A Beginners Guide to Meal Prepping with Ready-Wrap

Several years ago, one of my good friends gifted me with a book called The Five Love Languages. The love languages describe the way we feel loved and appreciated. Acts of service is my primary love language. I express my love for my family by preparing home-cooked meals that require a great deal of my time and effort. 

But honestly, no matter what your love language is, food is often the way to someone’s heart. While I try to serve good food everyday as a matter of habit, it is a challenge to do so without spending a lot. It’s an exercise in creativity to prepare a good meal that is also healthy and without being extravagant. I try my best to indulge them with weekend feasts, where I try out new and elaborate recipes. But for everyday fare, I have a list of comfort food that’s quick and easy to prepare.

It warms my heart and makes me feel appreciated when my own kids tell me that they feel a sense of pride that I take the trouble of making sure that my family is well-fed. I’m lucky that I have the luxury of time to cook for my family. That cooking is something that I do quite well, and something I really enjoy doing. I appreciate it when my kids come home from school and announce that their classmates tried their baon and loved it. I guess my secondary love language is words of affirmation? Hahaha!

Taco Salad in a cup is an easy baon to make in advance. I love it because it's a great mix of protein and vegetables. You can make it the day/night before and keep in the ref. Just keep nachos in a separate container so it doesn't get soggy.  

My kids tell me that classmates would ask them what they have for recess, way before it actually happens. Recess has become an anticipated time of the day for some classmates because of their baon. In fact, there are times that I pack extra so that they can share more.

You don’t have to be a master chef to prepare meals for your family. You just need to set aside a couple of hours to focus on it, and then you’re done! I always feel like it makes my week go so much smoother when I know that there are snacks in the ref that are ready to grab, and meals are planned and prepared.

Here are some tips for beginners on how to meal prep:

1. As soon as I get home from grocery shopping, leafy greens for the salad are washed, dried and stored with paper towels in reusable plastic containers.

If you have picky kids, one way to incorporate vegetables into their meal is by adding them into a colorful and flavorful taco salad

2. Fruits are prepped and stored in individual containers so they are easily accessible as a healthy snack.

The colorful fruit cups make healthy snacking fun!

3. I still indulge their sweet tooth once in a while, but I keep them in appropriately sized containers. I find that this really helps with portion control! This makes it also really handy to put them in the kids lunch boxes for school baon.

The cookie butter no-bake cheesecake is a big hit with the friends of my kids. 

My daughter posted this in her stories while we were making it 

and she was swamped with DMs asking her to bring some to school.

4. I make enough for 2 (or 3) meals. Leftovers - either you hate it or you love it! I obviously love it! You prepare one time and it takes you through several meals. This means that sometimes what's for dinner tonight is also the lunch baon tomorrow. 

5. I portion out meat into single serving sizes that will stack in my freezer. 

There are quite a few groceries that allows you to bring your own reusable plastic containers

 to store your meat purchase. 

These are just the right size for 250-350 grams of pang-gisa (liempo strips, lomo strips or giniling).
 I make sure that my raw meat containers are for the exclusive use of storing raw meat. 
For safety and hygiene reasons, I don't like mixing containers.

They are already color coded so even if I don't label them, I already know what's inside.

 Not only do I not add to the plastic waste, I also get the benefit of having an organized freezer.

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Purchasing the right containers for your food is very important. Whether you're on a quest to prevent food waste or you simply want to store prepared food or to transport baon, reusable ReadyWrap plastic containers can do the job. 

Why I prefer to use Ready-Wrap:
1. Made of 100% food-grade virgin resin. It's made of high quality plastic so it's safe for food usage and hygienic.

2. Freezer safe. The Freezer-Ready containers doesn't crack easily when frozen and is twice as durable than other brands.

3. Microwave safe. We don't really use the microwave in my kitchen, but if you do, then you can safely use Ready-Wrap containers to reheat. 

4. Smartly designed. Space in the fridge is a commodity so buying containers that stack and don’t take up any more room than they have to is essential in having an organized ref/freezer

5. Multi-purpose. Ready-Wrap is a useful storage container even for non-food. I've used it to store the lab materials of my kids, art materials, bento materials. You name it.

To know more about READY-WRAP: 

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