Reader Question: Prep Time For Dinner

by Jen L.

Reader Sara Beth asks:

How do you handle meals when you don't have much prep time? Do you do "freezer meals"? I find if I want to actually cook, we end up eating pretty late because of [my son's] schedule.

Great question!  Being busy often gets in the way of cooking, as we all know.  I have certainly changed my planned menu on a whim due to lack of prep time on nights I've had to work late.  My family is not that into freezer meals, mainly because my husband SWEARS that everything I cook and freeze tastes freezer-burned. (It doesn't.) He also dislikes most things cooked in a crockpot because he says they get soggy. (They don't.)  Here are a few tricks I use to cut down on prep time and still manage to put tasty meals on the table.

*PREP IN THE MORNING.  No one wants to get up earlier than they have to, but I find that getting up just 10 or 15 minutes early allows me the time to prep a lot of ingredients, then toss them into the fridge.  A lot of mornings, I'll mix up a meatloaf (in the Kitchenaid mixer!) while the coffee brews, then put it into the pan, cover it with foil and leave it in the fridge until time to cook dinner that evening.  I also chop veggies and measure out dry ingredients, then place them in ziplock bags, and assemble casseroles before I leave for work.  This way, all you have left to do in the evening is the cooking part.

*DELEGATE.  Mr. "I don't like freezer or crock pot meals" often gets the special job of chopping, mixing and other prep jobs.  In his defense, he's an awesome cook himself and actually makes about 50% of our meals.  But the not liking things from a crock pot really wears me out.

*PICK A PREP DAY.  I have Mondays off, so I sometimes pre-prep for a few of the week's meals on that day.  I typically cook 2 big meals on Mondays, something for that night's dinner, plus something big like lasagna that I can divide up and pack for lunches throughout the week.  While I'm already in prep-mode, I chop a couple of onions and peppers, then store them in airtight containers to use throughout the week.  I also make sauces, fry bacon, brown ground turkey or beef, and bake some chicken breasts. All these things can be used as meal starters during the week.

Anyone have any good tips to help minimize prep time?

Comments

[Village]

My quickest meal that still involves cooking is as follows: meat strips from Trader Joe's that I marinate for an hour (I once did it in the morning but they wound up too spicy, though that may not be an issue for you), then stir fry while making cous cous and steaming broccoli. Basically takes the amount of time it takes cous cous to cook. My other quickie meal is meatsauce with pasta or seafood with pasta, because they all only take the time the pasta takes to cook.

[Katie]

I meal plan, so I know exactly what I'm going to need to do (no dithering) and most weeknights I draw from a repertoire of rotating recipes that take no longer than 15-30 minutes. Making the same recipes over and over again may be boring, but the repeated use definitely makes them faster- I learn where I can combine steps, that I can do x while y is sauteeing, that sort of thing. That's much harder with new recipes.

[Life of a Doctor's Wife]

I meal plan, too, and I try to coordinate the meals so that some of the ingredients are similar. Like... burritos and chili and tikka masala in the same week, so I can prepare the cilantro once and use it twice. That's a bad example because it's cilantro, not some super-hard-to-prepare thing. But that's the idea.

But I think the biggest time saver is to follow Rachael Ray's advice. And I cringe typing that because she kind of drives me nuts. But washing and even chopping veggies and fruits and meats on shopping day really helps. Buying a big family pack of chicken breasts and trimming them or chopping them into smaller bits before freezing them means that I can just dump them in the pot/on a cookie sheet/on the grill. Washing and chopping bell peppers and onions and carrots on Sunday means I can just dump them in stir fry or soups or whatever. Easy peasy.