Meal prep merely means preparing your meals ahead of time before you eat them. Whether you’re a student or a working adult, sometimes you just can’t be bothered to prep the ingredients and cook on the spot after a long tiring day. Here are simple meal prep ideas that could save you a whole lot of time by simply storing them in your refrigerator or heat them up, if necessary, whenever you’re ready to eat them!
1) Broccoli Pasta With Tuna
Time To Make: 15 minutes
Ingredients: Broccoli, pasta of your choice, one can of tuna, pepper, salt, parmesan cheese
This dish is pretty easy to cook and prepare. Simply boil the pasta, which should take roughly 8 – 10 minutes. After that’s done, proceed with placing the broccoli in the same pot and let it boil for 3 minutes. Drain both the pasta and broccoli, and mix them together with a tuna can of your choice. Add pepper, salt, parmesan cheese if you’d like for extra taste.
2) One-Pot Chicken Spaghetti
Time To Make: 20 minutes
Ingredients: Olive oil, onion, minced garlic, tomatoes, chicken broth, spaghetti, salt, parmesan cheese, Italian basil, shredded chicken
Now, this is super quick and easy. You don’t need the extra step of draining the spaghetti – just cook them all in a pot at one go. Put in the onion and garlic, saute for 3 minutes until brown. Then, add in tomatoes, chicken broth, Italian basil, shredded chicken and uncooked spaghetti into the pot. Let them boil for around 8 minutes with a lid on and you’re done!
3) One-Pan Baked Teriyaki Salmon and Vegetables
Time To Make: 30 minutes
Ingredients: salmon fillet, bell peppers, onion, carrots, broccoli florets, salt, pepper, oil, teriyaki sauce (ready-made bottle)
When you own an oven, you can easily cook many one-pan dishes within 30 minutes. This meal requires you to marinate the salmon and vegetables with any ready-made teriyaki sauce and place them all on the pan. It’s as simple as that!
4) One-Pan Baked Chili Chicken, Sweet Potatoes and Vegetables
Time To Make: 30 minutes
Ingredients: chicken breast, olive oil, chilli powder, paprika, garlic powder, pepper, diced sweet potatoes, salt, broccoli
Cook all of the staples at one-go within 30 minutes! Simply marinate the chicken, sweet potatoes and broccoli with the necessary ingredients and leave it in the oven for 20-30 minutes. You’ll get a full complete meal with this, without even having to prepare rice!
5) Peanut Butter and Banana Wraps (Sweet) or Ham & Cheese Wrap (Savoury)
Time To Make: 10 minutes
Ingredients: creamy peanut butter, whole wheat tortillas, honey, sliced bananas
If you’re a sweet tooth, you would probably enjoy this super easy to make breakfast wrap (or lunch if you fancy something sweet during the day). Spread the peanut butter evenly over the tortilla, drizzle honey and top it with banana slices.
Time To Make: 5 minutes
Ingredients: flour tortilla, mayonnaise, lettuce leaf, sliced cheese, ham
For something a little more savoury, this quick and easy lunch meal will be enough to fill you up for the rest of the day. Spread the mayonnaise evenly on the tortilla, top it with lettuce, ham, cheese, and add some tomato slices as well for an added crunch!
6) Korean Ground Beef Rice
Time To Make: 20 minutes
Ingredients: Lean ground beef, garlic, brown sugar, soy sauce, sesame oil, ginger, red pepper flakes, pepper, white or brown rice, spring onions
Instead of chicken as your regular choice of protein, you could also prepare your meals with beef. Prepare the sauce for the beef in a bowl, mix the brown sugar, soy sauce, sesame oil, red pepper flakes and pepper all together. Then, in a pan, cook the ground beef together with garlic until they are no longer pink. Pour the sauce over the beef and mix together – and you’re done!
Hopefully, with these meal prep ideas, you won’t have to stress too much on figuring what to eat every day. Doesn’t matter if you prepare these meals for breakfast, lunch, dinner, or even as a snack – you could have them any time of the day!
