The 5 Costco Finds that Make My Meal Prep SO Much Easier

Turns out, one of the first steps of meal prepping is to get a Costco membership. Or at least it can be! See, the warehouse store is actually a great place to start when you’re looking to plan your weekly cooking session. While not every item is suitable for meal prep, I’ve narrowed the list to top contenders that make the task more efficient.

Here are my picks for the best meal prep shortcuts that Costco has to offer.

My annual intention to freeze cubes of fresh summer pesto remains, once again, unfulfilled, but that doesn’t mean I scrap my favorite meal prep recipes from the menu. Kirkland Signature’s basil pesto is vibrant and full of Parmesan cheese flavor, just like my homemade recipe, but with no container garden guilt trip! For meal prep, I make slow cooker pesto chicken a two-ingredient affair, and always keep this pesto on hand to add intense flavor to the soups I prep early in the week. Oh, and of course, it can also be used on pasta.

Costco’s rotisserie chicken is one of the warehouse giant’s best deals. It’s hard to pass up a whole chicken, but when it comes to meal prep, the hand-pulled rotisserie chicken breast meat saves you time. Use this chicken breast meat anywhere you need cooked chicken — in salads, soups, tacos, casseroles, and more.

Peek into any meal prepper’s kitchen and you’re sure to find a steaming pot of rice on the back burner. A grocery-aisle find from Costco can save you from simmering those grains. Kirkland Signature’s garlicky Brown Rice and Quinoa blend cooks quickly in the microwave for rice bowl lunches or as a simple side to meal prep marinated meats. Or skip the microwave and sauté the grains in a skillet for a quick-fire stir-fry.

Have you’ve ever gotten through an entire meal prep session and only then remembered that — oh, yeah — you’ve got to feed yourself breakfast, too? Smoothies seem like an easy and obvious choice until you realize you don’t have time to prep make-ahead smoothie kits. Costco’s frozen fruit can’t be beat, but you can take the shortcut and look for these newer ready-made smoothie packs to add to your meal plan.

Wash greens and shake up a homemade dressing during your meal prep time, but leave the salad topper to Costco. NaturSource’s mix of dried cranberries and seeds is just right for dressing up simple salads with no extra effort from you! This mixture of sunflower seeds, pumpkin seeds, and dried cranberries is fit for more than salads. Try stirring it into homemade granola or muesli, topping muffins, or adding to cooked rice for a quick pilaf.

Do you have any meal prep shortcuts from Costco to add to this list? Leave your suggestions in the comments below!