As a busy working Mom, I try to do anything and everything to make life less stressful and allow me to spend more quality time with my family. Food prepping is one of those practices that really helps to alleviate stress during the week. In addition, in ensures that we do not get takeout every night and I can put healthy food on the table. Although it requires a little bit of time on the weekend, it is worth it.

The easiest thing to start with is getting all of your ingredients prepped. Look and see where you have overlap in your recipes. For instance, many recipes call for chopped onions and peppers. Chop those for all of your recipes first, and make sure you have all of your seasonings out and easily accessible. Then you can proceed to cooking. If you are like me, and do not like leftover meat, you can prep your meat so it is easy to cook the night of your dinner. For instance, trim and cut your chicken and put in a bag to marinate for the next night. If you are having tacos, prep all of your toppings and side dishes(rice, beans, salad) on the weekend, and then all you have to do is cook your meat and serve. Burgers can be seasoned and patted out prior and left in the fridge or freezer. If you are making fajitas, you can cut and trim the meat and slice all the veggies. For side dishes, I prep rice, macaroni and cheese, pasta, potatoes grilled and baked veggies ahead of time, so I just need to heat them. I always make sure to have a green and starch with each meal.

You can also make meals, where you will have leftovers that you can eat more than once or repurpose. For instance, you could make a big pot of chili and eat it with cornbread and salad one night and make chili dogs another night. If you are trying to lighten things up instead of cornbread, get low carb tortillas and make cheese crisps and make turkey dogs instead of hot dogs. If you make or buy a rotisserie chicken, you can use it in enchiladas, salads, tacos or sandwiches. Pot-roast, makes great burritos.

Here are some of my go to easy items to prep for dinner:

• Chicken and Steak Fajitas

• Chili

• Street corm and black bean tostadas

• Low carb street corn enchiladas

• Ground Turkey Tacos

• Lettuce Wraps

• Enchiladas

• Grilled BBQ chicken

• Buffalo chicken Sandwiches in the crock pot

• Bbq pork sandwiches in the crockpot

• Everything seasoning chicken tenders in the Air fryer

• Chicken stir fry

• Meatballs for pasta or sandwiches

• Chicken cacciatore in the crockpot

• Chicken Divan in the crockpot

*Pinterest.com, allrecipes.com and skinnytaste.com have great recipes for all of the above.

For breakfasts and lunches, I will make a big salad on the weekend and put it in Tupperware containers for the week. I will cut up veggies like carrots, cucumbers and sugar snap peas and put them in Ziplocs. I will portion out grapes in Ziploc bags. I will portion out healthy snacks like almonds into Ziploc bags. Sometimes I will make a batch of muffins or egg muffins for breakfast. Additionally, if you like smoothies, you can prep your fruits and veggies and put them in bags and just dump in the blender in the morning with some milk or yogurt. I also pack as much of my son’s lunches as I can. I will put snacks and juices in a lunch bag ahead of time and then I just need to make his sandwich. Sometimes for lunch I will make him charcuterie – cut up cheese, meat, crackers and veggies. I can prep that all ahead of time.

Here are some easy breakfast, lunch and snack items that you can prep and pack:

Smoothies

Protein shakes – put the power in a shaker cup and just add water and shake when ready

Cottage cheese with fruit

Fruit salad

Yogurt parfaits

Nuts

Trailmix

Cut up veggies

Tuna or chicken salad

Cheese sticks

Protein bars

Granola bars

Fruit leather

Pirate Booty

One other time and money saving tip, is to buy in bulk. I try to buy my chicken, beef and ground turkey once per month from Costco. I then trim and portion them out and freeze. I also buy salad dressing, pasta sauce, juices and snacks for my son’s lunches from Costco. This saves me a lot of money and time.