Sometimes the secret to quick but satisfying weeknight meals isn't finding ways to cut corners, but spreading out the work. We try to do a little extra prep work when we have the time so that meals come together more quickly when we don't! Here are a few tips we've picked up over time.
Save Time Later! Make Ahead Tips for Weeknight Meals
We don't usually set aside time just to make these things ahead. Rather, it gets worked into whatever we're already doing. If we're having stuffed chicken breasts for dinner one night, it's easy enough to grill a few extra for later in the week. If we're cooking vegetables for a soup, we chop up double what we need and then scoop out the extra before continuing with the recipe.
1. Pre-Made Salad Mixes - Most raw, chopped vegetables will keep fairly well in the refrigerator for about a week. They can be tossed with fresh greens and a simple vinaigrette (which can also be made ahead!) just before you want to eat. Also, check out our template for Make-Ahead Pasta Salad with Veggies, Cheese, and Greens.
2. Cooked Veggies - Our standard mix of chopped vegetables includes onions, peppers, and mushrooms. You probably have something similar! This mix gets used in almost every hot dish we make: frittatas, tomato sauces, soups, and even on weeknight pizzas. Having a big batch of these vegetables cut and cooked ahead of time means less time for individual meal prep.
3. Cooked Meat - As with the vegetables, we find it handy to have some kind of pre-cooked meat in our fridge that can be thrown into dishes as another ingredient. Chicken breasts or a roast cooked on the weekend can cut thinly for sandwiches and paninis, shredded for soups and pastas, or cut into salads.
4. Pre-Made Bread Dough - Any bread dough can be stored in the fridge for up to a week. Just make the bread through the first rise and instead of shaping it into loaves, stick it in a large container or plastic bag and refrigerate. Just let the dough warm for about 20-30 minutes before shaping and using it. Basic bread dough can be used to make sandwich loaves, pizza, or stove-top flatbreads.
5. Pre-Made Cookie Dough - For those nights when we're craving a little sweet to end the meal but don't have anything already made, we keep a bag of pre-mixed and pre-portioned cookie dough in the freezer, just like you find in the freezer aisle at the store. To bake, we just set the cookies on a sheet pan on the counter to thaw while the oven pre-heats!
What other make-ahead tips do you have for making weeknight meals easier?
Related: Basic Technique: Mise en Place
(Image: Flickr member numb3r licensed under Creative Commons)
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Tips & Techniques, Ingredients - Meat, Ingredients - Vegetables, Organization, meal planning, make-ahead, make ahead, quick meals, meal prep, quick tipRelated Links
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These are all great ideas and I do this quite frequently. As a matter of fact, I spent about 2 hours yesterday morning making meals for the next two nights of dinners. One, a ratatouille via Julia's "Mastering.." is completely done and the other, is all prepped and ready to be cooked-a corn soup/chowder. If I don't have room in the fridge for the completed meal, I just prep the components ahead of time similar to what is described above (prepping veggies, marinading meat, etc.). It is so nice to have the majority of the work done by the time I come home tired and wanting to spend quality time with my family.
view rosebud's profile
Make extra!! If you're cooking something--beets, chicken, etc--you may as well cook a bit more than you need and use it later in the week. You can use it in a different way so you don't feel like you're eating the same thing. Saves so much time.
view sjbreeze's profile
Whenever I make a lasagne, I double the recipe. Half goes straight into a casserole dish for dinner that night. The other half goes into a foil lined dish, which then goes into the freezer. Once it has frozen solid, I pop it out of the dish and wrap it entirely in foil. When we're ready for another lasagne meal, I unwrap it from the foil, pop it back into the dish to defrost overnight, and then stick it in the oven.
I love knowing that I have an extra meal in the freezer, just in case I come home from work too tired to cook a whole meal. It's also nice on days when I have to work late - I label leftovers like that with notes about cooking temp and time so my husband can have dinner ready for ME every once in a while :)
view mergarcia's profile
Planned overs, not left overs. Beef roast on Sunday, roast beef poorboys on Monday or BBQ beef on a bun. Roasting a chicken, consider doing a second one, pulling meat off the bone and using in BBQ Chicken pizza, chicken tacos, chicken and cheese enchiladas, chicken caesar salad, ah the list goes on. IF the oven is on, it's economical to do two.
view lawoman's profile
I have found that my family likes foods based on different sauces. That is the basis of my meal planning. We went through all the different kinds of sauces we liked. We like spagetti sauce, tomato sauce, different curry sauces, and so on. Now, all we do is prepare the different sauces that make up the meal on the weekendsand freeze. During the week we only have to boil noodles, pasta or cook rice or potatoes. Sometimes we grill meat or veggies to go along with it all and some bread. This has really cut down on prep time and makes great meals for the week with great leftovers!
view JunoM's profile