guests. We'll discuss family food traditions, how to strengthen bonds around the family table, as well as their favorite family recipes. There isn't one right way to feed your family. But there are countless stories, you can take bits and pieces and learn from all of them.
All right, friends, what in the world is batch cooking anyway, this might be a term that you've heard of. But just real quick, the definition that I found is that batch cooking is a method of meal preparation, which implies cooking in batches so that you're making more food less often, you can make a meal plan. And that's often done for a week. But some people do it for a month, you can do the shopping and preparation and dedicate a few hours of your weekend to cooking most of the meals that you will eat that week. So instead of doing the work daily, you do it once, maybe twice a week only.
What on earth are the benefits of batch cooking. So obviously the main idea is to save time, but still be able to regularly have wholesome homemade meals. So that's the most obvious benefit, but there are definitely others as well. So by planning your meals, and preparing them in advance, you're less likely to indulge in impulse eating and impulse food shopping. So that's when we make poor choices. And as it relates to nutrition. Typically those impulse choices are, let's just say less nutrient dense. We'll also batch cook. In order to ensure that you have everything you need for your cooking day you'll probably buy in bulk, which means that you'll have fewer trips to the grocery store. more mindful purchases and definitely less money spent. You'll also be saving money by reducing food waste because you are using ingredients and you're giving your leftovers a second life you know like I like to say planned overs so that you're using them all up in your batch cooking process. With batch cooking, there's more eating in which means less eating out and more money in your pocket. meals that you make at home are more nutritious, and definitely smaller food portion sizes than if you're eating out.
So the first step in this entire process is meal planning. So meal planning Sounds a lot more complicated than it is. So actually any kind of planning oftentimes sounds scary if you're not the type of person who thrives on lists and spreadsheets and that sort of thing. But if you can beat the initial resistance and get started, you'll soon realize how much easier everything becomes once you no longer have to think about what to cook every single day. So if you're just not sure where to start, then you can check out Episode Three, where I described my five key steps for meal planning. And I break down that process into simple tasks so that you can get it done, and I just share what works for me. So if you've never done meal planning before, I would start small, I would maybe start for three days, and then slowly move up to a week at a time. And definitely, I would start with just doing dinner for this process of batch cooking. So don't overcomplicate things make it easy on yourself. So step one is making a meal plan.
Step two, doing some of the prep work. Before you actually get down to cooking, you want to ensure that you have everything you'll need. It's all about efficiency. So being diligent in your prep is super important. So that includes obviously making a shopping list based on your meal plan, so that you can buy all the ingredients that you need. Next, make sure you have the right containers to store the food once you pair it. So using containers and airtight jars are really good options for storing in the fridge. But you also want to have a good selection of freezer friendly Tupperware, and Ziploc bags that you can use on hand too. So if it is your first time ever batch cooking, I would definitely suggest cleaning out your freezer before you start. So this relies on freezing foods and also storing it in the refrigerator for later use. So you definitely want to make sure that you've got space to store it.
Okay, step three, get ready. The main piece of advice to be a master at this step is to plan the order in which you're going to approach the tasks so that you maximize the use of your time and your dishes and utensils. So let's say if you need to use the food processor for something, you actually for several things, you want to make sure that maybe it's best to grind nuts first, and then you can go to carrots, and then wash and dry it again before making a soup, let's say. So you just want to use the least number of containers to make your food. But also, you don't want to have to wash it so many times during the process. So I would say this is a little bit more advanced to think about. So if this isn't totally making sense, as you get used to batch prepping, you can incorporate some of these guidelines in here as well.
Step Four. This is the fun part, so storing and freezing. So since you're cooking in larger amounts of food you need to ensure that the food is stored properly. There are tons of items online like checklists online that describes what the appropriate storage time or freezer time for certain foods is just so that you're having safe meals and incorporating food safety practices into your routine. So not all food freezes equally well. That means once it's thought it might not be as appetizing as you'd hoped for. So potato is one of these examples as our Manny's base salads or dressings. What does freeze Well, our stews, casseroles, meatballs and leftovers that have sauces breadfruit beans and muffins and ties those types of things freeze really really nicely and also thought very nicely. What I suggest if you're making a week long plan, you might freeze things that you know that you're going to have later in the week. So that when you're creating your meal plan, you are selecting items and recipes that can store for later in the week. But the things that don't freeze as well, you're going to eat those earlier in the week. And you won't necessarily freeze them but you will store them in the refrigerator so that you have them nice and ready. Also, it's best to let your foods cool a fair amount before you put them in the freezer so that you can avoid freezer burn. which kind of sucks the freshness and goodness out of your foods that you worked so hard to make. So one little note about defrosting. I know that the old school way was to thought like my mom used to by putting a roast or chicken In the sink and letting it thaw that way, but that's really not food safety wise, that's really not the way to go. So Fine, of course is going to be best done in the refrigerator. But when you're storing food, you might want to think about storing it in single serve. portions are not single serve for one person, but single serve for your family. So for example, if there are four people in your family, you are storing it in one container that has four servings, but you might have multiple of the same dish that you're prepared. So that when you thought all you have to do is take out one container.
So I hope these tips were super helpful for you. If you liked this episode, it would mean a lot if you took a minute to leave me a review, and share it with a friend. That way other busy moms like you have access to the information and can be encouraged by the episodes that I have to share. I'd love to connect with you on social media, Instagram, you can find me on Instagram at adventures and feeding my fam. And then the Facebook group as well where we are going deeper and talking about some of these ideas that are helping us keep healthy and feed our family in an efficient way. And remember about those discovery calls if you are having trouble in any way, hop on one of those and I can help you work out through that challenge that you're facing. Take care and until next time, bye bye