by: Emilie Hebert, dietitian at Nourishing Minds Nutrition

Raise your hand if you’ve been personally victimized by the clean-eating-meal-prepping movement circa 2015. I know I was! Maybe we’ve been led to believe that meal prepping equals identical containers of grilled chicken, steamed broccoli, and brown rice. Or that meal prepping is something you do only when you’re dieting and trying to control your food.

That is not true! Diet culture doesn’t deserve to own meal prep. In this post, we’ll talk about some benefits of meal prepping, plus three different methods of meal prep.

What are the benefits of meal prep?

Finding a meal prep method that works for us can help us eat consistently throughout the week. The first thing I work on with most of my nutrition clients is creating a daily pattern of consistent meals and snacks! Eating often enough helps us maintain energy levels throughout the day by avoiding extreme blood sugar highs and lows. It can also promote better gut health and hormone health.

Meal prepping can also save us time! By doing some of the grunt work earlier in the week, we can save time when it comes to prepping meals later.

Lastly, meal prep can help us reduce our food waste. I know that if I buy produce and just stick it in my fridge, it may go bad before I can cook it. Prepping that food ahead of time (which could simply mean washing and/or chopping) makes us more likely to cook it later. This also saves us money because we’re using everything we bought!

Let’s get into three different methods of meal prep, so you can find one that works for you.

Three Meal Prep Methods

Let’s get into three different methods of meal prep, so you can find one that works for you. Something to remember for all three methods is that meal prep meals don’t have to be boring, like the plain chicken, broccoli, and rice example above. When you’re thinking of what to prep, center flavors you enjoy and foods you know are satisfying.

1. Prepping most (or all) meals and snacks at once.

Who it is good for: You’re super busy during the week and/or find yourself skipping meals frequently. You don’t mind eating the same meal multiple times in a row.

How to execute:

Decide which meals you’re fully prepping. Choose recipes.
For lunch and dinner, pack everything up in storage containers (so you’d have 5 lunch containers and 5 dinner containers).
For breakfast, prep any necessary components (like a breakfast casserole) that you can pair with toast or fruit in the morning. You also don’t need to prep breakfast if it’s something you can easily cook each morning (like eggs and toast).
For snacks, buy pre-packaged options (like bars, trail mix, or crackers) or make your own snack packs.

2. Prepping a buffet of ingredients to use throughout the week.

Who it is good for: You get bored of eating the same meals multiple times. You can spend a few minutes at each meal throwing something together.

How to execute:

Choose 2-3 protein options to cook. Put each in a storage container.
Choose 2-3 grain/starch options to cook. Put each in a storage container.
Choose 2-3 vegetables to cook/prepare. Put each in a storage container.
Throughout the week, mix and match these ingredients to create meals. For example, if one of my protein options is chickpeas, one of my starches is rice, and one of my vegetables is broccoli, I can make a simple curry, a burrito bowl, a wrap, and a stir-fry (using other pantry staples).

3. Cooking dinner most nights and having leftovers for lunch.

Who it is good for: You enjoy cooking dinner and don’t want to spend any time prepping lunch in the middle of the day.

How to execute:

Choose recipes that are simple for you to cook for dinner. Make sure to make enough for at least one day of leftovers (you can make more to have extra days of lunches).

I hope you find a meal prep method that works for you! Also, what works for you may look differently in different phases of your life. Most importantly, remember that meal prepping doesn’t equal diet culture—meal prep can help support you in eating meals you enjoy consistently.