Meal Prep Recipes
Our best Meal Prep Recipes to get you through the week, plus meal prep and meal planning 101 tips! All vegetarian!
Hello friend, if you’re wondering if this post is for you, it definitely is. Maybe you’re curious about starting meal prep, or you want to get better at it, or you just need some new recipes. No matter what position you’re at in life, meal prep is definitely for you. I wanted to share my fav meal prep recipes with you. They are all vegetarian and gluten free, so feel free to customise to your liking. Best of all, they are ALL filling (yes!!). I also threw in a great dessert for you (double yes!!) read on for the recipes and some of my fav meal prep tips and tricks.
WHAT IS MEAL PREP?
So what exactly is meal prep/meal planning? It’s when you prepare your meals in advance, be it a week or even a month ahead of time. This could be preparing anything from full on recipes or sticking to prepping your veggies, proteins and carbs for your meals. Jessica in the Kitchen features a lot meal prep recipes. I love making meals ahead of time. Personally, and I know a lot of people who do the same, Sunday is that day that seems to slow down a bit and as such, is the perfect day to meal prep for the week ahead.
Why should you meal prep?
Personally, when I meal prep I feel in CONTROL of my life. It helps me with decision fatigue (one less decision to make). It gets pretty crazy sometimes, and I hate to say it but I often miss meals because I just don’t know what to eat, or the thought of going to prepare a full on meal when I only have an hour to do so is so daunting.
Other reasons for you may include sticking to certain eating lifestyle. Maybe you’re just so tired when you come home from work that it’s so much easier to order a pizza than cook a meal from scratch. Or, you want to bring lunch to work instead of all buying it. P.S. – I did an entire post on meal prep salad lunches. All of these reasons are why meal planning and prepping steps in to save us. Prepping all your meals/foods ahead means being able to stick to your plan/schedule/manage your crazy lifestyle. It means achieving balance.
Here are the recipes I consider the best meal prep recipes I’ve got. Speaking of, if you need a quick guide/cheat-list as to how to determine whether a recipe will be great for meal prep, use this:
Quick Guide/Cheat-List to choose Meal Prep Recipes
- Has a lot of servings – can easily last days
- Can be easily reheated AND will taste great
- Can be frozen. SO important if you want to prep ahead.
- Will keep fresh for at least a few days in the fridge.
- You can switch up the elements. This is why I adore bowl foods. Don’t be afraid to get creative! Switch out here and there for your fav recipes!
By the way, in my opinion, one of the easiest things to prep are roasted veggies. They go with any protein, last long, taste even better than raw veggies. I’ve included my grilled balsamic veggies but you could easily roast them instead. Enjoy and happy recipes!!
Meal Prep Breakfast Recipes & Snacks
Pumpkin overnight oats
7 Quick & Easy Banana Smoothies
Chocolate Raspberry Baked Oatmeal Cups
Banana Oatmeal Breakfast Cookies
Pumpkin Chocolate Chip Breakfast Cookies
Mexican Breakfast Burritos
Chocolate Peanut Butter Energy Bites
Brownie Energy Bites
Meal Prep Lunches & Dinners Recipes
Loaded Sweet Potato Skins
Roasted or grilled vegetables (PERFECT for sides)
Creamy Coconut Spinach and Mushroom Quinoa
Coconut Chickpea Curry
Quinoa enchilada skillet
Vegan Quinoa Cauliflower Burgers
Black Bean & Quinoa Veggie Burgers
Tropical Quinoa Salad Bowl with BBQ Chickpeas
Nourish Buddha Bowl with Harissa Tahini Dressing
Cuban Quinoa Bowls with Pineapple Salsa
Mediterranean Quinoa Salad Bowl
Fajita Bowl
Chickpea & Beet “Meat” Balls
BONUS – Dessert!
Peanut Butter Cups
You’ll love to always have some of these in your freezer! Let it thaw a bit first before biting in.
BONUS TOPIC: How To Meal Prep and Plan – 5 Steps
- Choose delicious meal prep recipes – see all the yummy recipes above.
- Ensure you have the correct tools. All you really need are the tools to make the dishes, and the correct meal prep containers to store the food in. I use these tupperware containers for products going in the fridge, and these Ball plastic freezer jars for foods going into the freezer (the shape works for pretty much anything). You can also use zipped freezer safe bags for freezer items, such as the burritos.
- Make it easy for yourself – prep on a light day. If that’s Sunday, do it then, if it’s another day, choose that. Make it customisable for you!
- Cook/bake like products at the same time. Roast similar veggies at the same time in the oven, and if baking something else at that same temperature, stick it in also and just set different timers. Put foil or silicone mats on baking sheets for easy clean up. Also, if you’re doing it week by week (I recommend) choose recipes with similar products to save on expenses and to make life easier. For example, the coconut chickpea curry, spinach and quinoa skillet, quinoa enchilada skillet and the chickpea beet meatballs all use a combination of coconut milk, chickpeas and quinoa. This way you get variety, but you aren’t using a ton of different ingredients.
- Lastly – eat! Ensure to eat meals with the freshest ingredients first to avoid waste and to ensure you get the full nutritional value.
My Fav Meal Prep Recipes Products
If you try any of these, or have any more questions, definitely ask and let me know! Happy Meal Prepping and Eating! Please let me know in the comment section below, or tag me on instagram with the hashtag #jessicainthekitchen! For more exclusive recipes follow me on Instagram AND on Snapchat: jessinkitchen.
I love to make roasted veggies! Actually just roasted some carrots, cauliflowers and leeks 🙂 I think it’s more than 2 kg and all for me (the man in the house only eat salads, and never touch the COOKED veggies)
Hi Angie,
Oh wow, NICE!! I love roasted cauliflower so much and all the others sound divine too! ALL those yummy veggies just for you 😀 heaven!
This is such a great post, Jessica! I need to start meal prepping more…it will help me make better decisions when lunchtime hits. And I love your tips for prepping, too. And your recipes…YUM! Those oatmeal cups are calling my name!
Thanks so much Gayle!! It’s crazy how much meal prep helps!!
So many awesome tips and yummy recipes! I love meal prepping – such a lifesaver especially with little ones! I can’t wait to add so many of these to our next prep session – the pretty smoothies and oatmeal cups are calling my name!!
Thanks so much Kelly!! We are prepping some of these tomorrow too. 🙂
BTW, my husband just put one of your recipes from your cookbook in the slow cooker – hoping to share a picture with you tomorrow! 😀 He is in love with your cookbook – he loves Asian food and is happy to make it at home with real authentic recipes and said it has helped him to realise just how much he loves ALL sorts of Asian food, not just Chinese fast food. So, thanks friend!!
Hi Jessica, I love your site! I’m using your salad in a jar recipes and enjoying them to the max! I have a question in which I’ll try to keep it short-ish. I’m an at home foodie, that as my sister says, is high maintance. (Uh oh! Really? ) My issue is that I struggle to eat the same meal or type of food twice in one week. So my challenge is how to do a food prep for each week cuz to buy groceries in such a small quantity and “prep ( cook) for one- everything different-still on a diet” is challenging. Do you have any suggestions? I feel like I’ve tried everything from slow cooker freezer to “lean cuisine is on sale” (eww) to pressure cooker quicks, to just give it away cuz I’m not gonna eat it. I mean should I just shut up and eat green beans and brown rice??? I’m Blessed to have food on my table and I feel selfish for wanting something different each day but I guess that’s another story! thank you so much for your help. In light, love and a dash of laughter, Isis.
Hi Isis!
I’m so glad you’re enjoying my salad jar recipes!! So, I love making dishes that can handle larger quantities! Things like the chickpea curry that’s linked in this post, can be tripled! Making things like lentil soups, roasted sweet potatoes, grilled balsamic veggies and veggie burgers are great too. Basically, things that FREEZE well. That way you always have food in the house. You can prep for a whole week at a time, and swap things out too! Pancakes and waffles are great for breakfasts because you can just toast them straight from the freezer for the next morning. That way it isn’t really pressure cooker, or slow cooker type stuff, but meals that taste nice and fresh daily without overdoing the quantity. For a week for example, I would double the chickpea curry, make a set of veggie burgers, and make a Thai green curry. That will split into your dinners for the week, with leftovers for lunch. Then I would make a batch of pancakes for breakfast + waffles, and those can be portioned out throughout the week. That way it isn’t a crazy amount of food, and just ONE day of prepping for everything.
Did I help? I sure hope so! It’s really just looking at how much the recipe makes and planning accordingly! I’ll be doing meal prep posts very soon so you can also check those out since I’ll be doing that part for you!
Let me know if you have any other questions Isis! Light, love and laughter to you too!
Great post Jessica! This is really helpful to me!??