7 Meal Prep Hacks That Will Save You Time AND Money

motherhood and health. I'm your host, Steph Pace, and I'm the woman behind Just Another Mummy blog and also the founder of Steph Pace Planners. But I can assure you this is not just another podcast online. I'm known for my organization tips and tricks and the occasional banter, but it definitely wasn't always this way. I used to be a hot mess and occasionally still am. And I'm here as your honest and real friend each week to show you how I turn my life of chaos into clarity.

Between the house, health, kids, work, and wanting to be the best version of yourself, it can be overwhelming, and I'm here to give you the tools and tips to stop you feeling like a slave to your daily tasks, home life, and especially the expectations you have on yourself. Join me as I share my journey and insights into the art of balancing at all and speak to guests

who can help us all live a better life. Whether you're looking to streamline your daily routines, boosh your wellbeing, achieve your fitness goals, dive into personal development, or find inspiration to step up into the best version of yourself, We've got you. So are you ready to step up your game? Let's go. Hello, guys, and welcome back to Stepping Up. I'm so pumped for today's episode because this is one thing that you guys ask me about daily, and it's also one of the things that can be

the toughest. And this is all about meal prep. And this is literally something I'm just so passionate about because if you guys remember my story, if you didn't know, I've been on this huge health journey over twelve years now. I used to not know how to be healthy whatsoever. I literally was a girl that ate noodle box for breakfast.

I put on twenty five kilos in a year. And it's not about the way which we know, but I was very, very unhealthy, and I did know where to start and I always found that, you know, I would try to eat healthy and I didn't know what to eat,

and then I would always get stuck. And then on the flip side of that, I feel like meal prep is a big one for people because everyone is so busy and we all hate where you get home from work or after a big day, you don't know what you're having, There's nothing in the fridge, and there's nothing worse than having to do a million Woolies trips in the evening and the kids are screaming for dinner and everything is a shit show. We're not doing that anymore.

So how to meal plan, meal prep all those things is one of the biggest things I get asked about. And again I used to not know anything about it. I used to live on takeaway and now it is literally the thing that has enabled me to be healthy for the last twelve years and save money and be organized and be able to actually have a life. So

that's what we're talking about in today's episode. I'm giving you the seven tips slash steps that you need to do to meal prep, meal plan all the things and that will allow you to save money, stop running around like a bloody stray Cat, I don't know what to say. You know someone that just like a hot mess, you don't know what you're gonna have for dinner. It's going to help your whole family, it's going to help you,

and it's just going to change your life. So make sure you listen through the whole episode because at the end, I'm also giving you the hack that will make sure that you actually eat the food that you make and also your family and actually get your family to eat healthier as well. So excited. But before I get into it, I'm gonna do a bit of a life update. So the new house that we're building, we're probably moving in in another two months. It's just taking its time. You know,

it is what it is. But I need to tell you the funniest story, and it's happened a couple or a few weeks ago now. But Ryan went to the block because if you guys don't know, we're building the house iself. Ryan is a builder. He's wrapping up soon to work for me, but we're building the house. Anyway, he went there, he went to the site. We're at lock up stage now, so we just had like he opened the back doors. He was on the phone and he came back into the main like living area, and

in there was like six baby goats. I'm not even joking. They were just just walking around, just checking it out, thinking it was an open house, just having a look. And Ryan was like literally thought he was on something. He was like, what the what the fuck is happening? And even one went down the stairs and they were like looking around downstairs and there was his random goats. Like where we live there is a bit of farm land,

but it was just the most random thing. And then he had to like try and get them out, and it was just so funny. Like I just couldn't believe when he sent me the photo. There's no context. I was so so confused, and I posted it on Instagram and you guys thought we were full of shit and that Ryan photo shopped it. And Ryan couldn't photoshop it to save his life. But yeah, so that's a good time. So they actually came from like the neighbors up the back, I think, but they're super cute so I kind of

want to keep them. But anyways, they had a good look. I think they approved of the house. They like the plans. Barry the goat was really impressed by the kitchen. So yeah, that's what happened. Anyways, let's get into it because this episode is going to change your life, all right. First step you want to do is schedule a time to meal plan and scheduling in time to meal prep. I used to do all of that in one day, and for me it does take time. It does take time.

So now what I like to do is on Friday morning, I will do my meal planning, so plan at the meals which you'll get into, and then i'd like order my groceries and then they come that day all the next day and then our meal prep. So it's like broken up into a couple of days, so I'm not doing everything in one day. Some people do like to smash it out in a day. I used to do that. Now that the girls are older and they don't do naps like, I like to just do parts of it

over like three days. So it really does depend on your situation or what you prefer. If you'd rather just do it all, they can go for it. So main point with this is scheduling a time for when you're going to do these things. Step two, before you even meal plan, before you even think about what you're going to eat for dinner or breakfast or lunch or snacks. Is I want you to shop your freezer and pantry now. I want you to physically go through your freezer and

pantry and see what you've already got. And this is how you're going to save so much money. Now, how many times have you guys? I know we have guilty We've gone and book like mince meat and we've already got bloody three mince meats in the freezer. So you want to see what you've got. What meals can you make from what you've already got. It's gonna save money. You're going to make sure you're not wasting food. Look in your pantries. If you've got rice already, if you've

got pasta, what can you make with that? So grab your SPP notebook, write it down, see what you've already got. Step three is now we're going to meal plan now that we've scheduled in our times, we've shopped our freezer and our pantry, and we already know some basis of what we can use. We know, okay, we've got heaps of rice, we've got pasta, we've got some mince, all of some chicken drumsticks in there. We need to use these up. Now, what meals are you going to make?

My biggest tip with meal planning is to actually have it physically, visually in front of you and the whole family. So that's why I made my SPP fridge magnets. Their life changing. They look beautiful. You can have an ongoing running shopping list next to it, which I'll get into later as well. I have a whole system, guys. It's a full system and it makes life easy and that's why I make these products. So say, if we're having spaghetti, I'm still at work, I'm still running around ryanker home,

and you can say, oh, we're having spaghetti. He can cook it. He's got your hands off your go love. It's all about being a team. So that's the first thing. Now, I want you to remember that on the days you're really busy, those are the days you want your dinners to be the easiest. You either want to make extra the night before and then you just heat it up and eat it. You're gonna have ready made meals. You're gonna have something that's super quick and easy to chuck together.

So for us, Mondays and Tuesdays are crazy. We always just make sure we have leftovers from the Sunday night or something super easy. So just be aware of your schedules, especially if you've got kids sports after school. Maybe have things already prepped so you can just chuck it in the microwave. Now, I want you to know when you were doing your meal plan. Obviously you write it's like Monday to Sunday and you write down your meals. Some people think that this means you have to eat it

on that night. That is definitely not the case where you will switch things up. How many times will you like, plan to eat something and you go to make it and you're like, I don't feel like it now. So that's why it's good to ensure when you are buying the ingredients and things to have a bit of leeway with the dates and if there is safe For example,

I don't say steak one night. I'll actually write on my magnet the expiring date of the steak on them unless you just chuck it in the freezer, so I know, okay, like I've put it in for Monday to have steak, but I don't feel like it. But it goes out a date on Thursday. So I've still got some days so you can mix a match, mix up your meals. It doesn't mean you have to eat it on Monday. You can have it on Tuesday as long as you've got the ingredients for it and you've got it prepped.

It does not matter. You don't have to stick to it one hundred percent. Remember we're not making big elaborate roasts on a Monday when everyone's running around like a crazy person. Save the more intricate meals for days where you have the time. So really look at your days in your planner. And also, one thing I love to do on my fridge magnets is I'll put in red when I need to take things out of the freezer. There's nothing worse than when you go to cook something

and things are still frozen. So I actually write on my magnet the night before when to take meat out. I do actually have a discount code for you guys for all my staff based planner items. It's stepping up and you get fifteen percent off, So you guys can use that all right, So step four create a list. So now we've scheduled in time, shopped your freezer and your pantry we've done your meal plan. Now we go

to create our shopping list. With the shopping list I made again, I'd done it in categories because it makes it a lot easier. So when I'm at the shops, if I decide to go to the shops, I am not running around like a mad person. There's nothing worse when you put in all the items you need to buy and it's in a random order, and then you go to the fruit aisle and then you're back over here, and then you're running around and it just wastes time.

So I did that, and I also put like a budget at the bottom of our shopping list, which, let's be honest these days is so hot, so that's why we're shopping our freezer. Another really good hack for this is if you do shop online. We shop on Woolies online a lot of the time. You can actually make lists in there. So I'll have a list for our weekly groceries, so items that we literally will buy every week, even down to the quantities. I'll have it in a list in the Woolies website. And I also have a

fortnightly one and a monthly one. So in the monthly one, there's more things like house cleaning products and things that we don't have to get as often fortnightly. These things again like we don't need to get every single week. And if you have them already made lists on the website, I'm sure Coals and all that probably do it too. You literally just click it and then it goes into your cart, or at least I use it as inspa when I actually want to go to the grocery store

and I write it on my shopping list. Best tip, we actually used to own a on site van at a caravan park. I even had a list for that, so every time we would go down there, I would use the same list for just when we're going away. So it's so so good. So if you've got like babies and little ones, you can have separate lists for everything. It's so so clever. Well, if I do say so myself. Now, this isn't just a list of your shopping list and things like that. I want you to keep a running

list throughout the week. So as I said, when I magnet, I've got the shopping list with the meal planner, and as you run out of things, you write them on the magnet. You write it down, because then you know, because there's nothing worse when you go to do your shopping list and you forgot that you run out of toilet paper, and you go there and you come back and everyone's stuck on the toilet. You know what I mean? Why did I say that? I say the weirdest shit

on this podcast, honestly. All right, Now, Step five is about actual meal prep. Now, there's a couple of ways you can do this. You can batch cook things like pasta. You can do casseroles, pasta bakes, lasagna, curries, even I love to do big like Keisha's and I cut it up and have it for lunches as well. I really like to batch cook snacks. So my stuff paste clean treats. If you guys don't know, I've got my own range of clean treats with more life. I'll batch cook the muffins.

I'll just do like boiled eggs as a snack. Anything that can be like a snack you can wrap all together. I usually like to keep those things in the fridge for about three days. Anymore, I'll freeze it. That's kind of my rule. Obviously I'm not a professional, but that's just what I do. So three days in the fridge anymore, I'll freeze it. But if you're someone who likes to kind of mix it up a bit more like myself, I actually like to cook components of meals. So one

big one I do is cooking protein. So I like to chuck in chicken breast in a slow cooker with chicken stock, and then I shred it up after I cook it for like eight hours, and then you've got chicken ready for sturf fries. You got it for sandwiches, you got it for wraps with the kids, for anything. Also my Mexican beef, which I think I've got the recipe on my blog. I'll have to find it for you guys. I cook that up and then you can have that as tacos, burrito bowl, anything even down to

like meatballs. There's so many different things you can do. So I like to actually cook components of meals, which actually leads me to my next point, the wash and chops. This is where I will literally prep again components of meals,

and this is more about fruit and veg. Now you've possibly made up some pastas for the kids, which is really really handy, made up maybe for Tata kishe whatever, you've cooked some slow cooked beef, You've got your boiled eggs and your healthy muffins and all that ready to go. You can even batch cook things like pasta sauce and then you freeze it into ice cubes and then you can just give it to the kids with their pasta. Easy done. All right. So now number six is your

wash and chop. So this is when you get home and you wash all your fruit and veggies. We chuck it all in there with white vinegar. We rinse it off. I pre chop it because yes, you can just leave it, but the chances are during the week you're going to be busy, and again there's nothing worse than having to chop up a million things and then you're cooking as well. Even when the kids were little, I would pre chop

like strawberries and stuff. Now I don't do that anymore. Again, it depends on the fruit, but I like will pre chop our roast veggies, so our like sweet potato, onion, white potato, carrot, and the hardy vegetables you will find. Depending agap from like the batch you get and what container you store it in, it will actually last you like four or five days not always the majority of the time, they last ages. And I will talk about

containers in a minute. So pre chopping everything, so when you get home, Hey, you've already got that component of meat that you cooked. You got your slaw cooked beef, chock it on a plate. You've got your roast veggies that already pre chopped. Chuck it in the air fryer and you're done. You sort it so good. Now I'm going to talk about storage, so fridge organization and containers

and like how to actually store this stuff. This is such a big question, and I get because I know there's nothing worse when you like cook things, and you know, especially if fruit and vege, they can spoil pretty quickly. So I use the little label coat containers and they're amazing because they do keep your fruit and vege lasting longer. God, you know you're old when you're doing a podcast on bloody containers for your fridge. Jesus, Steph, what's happened to you?

Used to be so fun. Anyway, I do have a discount coach for a littlelabel co pop it in the show. Notes to you guys, Now, some little tips to make certain things last longer. If you're pre chopping your carrots. I personally am lazy and I like to pay an extra two dollars and I'll buy their carrot sticks. And then you don't have to store them in water, which I'm about to tell you, but if you pre chop things like carrot and stuff, store them in a jar

in water and they'll last longer. Same if you buy fresh herbs, pop it in a little jar of water, it will last a lot longer. There's so many reasons why I love some good fridge porn. You guys are sure if you're listening to this podcast you've seen my fridge. She's pretty beautiful. Clear containers. Everything just looks gorgeous. But there's a few reasons why I do this. Number One, you at least get to wash your fruit and veg and that's done. Number Two, you have it chopped and

prepped and ready to go. Number Three, by using these clear containers, they are not only going to last longer, they're on display. And this means that when you go to your fridge, you are not going to be ruffling through and trying to find things at the back. And how many times have you guys bought things? It's been shoved at the back of the fridge and you forget about it, and then it gets out of date, and

because you don't know it's there. It's the same with like I love pantry organization, because all this shit goes up the back. You've got twenty curry powders, and you keep buying more, you keep bringing them home. We're not doing that anymore. So that is why. Because it's like at a restaurant, if they bring out a plate of food that looks like a piece of shit, it probably tastes cool, but it looks like a piece of shit, You're not gonna eat it. You're not gonna want to

eat it. But if they bring it out it looks really nicely, it's on display. They've done the little parsley, put like flowers and shit on it. It was good, you want to eat it. It's the same with the fridge. So if you have all your fruit and veg all nicely displayed in containers, guess who else is going to eat it? Instead of eating chips? Your children, My kids now will just go in there and grab carrot sticks and baby cucumbers and eat it. Because if it's out

of sight, it's out of mind. So if you can't see it, and if you have to do the process of having to prep anything like carrot sticks and that you're not gonna eat it. You're not gonna grab some homess and have it as a snack. So if things are prepped, even down to the eggs, I will usually peel boiled eggs as well, and then I can just grab it and eat it. Now, one thing I want to say is you are not a bad person or a bad mum. If you're not making all these wholesome

foods with one hundred ingredients. It's I'm not about that life. I'm about convenience. I literally will do the easiest recipes on the planet, especially lately, guys, my life's been a hot mess with work. We will chuck nuggets in the air fry and get them some like carrots and fruit. It's fine, that is normal. You're a normal human for doing that. I'm not saying you have to make everything from scratch. This is just how to make things easier. I do actually have a really good a recipe e

book and the ingredients, and they're really super easy. I'm not someone who likes to add on a million steps. I will do it the easiest way. And that's why. Like with my Mexican beef that I make in the slow cooker, it is literally beef packet of taco seasoning because I can't be bothered to mix four different types of spices together, and I chuck it in with like dice tomato and a bit of water and I'm done. That is it, and that's healthy. That's done. You want

to make it easy for yourself. You don't have to make your own bone broth, you don't have to make your own bloody pestro if you don't want to, just do what works for you and your family, and don't be scared to try pre made meal kits. There's been so many times Ryan and I over the years we've used ones where you chuck in the microwave and we just eat that for dinner. That's fine. Just do what works for you. It's not about being perfect. It's about

making your life easy. Yeah, it's about trying to save money as well, and you not having to run around to woolies during the week. Now, just a little recap to remind you. Make sure you do say this episode because this is literally just like the best framework ever. But Okay, the seven steps we're going to go through is step one schedule time to meal prep and plan. Step two is to shop your freezer and pantry. Step three is to meal plan based off of what's in

your pantry and your freezer. So do your meal planning. Next step is creating your lists, so your shopping list based off your meal plan and what you've got. And then you're going to be meal prepping. So you're gonna be meal prepping components, batch cooking your snacks, whatever floats your boat, your wash and chops. So we're going to get our veggies and fruit prepped up and in their cute containers. And then the last step is having your

fridge organization and containers and in the fridge. Also, this is the best bloody Hacker came up with. I feel I have a used me first shelf in our fridge. You know, when you open up packets of deli meat or anything that's about to go well, I will pop that in this shelf that's on the door of the fridge. I've labeled and it says use me first, so everyone in the family knows that they have to use that first before they maybe open another packet. Or go for

something else. Best hack ever, I literally have labels on everything. I would label Ryan if he stood still for long enough. Anyways, guys, I hope this helped. I will link everything I said in the show notes below if you didn't realize I have heaps of recipes on my blog. I've got my recipe e book as well, that's got heaps of stuff in there. I've got so much content for you guys. I actually need to refresh my blog asap because now I'm no longer just another mummy blog, thank god, I'm

just steff Pace old regular staff pace. But yes, please don't forget to subscribe and follow my podcast. It helps me keep doing what I'm doing and bringing out all this stuff. I've got so much good stuff coming up for you guys, heaps of freebies. And also don't forget to grab your discount code from my brand, staph Faced Planners with all these meal planning goodies. The code is stepping up for fifteen percent off, so make sure you jump on that and I'll see you guys on Monday. Bye,

love you. Thank you guys so much for tuning in today's episode of Stepping Up. I don't want this to be just another podcast that you listen to, you get inspiration and then you don't take action. If there's been something in this episode that will help you step up into the best version of yourself, open up your trusted plan out and make a plan. And if you've loved listening to today's episode, take a screenshot and show me

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