Learn How To Strategy Your Meals To Free Up Your
Learn How To Strategy Your Meals To Maximize Your Time
Meal planning and bulk cooking are both terrific strategies you can utilize and modify to fit your families requirements. The concept behind this is basic. The principle is that you prepare and or prepare your meals ahead of time and then preserve 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 family favorite, double, triple, even quadruple the dish if it will keep in the freezer. Sound wonderful doesn't it? Why not provide yourself a much-needed break-- cook ahead today so you can relax tomorrow!
The first step in meal planning is constantly the most difficult. To make it less difficult I suggest that you get the following products: Pen, paper, your personal recipe collection or your preferred cookbook and a comfy chair.
Start by writing down a list of your preferred meals and intend on preparing a grocery list that will accompany your list. Now, since we are talking bulk cooking here if you normally would provide one pot of spaghetti prepare to serve 2 (that would suggest that you will have to double the dish so be sure to modify your shopping list accordingly) It will take the exact same amount of time to prepare just a little additional planning is needed.
Next you can utilize a blank calendar and just compose the meals down on the day you will serve them. I personally post my meal plan up on my refrigerator for the entire house to see. This likewise helps to prompt me for the next day of meals that will be served.
The most important tool in meal preparation and bulk cooking is your freezer. If you have a little freezer, don't worry; you can fit lots of meals because small freezer area it will simply call for a little bit more creativity on your part. With using freezer bags, that you can stack flat and using some freezer evidence containers you will be shocked at how many meals your freezer can hold.
Here are a couple of necessary and extensively utilized meal preparation strategies and ideas:
Multi-recipes ~ Utilizing this technique needs you to cook numerous main dish meals in one day. For example, on a Sunday early morning you might prepare a roast in your Crockery pot, some spaghetti on top of the range, a 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 use throughout the whole week. You can eat one of the meals that very night and you could Freeze or cool the rest. This strategy works effectively for some individuals and it offers a wide range of meals that you can utilize. I personally use this method from time to time. I usually do my multi-recipe cooking on a Sunday and it can use up to 5 hrs to finish but what you are entrusted to is 2 weeks worth of food that you can enjoy. And notification that the meals that I use in my Multi-recipe list are easy to prepare.
One Cook Wonder ~ With this technique you would cook one main dish dish that can be used for various meals. For example, lets say you simply baked a large turkey. You could 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 need to prepare all of those meals on one day. After the Turkey has been cooked and cooled, you can freeze and cool the turkey that you cut off the carcass and prepare your other Turkey related meals at a various time.
Quick and Easy meals ~ Be sure to integrate those quick and simple meals into your planning process. If your household enjoys Sloppy Joes cook up the careless joe meat wholesale and freeze it then all you need to do is thaw the meat, get some buns and viola.
Designate a meal for a specific night ~ Every Friday night in my home is either Pizza or hamburger night. The concept here is to choose any night of the week and simply designate a meal to go with that night. I constantly make Go to this website sure that I have lots of Frozen Pizzas with a range of garnishes on hand in my freezer. The same goes for those Turkey hamburger patties (my household doesn't eat much ground beef). The idea behind this procedure is that you now have one nights meal currently planned. You can also stock up on that meal when the products are on sale. If you see Frozen pizzas being sold wholesale, get them up!
Love your leftovers ~ This is one of my favorite parts of meal preparation as it allows you to use your imagination. A minimum of every other week approximately make sure to go through your fridge and take inventory of what you have in there. When you combine 2-3 leftovers, you might discover that you eat right there. You can utilize left over pasta from spaghetti to prepare a pasta salad, leftover spaghetti sauce and simply a couple of pieces of chicken can be a wonderful meal to top with cheese and place in the oven. Once again, with a little creativity you can make your leftovers work for you!
Use the sales paper ~ everyone enjoys a good sale and I utilize the sales paper to help me in my meal planning. When I see our Family favorites on sale instead of purchasing one, I will purchase 3-4 of the same products and just get back and prepare the meals or freeze the food that I purchased. My family and I like Chicken. When I spot whole chickens on sale Ive been known to purchase up to 5-6 at a time. Keep in mind that I have a household of 6 and in my household of six; there are 3 teens (and you know how much they can take in). By going shopping like this, I actually save hundreds and numerous dollars a year in food alone!
Helpful supplies
Labels/ freezer bags/Freezer-proof containers: Be sure that you have all of your freezing and refrigerating needs on hand. When storing food in freezer safe containers make certain to place a label on the container with the name of the meal and the date the meal was prepared.
Crockpot: This convenient home appliance is my buddy in the cooking area. When using a crockpot you actually 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 after that slice the chicken as much as 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, peace of mind and convenience-- what else might a busy mom ask for?
Now, lets get Cookin!