5 Reasons to start meal planning today!
How do you save time, save money, eat healthier, save your waist line and reduce your food waste?
By meal prepping and planning.
Meal prepping and planning is an efficient and effective way to help you save money, time and be healthier. Planning your meals is also a great way for you to reduce food waste while helping the environment.
Take some time and start planning a few meals. If you can’t plan out every meal, start by planning your work week lunches or dinners and progress from there.
Meal planning involves meal prepping. Because you know in advance that you are prepping for more than 1 meal, you are able to
- Reduce you trips to the grocery store
- Reduce time wandering in the grocery store searching for deals and yummy snacks.
- Buy goods in bulk – enjoying great savings
- Reduce overall time spent in kitchen chopping onions and veggies or washing and drying dishes.
Planning ahead does not mean that you need to eat the same meal for a week. With all the amazing resources available online today, you are easily able to find exciting and innovative methods of using the same ingredients in many different ways.
Top 5 reasons for meal planning and prepping :
- Saving you time
- Eating healthier, nutritious meals
- Saving you money
- Reducing your food waste
- Reduces stress
Saving you time
By planning ahead, you are able to spend less time going to the grocery stores. Meal prepping means less time is spent in the kitchen every day as there is less chopping, washing, drying and cleaning. More time can be spent enjoying meals together and taking time to relax and unwind.
Eating healthier, nutritious meals
Planning ahead means you can eat what you like; specific to your needs and preferences.Portion size, better control what you eat and how much of it you eat at one meal can be observed and followed.
This can help with weight loss, weight management and overall general health.Meal prepping and planning is an excellent way to eat nutritious home-cooked meals.When you aren't at home or don't have time to cook plan to have a healthy and delicious meal replacement shake.
Saving you money
Fewer visits to the grocery store will reduce the amount of money spent on small items of food. Prepping and planning will involve buying bigger volumes of food – allowing you to buy in bulk and save. Impulse buying will become a thing of the past or happen less frequently. How many times do we buy items because they are on sale or because they look super tasty – but in reality we don’t need these items. Saving loose change on parking and ‘car guards’ can be kept aside for special treats or rewards.
Reducing your food waste
Planning your meals can help reduce food waste. Eating left overs should form part of your meal plan. Left overs are awesome for lunches or snacks. This will help reduce food waste, save you time and money.
Reduces stress
If meals are planned in advance there is no stressing over what to cook. Making lists of required ingredients will make the grocery run a lot less stressful too. Evaluate your schedule and plan effectively to have meals prepped and or prepared on the days you know are stressful and challenging. Planning your meals around your lifestyle and your schedule is helpful in reducing overall stress and anxiety at meal times.
Don’t let meal planning scare you – even if you plan not to cook – the goal is to have a plan so that you know what is going on so that you can benefit in the long run.