Tips for Pre-Prepping Ingredients

Welcome back to the next installment of our Healthy Meal Plan for Homeschoolers Series for Enlightium Academy. Finding new recipes and creating tasty meals with your children can be a great way to bond, as well as to help your child learn valuable life skills. One strategy to keep in mind when feeding your family throughout the week is to prepare the ingredients that you will need ahead of time. 

This is the third entry in the Healthy Meal for Homeschoolers series. You can find the entire series at this link.

Include Your Children in the Process

One of the major benefits of homeschooling is that you have more oppotunities to teach your children valuable life skills, and planning ahead with your ingredients is no exception. As you read through this blog, think about how you can include your children and instill wisdom in them about planning ahead, even for things like chopping and storing ingredients.

Let me share an example

At the grocery store last week, I picked up a few sweet potatoes, onions, bell peppers, and mushrooms for a couple of different dishes. I knew the week would be a busy one, and when I got home from the store, I prepped all of the fresh ingredients for the recipes I would use them for. I also know that I am usually most excited about my grocery store purchases right after I buy them. So, I cubed the sweet potatoes and sliced everything else for the fajitas I’d be cooking later that week. After I roasted the sweet potatoes and let them cool, I stored them and some vegetables in separate containers in the fridge. Throughout the week, I added sweet potatoes to my lunches. On a particularly hectic evening that week, I was able to quickly toss the fajitas with the seasoning mix (which I also prepared ahead of time) and start cooking.

What if I don’t have time to prepare?

What if you don't have time or don't feel like prepping ingredients when you get home from the store? Then do it when you want to! Maybe you are chopping onions for dinner. Instead of just chopping the one onion you need for your recipe, chop a few extras that you will use later in the week. Simply store them in a container in the fridge and pull them out when you are ready. And while you have the cutting board out, you might as well slice up those greens for tomorrow night’s salad.

I find this method to be particularly helpful for actually eating those fruits and vegetables you buy intending to eat but end up throwing out two weeks later. By preparing these ingredients before cooking, you give yourself a better chance of actually using them. Think about all those heads of broccoli and bunches of spinach you will actually eat! Also, try slicing carrots and cucumbers into sticks or mixing fruit for a salad before snack time, so when the kids say they are hungry, you can point them to the fresh ingredients you have already prepared.

When it comes to cooking, take all the shortcuts you can to set yourself up for success. Preparing ingredients before cooking helps you use all the ingredients you have and still feed your family well on those inevitable evenings when you just don't feel like cooking.

Check out these great resources on preparing foods ahead of time:

• Great tip: Precook a Week’s Worth of Vegetables
• How to Store Salad So It Stays Fresh & Ready to Mix-n-Match
• 25 (Actually Easy) Ways to Prep for Dinner Before You Leave for Work

Enlightium Academy is a private Christian online school that serves homeschooling families by offering a Bible-based, flexible, accredited, teacher-supported, and affordable education from the comfort of your home. For any other questions about Enlightium, please call (509) 319-2288, or visit EnlightiumAcademy.com.