When I started meal prepping, I’m not going to lie, I wasn’t exactly thrilled about it. There I was thinking, I get such little personal time between working, maintaining a household, and now potentially losing a majority of my day off to “MEAL PREPPING”.
Why I started:
After working 12-16 hr. days (seriously), the thought of coming home to cook dinner was not the most thrilling of ideas. And the same for my spouse. So, naturally the “lazy” way out is to order takeout. Obviously, with ordering takeout adds up financially quite quickly. Not to mention, counterproductive while encouraging in health/fitness.
How I started:
I don’t know about you, but I certainly don’t want to like to eat the same thing over, and over, and over again. I’ll plan for Monday-Friday. The plan is breakfast, lunch and dinner, with 2 forms of snacks between (5 meals total). However, I do “cheat” a little! My “cheating”, is making crockpot meals and/or use the instant pot. And honestly, it cuts the amount of time, I spend in the kitchen by half. But because, I can’t stand the same meal beyond 3 days, I do meal prep for 2 days on Wednesday. Which is something I take into consideration Thursday-Friday menu in preparation for the entire week.
I highly recommend seeking recipes, make reasonable choices, and seek different avenues beyond the typical grocery store (such as Costco). And have fun with it. My spouse helps with menu suggestions and helps in the process. Granted, I understand not everybody is that luck-and I’m grateful. Have fun with meal prepping. At first, it can feel overwhelming and time consuming. But the more you do it, the faster and easier it will come.