Prep Once, Eat All Week
This is not a full meal prep Sunday where you spend four hours batch cooking and portioning 20 containers. This is one hour on Monday evening while you cook dinner, and that single hour sets up the rest of your week so every other dinner comes together faster, easier and with significantly less stress.
The concept is simple. While Monday’s dinner cooks, you prep vegetables, season proteins and marinate meat for the rest of the week. You’re already in the kitchen. The stove is already on. The cutting board is already out. Adding 30 to 40 minutes of prep to your Monday cooking session means Tuesday through Friday dinners take half the time and require almost no thinking. The hardest part of weeknight cooking isn’t the cooking itself. It’s the chopping, the seasoning, the decision-making. This easy prep-session minimises all of that (it can also easily be done on a Sunday if you preferred).
The Monday Prep Session
While Monday’s dinner cooks, you’re doing all of this alongside it:
- Cook extra rice. You’re making rice for tonight’s dinner anyway, add a little more for tomorrow’s dinner. Spread the extra rice on a sheet pan to cool, then refrigerate. This becomes the base for Tuesday’s savory rice and it’s already cooked. Cold rice is actually better for this because it fries and holds its shape rather than turning mushy.
- Prep vegetables for the week. Chop peppers, slice zucchini and prep any other vegetables you’ll need. I don’t personally love prepping onions in advance because I hate how it smells in the fridge but you could add that to this prep too. Store them in airtight containers in the fridge. Prepped vegetables keep for 4 to 5 days and they’re the biggest time saver during the week because the chopping is what slows most dinners down.
- Spatchcock and season tomorrow’s chicken. Remove the backbone, press the chicken flat and rub it with the peri peri marinade. Cover and refrigerate. Tomorrow you just put it in the oven. Zero prep on Tuesday.
- Marinate steak for Friday. Season the steaks and place in a container or zip-lock bag in the freezer. Thaw the steak on Friday morning.
- Total prep time alongside cooking Monday’s dinner: about 40-60 minutes. Most of it is chopping vegetables while you wait for things to simmer.
The 5 Dinners
Monday:Â Butter Chicken Meatballs with Rice
The dinner you’re cooking while you prep. Juicy chicken meatballs browned in a pan, then simmered in a rich, creamy butter chicken sauce made in the same pan. Served over rice. This is the most hands-on dinner of the week because you’re multitasking: cooking dinner and prepping for the week simultaneously. But the meatballs and sauce are straightforward and once everything is simmering, you’ve got 15 minutes of hands-free time to chop, season and marinate.
Tuesday:Â Creamy Peri Peri Spatchcock Chicken with Savory Rice
The chicken was seasoned yesterday so tonight is just cooking. Add some onions to the pan with the chicken and pop it into a hot oven. While it roasts, make a quick creamy peri peri sauce (peri peri sauce, cream, lemon juice, 5 minutes). For the savory rice, sauté a chopped onion with the peppers you prepped on Monday, add frozen corn and stir in the cooked rice from yesterday. The cold rice warms through and picks up all the flavor from the peppers and onion.
Serve family style: pile the rice onto a large platter, add the chicken pieces and pour the peri peri sauce over everything. This might be the best meal of the week.
Time saved by Monday’s prep: No spatchcocking, no marinating, no chopping peppers, no cooking rice from scratch. You’ve saved about 40 minutes.
Wednesday:Â Spaghetti alla Nerano
The zucchini was sliced on Monday so tonight is as simple as sautéing it in a pan while the pasta boils. Spaghetti alla Nerano is Stanley Tucci’s favorite pasta and once you make it, you’ll understand why. It’s deceptively simple: sautéed zucchini tossed with pasta, a mountain of parmesan and a few fresh basil leaves. The parmesan melts into the hot pasta and creates a creamy, savory sauce that clings to every strand. Finish with basil and serve.
Time saved by Monday’s prep: No slicing zucchini. A small saving but on a Wednesday when energy is low, even 10 minutes of prep you don’t have to do makes a difference.
Thursday: Indian-Spiced Lamb Chops with Cucumber Salad
The fastest dinner of the week. Season the lamb chops generously with spices and air fry until perfectly cooked. While they’re in the air fryer (about 10 to 12 minutes), make a quick cucumber salad: sliced cucumber, red onion, a splash of vinegar, salt and whatever herbs you have. That’s dinner. No prep from Monday needed for this one because it’s already such a quick meal.
Friday: Grilled Steak with Air Fryer Baked Potatoes
The steaks have been marinating since Monday so they’re deeply seasoned and tender. Thaw them during the day. Get the potatoes going in the air fryer and grill the steaks alongside any leftover zucchini from earlier in the week. Split the potatoes and load with an obscene amount of butter. Friday dinner, sorted.
Time saved by Monday’s prep: No marinating, no seasoning, no decision about what to cook. The steaks are ready and the plan was made four days ago.
Why This Approach Works
- You’re already in the kitchen. The prep happens alongside Monday’s dinner, not as a separate session. You’re not dedicating a Sunday afternoon to meal prep. You’re just extending Monday’s cooking time by 30 to 40 minutes while things simmer.
- The proteins are prepped, not cooked. This isn’t batch cooking where you eat reheated food all week. The chicken is seasoned but roasted fresh on Tuesday. The steaks are marinated but grilled fresh on Friday. The prep just removes the tedious, time-consuming steps.
- The vegetables are chopped, not cooked. Prepped raw vegetables in containers keep for 4 to 5 days and they go into whatever you’re cooking that night. The freshness is preserved, the flavor is preserved and the only thing you’ve eliminated is the 10 to 15 minutes of chopping on each night.
- The rice is a leftover on purpose. The cold rice actually works better for the savory rice because it holds its shape and fries rather than clumping.
- Each dinner still feels like a proper meal. Butter chicken meatballs, a whole roasted peri peri chicken, a Tuscan pasta, lamb chops and grilled steak. None of these feel like meal prep food which is intentional because our family can’t eat the same thing four days in a row.