Eating properly is essential for everyone’s well-being. By taking all the micronutrients you are ensuring your body works properly and preventing problems related to malnutrition. However, many people are not eating well with the excuse of being too busy.
Being busy should not be used as a reason for having an unhealthy diet. Especially when we understand how little time we need to prepare our meals for a whole week. Because of the essentiality of eating a balanced diet plan, you have to take matters into your hands.
To show you the benefits of meal preparation for extremely busy people, we have made this article. You will also learn how to do that easily, and get a habit of cooking your favorite meals in advance.
Saves Time
Cooking your meals every day is a time-consuming activity that many people cannot find time to do it. Imagine coming home from a long day, and you have nothing prepared for eating. It is a stressful situation and we always tend to find shortcuts.
With meal prep, you know you have food at home that just needs to be heated. It usually takes the same time to cook one meal, and meal prep for a couple of days. In addition, you will have fewer dishes to wash which is another time-efficient benefit.
Saves Your Finances
We already know how expensive ordering food is. If you are not cooking your meals, you are spending a lot of money that otherwise could’ve been used better.
The ingredients can be bought in larger quantities for a better price. In addition, there are always promotions at the market with products you can try for a more versatile diet.
Eating Better
Since food has a great impact on our health, we always have to prioritize healthy meals. When we cook on our own, the food can be made up to our taste while still being nutritious.
Tracking our calories intake is simpler when we know all the ingredients we use. In addition, creating proper portion sizes is beneficial because at restaurants we are usually served more than supposed to.
By consuming a balanced diet, we are sure that we have ingested all the required nutrients. In fast food places, we get more carbohydrates and fats instead of protein. In addition, we often forget about fruits and greenery with all the vitamins essential for our health.
Prevents Unnecessary and Unhealthy Eating
With meal prep, we already know our food since its only needs to be heated. If we get bored of a certain food combination, we can rearrange the meals, and have a versatile the healthy dietary plan.
If we have not prepared anything and there is nothing for us when we arrive from work, we get more cravings for unhealthy meals. By ordering takeaway we have the mindset to eat the dish we enjoy the most, and it is usually the unhealthiest one just to make it worth it.
Avoiding Additional Stress at the Busiest Periods of Your Life
You have surely thought about food whenever you were busy the most. What will you eat when you finish, or what does your family has to eat at home. This only complicates the situation and increases the stress levels while you are busy.
Preparing meals for a couple of days, or even a week saves you from stress because you know there is food at home. In addition, you can come up with dishes that can be taken to work so you can eat during the rest. You can even portion whole meals, or only cook the ingredients for a variety of combinations during the week.
How to Meal Prep
With various recipes and cooking meals that you can find on the internet, meal prepping has never been easier. However, we have provided a couple of tips that you can follow for an efficient and quick food preparation session.
Keep in mind, there are services such as prepstartlifestyles.com that can do most of the meal prepping for you. This has been shown as the most efficient and energy-saving method, so make sure you give it a try.
Do it at a time when you are free
Busy working schedules and other obligations are not an excuse to avoid meal prepping. Cooking food for a whole week takes the same time as preparing one meal. For that reason, choose the time when you are most free and get to cooking.
People usually meal prep on Sundays, since most of the people do not work that day. However, this process does not have to be done in one day. You can split the meal prepping into a couple of days. Use one day for proteins, and another for vegetables and carbohydrates, or do whatever feels easier for you.
Cook in batches
The quantity of food is not a determinant of the time required for cooking if it fits in a single pot or tray. For that reason, you should cook in batches and have food prepared for a whole week. Just make sure you have a variety of ingredients to make the diet versatile.
Meats usually require the most cooking time. However, you don’t have to stand above them when you can simply place them in the oven and take them out when their time is up. You should also boil a couple of eggs, and have a few spare tuna cans.
When it comes to carbohydrates, prepare a large quantity of rice or quinoa seeds. That way, you can always incorporate a meal with the proteins from above.
For breakfast, you can just put oats in jars, and put milk the night before. This helps you to have breakfast ready for the mornings, without any waste of time.
Lastly, fruits and veggies are only annoying for washing and dicing. If you don’t have time for that, you can always purchase prewashed and chopped products from the store. Although they are slightly costlier, you will save a lot of prepping time which is always beneficial.
Don’t make the same portions
If you are meal prepping for a whole week, you can become bored of the same food. To prevent that, it is better to cook all the ingredients separately, so you can easily mix and match them during the week. This will lead to more versatile dishes that you will surely enjoy.
Use simple recipes and methods
Preparing the food does not have to be complicated. You have various guides and recipes to try out, but we advise you to go for the simplest options. Cook the ingredients with only salt and oil, since you can add all the spices when you get the meal combined.
For quicker meal preparation, use large pots for rice and other carbs, and baking trays for meat and vegetable. Make sure you do things simultaneously to be more efficient and have more time for resting afterward.