Meal Planning Made Easy With Meal Prep

Most weeks I meal plan. I find it easier if I have some kind of idea of what I’m cooking that week. Of course sometimes things change, perhaps we go for an impromptu meal out or go over my parents etc but for the most part we eat the meals I’ve planned at the beginning of the week.

What I’ve started to do which makes a big difference to the way I cook our meals is spending a few hours on a day when my OH takes the little ones for a trip to the park doing meal prep. Last week for example I cooked chicken thighs, sausages and gammon steaks in the sous vide machine in one afternoon. Then I quick chilled them ready for meals in that week. Whilst they were in the sous vide I chopped vegetables and browned mince ready for spag Bol, I boiled potatoes ready to mash and mixed dough for bread.

In two hours I more or less completely prepared meals for four days and it made life so much easier.

I’m doing the same today.

Today’s prep work:

*Sous vide chicken thighs ( you could just oven cook if you don’t have a sous vide) and sausages
*Defrost ribs and minced beef from freezer
*Chop sweet potatoes for wedges
*Dice and boil potatoes for rosemary parmentier potatoes
*Chop onions and carrots
*Cook chick peas ready for curry and burgers
*Make dough ready for bread rolls
*Make a batch of waffle batter
*Grate cheese
*Dice peppers and cucumbers

This weeks meal plan

I’ve decided to stop setting meals for specific days so I just have one of these meals on whatever days we want.

*DJ BBQ chicken thighs with s.potato wedges and salad

*My veggie bean burgers in homemade bread rolls served with spicy rice

* Smoky 48hr Ribs with parmentier potatoes

* Sausage Casserole with homemade soda bread

* Domodah – this is a Gambian recipe which I haven’t cooked in several years so will be interesting to see how it turns out. I make it with chicken but you can also use beef.

* Lasagne with a big salad

Breakfasts are usually cereal and fruit but waffles on one day as treat.
Lunches are usually lighter meals of sandwiches or soup… Or you know naan bread pizzas with leftover saag aloo 🙂