Meal prep on Sunday sets you up for a yummy week
What if you had a prep cook in your kitchen? A sous chef who made sure that all of the slicing and dicing was done for you?
Most of us aren’t going to get this in our lifetimes. But what if we took an hour on Sunday evening to be our own prep cooks and make life easier all week long?
Yes, you can buy many of these items pre-cut — but when you prep the ingredients yourself, you have a better shot at a longer shelf life, and you know exactly how fresh they are.
If you are a meal planner, then identify the ingredients that can be prepped ahead of time, add them to your shopping list and get them into recipe-ready shape.
But if you aren’t quite sure what you are making, then you can still be your own best friend by prepping a bunch of ingredients you likely will call into duty.
If you have a food processor, you can pulse everything up, small batches of one ingredient at a time. Keep all of your prepped items in tightly sealed containers in the fridge.
Here are some suggestions: ingredients that make frequent appearances in my kitchen. But you’ll determine the ingredients you most often use.
Minced garlic: This will last for up to a week in the fridge, and mincing it yourself is much better than buying a jar of preminced. Minced shallots: They are a bit of a cross between onions and garlic, but they have a mild sweetness as well. Use about half the amount in any recipe that calls for onions, and twice as much if you are subbing them for garlic. Chopped or slivered onions: How nice to get any onion-induced crying out of the way in one fell swoop. I usually sliver one onion and chop a couple. Big carrots peeled and cut into sticks: Keeping them as sticks means you can munch on them, or if you need them chopped for a recipe later, you are halfway there. Citrus zest and juice (lemon, lime and/or orange): Use a
grater (a Microplane is good) to remove the brightly coloured outer layer and store that in a tiny container. Then juice the fruit. Both items will lend brightness and freshness to recipes. Broccoli or cauliflower florets: You might simply roast or sauté these later in the week, or use them in stir-fries or soups, or lightly steam them to use in pastas and salads. Chopped parsley: This is useful for adding a finishing bit of fresh herbiness to all sorts of foods. Other fresh herbs are less sturdy, and to get a head start on those just pull the leaves off, fold them into a slightly damp paper towel and store them whole. Cooked crumbled bacon
(don’t judge me): A little container of this is like gold: perfect to top off a soup, add to potato or pasta salads, stir into a frittata — there are more ways to use cooked, crumbled bacon than can be mentioned in a few sentences!
Grated cheeses: Yes, you can buy some pre-grated cheese, but sometimes you want to grate your own Parmesan, or you need a cheese that’s hard to find.