Eating out is expensive and often happens when meals aren’t planned ahead. But what do you do when you don’t have the money to eat out on busy nights but don’t have the time to cook healthy meals? I’ve put together 5 steps to help you cook healthy meals with a tight schedule.
Why Healthy Meals?
Fueling your body with healthy food during the week is essential for keeping up your energy and productivity levels. You’ll notice that when you’re more productive, you’ll be able to maintain boundaries with work (since you’re getting more work done). That way you can spend more time with those you love and doing things outside of work that you enjoy.
Why Home-Cooked Meals?
One of the biggest advantages to home-cooked meals is that you’re the chef. You can control what ingredients are used and how much of them you add (like salt). You can also turn your favorite not-so-healthy restaurant meals into healthier meals when you’re in charge.
Another advantage is how much money you save from making healthy meals at home. If you were to buy healthy food at a restaurant, you’ll often pay 5+ times more than it would cost you to make it yourself.
All this to say, food must be a priority because it’s the fuel that helps you do what you need and want to do throughout the week. So, it’s critical to make the time to make meals that are going to boost your health, not inhibit or ruin it.
Quick Note on Cooking Healthy Meals with a Tight Schedule
One of my mottos as a Dietitian is to make each ingredient the best, healthiest version of it as possible. Unfortunately, most restaurants don’t have the same motto. They, normally, buy the cheapest version of the ingredient.
If you struggle with wanting to eat out all the time (like me), start paying attention to the ingredients you use and focus on replacing cheap, low-quality ingredients with higher-quality, healthier versions (as able). In time, you’ll find more enjoyment in cooking meals with your healthy ingredients than eating out, though there is a time and place for a tasty meal out from time to time.
Tip #1
One of my favorite phrases I’ve heard is from the Natural Living Family: “if you fail to plan, you plan to fail.” This phrase is so true, even for meal planning. If you don’t take the time to plan out your meals, you are setting yourself up for failure. This is especially true if you aren’t in the habit of cooking meals at home. If you are in the bad habit of eating out, it’s much easier to replace a bad habit with a good one – meal planning.
If you need more tips on meal planning, check out this article here.
Tip #2
A way to free up a lot of your time cooking is to choose recipes, when you’re meal planning, that use the same type of ingredients. By doing so, you can prepare and/or cook one big batch for 3+ of your meals that week. Rice, beans, chicken, potatoes, and sweet potatoes are easy to cook in big batches.
You may also be able to save money by buying produce, meat, and starches in bulk. That’s another great incentive to plan meals with similar ingredients.
Tip #3
Another way to free up your time cooking is to meal prep in bulk on the weekends. You can cut up produce, mix together dry ingredients (spices and seasonings, baked goods, etc.), and/or cook a big batch of chicken, rice, or beans that you’ll need for the following week. You can also stack meat in your freezer by putting the meat for first meal on top and meat for last meal on bottom.
The key is to do the most work you can do on the weekend to make it the easiest for you during the week.
If you need more tips for meal prepping, check out this article here.
Tip #4
After bulk prepping your meals for the week, write out each step you’ll have left to do during the weekday to cook your meals. Write down the day you need to complete each step and whether you’ll need to complete that step in the morning or evening, according to your schedule. This will increase your chances of cooking healthy meals at home on most nights, even on busy work days.
Tip #5
Lastly, whenever possible, double your recipes and freeze any second batches for another night. That way you’ll have back-up frozen meals for your really busy evenings. You can also freeze leftovers to eat at another time, if you’re not planning on a night of eating leftovers.
Tips to Cook Healthy Meals with a Tight Schedule
There are so many things fighting for your time. However, it is essential to make time for cooking healthy meals, even if you believe you don’t have the time. If you’re finding it hard to set boundaries with work so you can have free-time at home, check out this article here.
Above, I just listed 5 tips to help you cook healthy meals with a tight schedule. Planning and bulk prepping meals for the week are both important steps in building up a habit of cooking meals at home. If you want to work smarter and not harder, then tips #2 and #5 can help you do just that.
If you can’t seem to find the time to cook your own healthy meals, you may want to consider working with me. Or, if you know what you need to do but can’t seem to stick to meal planning and prepping, you may find it helpful to get some accountability and extra help.
Now I want to hear from you in the comments below… What tips do you have on how to cook healthy meals with a tight schedule?