Facing the task of preparing a meal after a long day of work can be overwhelming. Preparing a meal in a slow cooker or relying on frozen meals from the grocery store are commonly used alternatives. Another way to reduce the overwhelm is to break the meal preparation into steps and prep-ahead all or parts of the meal.

Review the meal and identify what you can prep the night before. Are there vegetables that need chopping? Is there meat that can be prepared the night before and just reheated the next day? Or maybe there’s a sauce you can prepare the night before.

Chicken Breasts:

For salads or pasta, bake and cut up chicken breasts the night before and place in refrigerator or prepare several and place in the freezer for future meals. Pull them out of the freezer the night before to thaw.

You can do the same for quesadillas, chimichangas or chicken salad sandwiches, just season and shred the chicken.

Ground Beef:

Make home made meatballs and freeze them.

Meat sauce is also easy to make the night before or in bulk and freeze. Imagine how much quicker it is to make a lasagna, spaghetti dish, or Italian sloppy joes with the sauce made ahead of time.

You can have nachos or tacos quick and easy by cooking up the meat the night before and placing in the refrigerator. And this is great made ahead of time and frozen in the freezer as well.

Soups:

Prepping your vegetables the night before makes it quick and easy to serve a soup with dinner. See our blog post on prepping your vegetables and freezing them to prepare soup later. This is a great way to use left over vegetables or vegetables that are about to go bad.

Lasagnas and Casseroles:

Consider making a double batch of your favorite lasagna and casserole recipes. You can place the additional batch in the freezer for a future meal.

These are just a few ideas of how you can prep-ahead some of your meal and reduce the stress at meal time. Share with us some of your prep-ahead tips.