Simple ingredient prepping can transform kitchen chaos into calm. If you’ve ever stared into a fridge full of random groceries and wondered what to cook, this post is for you. By doing some ingredient prep once a week, you can make quick meals that suit your lifestyle — whether you’re low-carb, keto, gluten-free, or vegetarian!
With a bit of planning and a handful of staples ready to go, you can craft nourishing breakfasts, lunches, and easy dinners in minutes — perfect if you want healthy and delicious meals for the week without spending hours in the kitchen.
Food prep is my secret weapon for quick, healthy weeknight meals. It’s less time-consuming than meal prep and allows for more flexibility. Also, see the ingredients I prepped this week and the meals I made with them!
Meal prepping is a popular strategy for saving time in the kitchen, but I prefer ingredient prepping, which is precisely what the name suggests. Instead of having complete meals ready to go, you have a variety of ingredients prepped, allowing you to put together meals quickly and with minimal effort.
If you follow me on Instagram stories, I often show my weekly food prep and the meals I make with it. I love having a variety of produce, proteins, and dairy products prepped and ready to go, and I can’t stress enough how time-saving it is!
Ingredient Prepping vs Meal Prepping
While the two sound similar, they are very different and cater to various needs. Meal prepping involves preparing entire meals ahead of time and eating the same or very similar things all week long. This works for many people, especially those with little time in the kitchen. If you’re interested in meal prepping, we have a simple five-step planning process to help you get started!
On the other hand, ingredient prepping involves prepping individual ingredients such as vegetables, proteins, grains, and dairy. You can prepare meals quickly by having separate ingredients prepped and ready to go. It allows more flexibility in your meals and is best for those who need to save time in the kitchen and don’t want to eat the same thing every day.
Prevent Food Waste
We all know I’m passionate about preventing food waste. In fact, I wrote a whole blog post about it. In my experience, perishable foods, mainly produce, can be easily pushed to the back of the refrigerator and spoil quickly. Having these ingredients prepped and ready to go encourages you to use them.
Ingredient prepping is a great way to use up things that need to be used. One of the first things I do when choosing what to prep is to inventory what I already have. Anything that needs to be used goes on the list, and this week, that was two avocados. Since a dressing or a sauce is always part of my weekly ingredient prep, I used them to make an avocado sauce!
Related: How To Stop Food Waste (and stop money from going in the trash)
Food Prep Planning
I like to start with what I already have. It helps prevent food waste and saves money because you’ll buy less.
- Begin by taking an inventory of your refrigerator, freezer, and pantry. Then review what you already have, jot down what you need to use first, and plan your meals around those. This is the step that should start to give you some inspiration. For example, if you have black beans in your pantry already and ground beef in your freezer, you can build on that.
- Brainstorm some meals that allow you to use the ingredients you prep in different ways. For example, if you want to prep ground beef, rice, and roasted veggies, think of a few meals you can make combining those ingredients.
- Write down what you’ll need to make each meal and cross off what you already have. One of my favorite meal-planning hacks is to use specific Google searches for inspiration. Let’s say you have ground beef, broccoli, and black beans, and want to use them in various meals. Do a Google search exactly like this: “ground beef” + broccoli + “black beans”. The plus sign tells Google to include every word, and the quotation marks to search for that exact phrase. Swap those ingredients out with whatever you’re looking for. I like to go to the image tab because I’m a visual person.
- So you’ve taken a quick kitchen inventory, brainstormed some meals, listed the ingredients you need for each one, and crossed off what you already have. Now, you can finalize your shopping list.
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Ingredient Prep
Multitasking is your BFF here. Start with what takes the longest to cook, and prep everything else while it cooks.
- Cook your protein. This usually takes the longest, so I start with that. This is also when I start my water for hard-boiled eggs, pasta, etc…
- When cooking your main protein, keep the seasoning simple so you can use it in various ways. For example, if you heavily season it with Italian seasonings, that limits the dishes you can use it in.
- Cook your grains. My oven-baked rice is a staple in our household. Since it needs to be in the oven for a bit, I’ll get that started after I start the protein.
- Prep your produce. This depends on personal preference. I prefer to keep it raw so I can use it in salads, and if I want to cook it, it’s already prepped.
- Extras. Grate cheese, toast nuts, and make a sauce or dressing. Your future self will thank you on a busy night when these little things are ready to go.
- By now, your protein is either done or almost done, and so are your grains. At this point, I usually remove everything from the oven or stove and let it cool slightly before transferring it to the fridge.
I suggest storing all your prep ingredients in clear glass containers designed for stacking. This way, you can easily see what you have without opening each container. You’ll be surprised how time-consuming this is. I’ve included some affordable options below!
Storing Produce
How you store your produce can make a big difference in maximizing its life and maintaining freshness.
- Diced or shredded carrots must be covered with a damp paper towel to prevent them from turning brown and drying out. As you use them throughout the week, dampen the paper towels if you notice they are drying out.
- Bell peppers, onions, and hearty greens like kale do better when moisture is kept to a minimum. I typically line the bottom of the container with lint-free paper towels to absorb any excess moisture.
- Fresh herbs have a short shelf life, but I’ve found what I think is the best way to store Italian parsley, which I buy every week. When I get home from the store, this is precisely what I do.
- Leave the bunch together, then plunge it into ice-cold water.
- Leave it for about 15 minutes.
- Shake out the excess moisture.
- Release it from the rubber band or tie, and lay it on a towel.
- Dry it well before storing it in a container between several paper towels.
I’ve tried every method imaginable for storing Italian parsley, and I’ve been doing it this way for years.
My Ingredient Prep + Plan This Week
Now for some inspiration, let’s review what I prepped this week. I keep myself stocked with Greek yogurt for yogurt bowls, canned protein and cottage cheese, frozen vegetables, condiments, scallions, and Italian parsley. Those ingredients are always in my kitchen! The list below is what I prepped this week (pictured above), and I’ll give you some meal ideas below.
- Two pounds of ground beef sautéed with simple seasonings
- Six hard-boiled eggs
- One can of black beans, rinsed and drained
- Three bell peppers, diced
- Two large carrots, shredded
- One red onion, marinated
- Two containers of fresh mushrooms, quartered and sautéed
- One cup of pecans, roughly chopped and toasted
- One block of sharp cheddar cheese, grated
- Avocado ranch. I make a sauce or dressing every week. This week, I have two avocados that need to be used up, so I made an avocado ranch sauce using my homemade ranch dressing mix, Greek yogurt, lemon juice, and avocados. This can also be used as a dressing.
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Meals Made With The Ingredients Above
You’ll notice there’s no dessert here, and that’s because we don’t eat dessert every night.
- Veggie egg bake. I loved this so much last week that I made it again using the peppers, scallions, and cheese. For extra protein, I added some of my homemade Italian chicken sausage.
- I made an egg-and-veggie scramble with black beans, peppers, mushrooms, scallions, and cheese, topped with avocado sauce. It’s not pretty, but it was good!
- Rice and eggs. I make this all the time. It’s a quick and delicious savory breakfast that always hits the spot!
- Ground beef rice bowls. I make a batch of oven-baked rice every week, which serves as the base, along with some lettuce. I used peppers, beef, eggs, carrots, and avocado sauce for this bowl.
- Bean and pasta salad. I love having an easy bean or pasta salad that I can quickly throw together. I mixed the black beans with peppers, marinated onions, carrots, scallions, and parsley, then tossed everything with a simple Dijon vinaigrette.
- A savory cottage cheese bowl with beef and peppers. To jazz it up, I seasoned the meat with Za’atar seasoning and Aleppo pepper. The cottage cheese became the sauce, and this was SO delicious!
I prefer the flexibility of making meals on the fly. That said, having some planned out will help you on nights when you need something quick and don’t want to think.
Final Thoughts
- Don’t overcomplicate it. Your food prep doesn’t have to be done all at once or on the same day. If you have an extra 10 minutes while you wait for pasta to cook, use that pocket of time to get something else prepped!
- Frozen produce is hugely underrated. It’s prepped and ready to go. If you’re guilty of letting fresh produce go to waste, consider keeping a variety of frozen produce on hand to avoid this issue. You can use as much or as little as you need and pop the rest back in the freezer.
I hope this post has inspired you to start ingredient prepping. If you have any suggestions, please share them in the comments below!
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