We spend a lot of time preparing food in our home, so I love learning little tricks for making meal preparation easier and more efficient. This week I was inspired by a post on Food Renegade called ‘Easy Grain Free Lunch Ideas.’ It wasn’t so much the lunch ideas that caught my attention, but rather a kitchen tip for saving time preparing meals. Here is her step number one:
“1) Always have ready-to-grab veggies and fruits available. My Farmer’s Market meets on Thursday afternoons, and I come home with bags full of vegetables & fruits. Before I put them away, I prep every last bit of them that will keep for at least a week. Everything gets washed before going into the refrigerator, and any vegetable that can handle it also gets peeled, sliced, and diced and set into the fridge in its own container. Vegetables that don’t hold up well to refrigeration (like tomatoes) are simply washed and kept in a large screened fruit basked on my counter. This process takes me about thirty minutes to an hour and eliminates at least 15 minutes a day of prep work. I start my week armed with pre-cut carrot sticks, diced bell peppers, chopped onions & garlic, chopped greens, and sliced summer squash.”
Now this might seem really obvious to many people, but to me it was like a big a-ha moment! Normally we come home from market tired from a long day, so everything from farmer’s market gets bagged and put in the fridge as is. We put everything in plastic bags which we wash, dry and re-use. I’m so proud when we bring our own basket and bags to farmer’s market and avoid using any plastic bags. Then when we come home and put everything in plastic bags so it will stay fresh in the fridge, (even if we do re-use the bags) it seems like a let-down every time.
Today, since we didn’t come home late from market, I was able to take the above advice and get vegetables prepped before putting them away. Celery ends all got washed, chopped and went straight into a pot of soup. The rest of the celery got washed, chopped, and put into a glass container with a lid (no plastic- yay!) to use for spreading almond butter and raisins on for a snack. Beet greens went straight into that same pot of bone broth soup. Some beets got chopped to use for steaming, some got set aside for grating raw on salads. They all went into a glass container. I still used a few plastic bags because I ran out of containers. (My goal is to get more glass storage containers.)
I continued with each different vegetable. You get the idea.
I continued with each different vegetable. You get the idea.
Before, whenever we wanted carrots on our salad, I would grab a few out of the fridge and wash and prepare them. That doesn’t seem like a lot of time spent each mealtime, but it adds up. If I have them already prepared in the fridge, I will be saving so much time!
I’m really excited about this. It saves time in the kitchen and when I prep the veggies as I put them away, they easily fit into glass containers and I can move away from those plastic bags. Whenever I’ve stored things in those glass containers rather than plastic bags, it always seems to stay fresher and last longer. Lots of bonuses. Plus, I’m a Virgo and I really really like organizing (and a pretty refrigerator.)
I’m really excited about this. It saves time in the kitchen and when I prep the veggies as I put them away, they easily fit into glass containers and I can move away from those plastic bags. Whenever I’ve stored things in those glass containers rather than plastic bags, it always seems to stay fresher and last longer. Lots of bonuses. Plus, I’m a Virgo and I really really like organizing (and a pretty refrigerator.)
What tricks do you use in the kitchen to make things easier, simpler, faster, and more efficient?
And also, how do you reduce the use of plastic bags in your kitchen?
And also, how do you reduce the use of plastic bags in your kitchen?
When we started eliminating all the plastic from our kitchen about 4 months ago this guide to storing vegetables without plastic really helped: http://www.washingtonsgreengrocer.com/how-store-vegetablesfruit-without-plastic.htm
I am a little late responding to these comments! 🙂 I love hearing from all of you.
So many great ideas and inspirations. Thanks!
I hear your concern with pre-cutting vegetables. There are only certain ones I pre-cut. I’m still experimenting and seeing which ones I like that way. I had not heard of nutrient loss from pre-cutting veggies. I’m curious.
I have been doing this as well lately with our CSA shares. I wash, clean and prep whatever I can right away and it helps a lot with our crazy schedules and not letting food go to waste. I am slowly collecting more glass containers, but still do use plastic from time to time, which although not ideal, I am sure to not cook in them, which I understand leaches the most chemicals into food.
Hi there,
Not a big fan of pre-cutting vegetables here (loss of nutrients, and loss of beauty! :-)But I store my (uncut) vegetables just as they are (no container, no bag) if they allow that kind of treatment, and otherwise I wrap them in a moistened tea towel. Just soak it in water and wring it out. Keeps even leafy things like salads fresh for more than a week!
Greetings from a Dutch reader!
Anne-Lise
Mmm, I’m confused here!
Cutting up fruit and vegetables in advance results in a loss of nutrients, doesn’t it?
I cannot imagine slicing up fresh colorful peppers or vibrant greens in advance as all the vitamin C would be gone!
I’m not willing to sacrifice important nutrients just for the sake of convenience, especially since I’m paying so much money to buy fresh organic produce.
Also, as another reader said, we do not like the taste of pre-cut veggies.
Evi (the Greek girl! 🙂 )
I love the idea of preparing veg at the beginning of the week!
We have plastic tubs to store food in, but I much prefer to use glass jars or earthenware pots for storage.
I made a stew yesterday to store overnight as I knew we would not have time to cook after a long day out today. Oooh it was tasty. All the better for being kept overnight!
xxx
What a great idea? I had never even thought of pre prepping food! I love it, and will certainly give it a go. Lots of times I seem to forget to use veg stored in the fridge when I’m in a rush. Hopefully this will help.
Since I started making our family bread I’ve been using pillow cases to keep the bread fresh – and its amazing how little plastic comes into our home just from saving on loads of plastic bread bags! Love the glass storage idea too. x
It really is so much easier to prepare veggies as soon as I get home from the market—-AND, I’ve found that when they are ready to go I am more likely to include them in meals (soups/stews/salads)or eat them for snacks rather than letting them sit in the refrigerator turning to mush because I either forget them or didn’t feel like taking the time to wash, chop, etc. when time was an issue.
I reuse nearly all glass containers that come into my home—-they are easy to clean, pretty to use, and the food still tastes fresh when stored in them.
Have a lovely week!
Taryn, I needed to tell you that you have the brightest, cheeriest blog in Blogland and it’s such a treat coming to visit!! Beautiful pics, beautiful green border ….oh and that beautiful baby – thanks for sharing it all!!!
are you finding the taste okay when stuff’s cut more than a few hours ahead?
my mother always did that when i was growing up in the 60s/70s, but things just don’t taste as fresh to me when they’ve been cut up for a day, even if they’re chilled/watered (and we have lovely well water, so it’s not chlorine/chloramine).
i’ve even tried just pre-scrubbing carrots for a while, but then the outside tasted stale when i went to eat them.
i notice it more on super fresh organic produce than stuff form the store that’s already sort of stale.
I just started doing this too, for a different reason though. I have two boys (6 & 4) and they always reach for crackers as a snack. Considering how much they eat, I wasn’t happy with them eating all those crackers. So instead I started keeping a glass container full of cut up bell peppers, carrots and celery and told them that they can eat as much of those as they wanted for a snack without asking. Their veggie intake has tripled since then!
I also recently made bone broth and froze it in the exact amounts that it takes to make our standard rice portion. Then whenever I want to make rice, I use the broth to cook it, which makes it extra tasty and nutritious!
I’m a virgo too! 🙂
I have a ton of recycled glass containers with lids. Mostly from pasta sauce and veganaise jars. Let me know if you are interested and I can bring some down to market next week.
This is a great tip on veggie prep. I also like the glass jar idea because you can see what you have easily. I get tired of looking through all the plastic bags to find certain vegetables.
We learn something new everyday!
—-And also, how do you reduce the use of plastic bags in your kitchen?
We have a local person here who sews large square pillowcases with velcro closures. (I’m sure non plastic snaps or buttons/zippers would work also) and then you stuff your old bags inside for using as a dog bed.
Just pull all the bags out when you need to wash it, and re-stuff.