5 Food Prep Tips for a Busy Working-Parent Household

Tiffany Sauder [00:00:01]:

Welcome to Scared Confident. I'm your host, Tiffany Sauder. I hope this episode finds you having an awesome day. It has been a bonkers day for me. One of those where, like, I think I've somehow worn every possible hat known to mankind. Like, I'm like a human ping pong ball. And so in days like this, it can be so hard to be like, what is everybody going to eat, and how am I going to feed them? And so I actually have food to feed the people, and I thought I would just pull out, like, five. Oh, my word.

‍

Tiffany Sauder [00:00:37]:

I can't even talk. Five food prep tips. They kind of help me stay sane so that when weeks like this happen, I'm, like, ready, and it's like, no problem. I mean, it's sometimes a problem, but not really. So because I feel like I know how to get ahead of, I'm gonna give you my tips that I do. Okay. One is that I make a crock pot of chicken breasts every week. You can also use pressure cooker.

‍

Tiffany Sauder [00:01:03]:

For some reason, I just like the crock pot better. I do use my pressure cooker sometimes, and it does just as good of a job. And, yes, it is shorter, but there's something about, like, I can plug it in and be gone for five or 6 hours. That is helpful to me. But you can also do it after work in a pressure cooker and throw a bunch of chicken breasts in the. And something to give it some flavor. I'm usually just doing, like, salt, pepper, some paprika, like, kind of make it neutral, flavorful, but not, like, asian y or something. And then I can use it in different ways.

‍

Tiffany Sauder [00:01:31]:

So I always make a crock pot of chicken. If we have good, ready, lean protein, I can always make a wrap. I can make a barbecue chicken sandwich. I can make a pizza on a naan bread. I can make a bowl with some rice. I can heat up a sweet potato. The microwave and throw a bunch of shredded chicken on it and put some, like, hot sauce. Like, if I have protein, I can do a lot of things really, really quickly.

‍

Tiffany Sauder [00:01:54]:

That's what I found. And so literally crock pot of chicken. The girls make chicken quesadillas on, like, hard repeat. So I would rather eat that than chicken nuggets. Like, that doesn't really do that well. And I like rotisserie chickens, but they get dry, and then they have a lot of dark meat, and the girls don't really eat the dark meat that well. And so just chicken breasts, like, repeat four to six chicken breasts lasts us a whole week. And we are eaters.

‍

Tiffany Sauder [00:02:20]:

So I'm here. I'm on the chicken breast train Sunday after church. Sometimes I'll put them on and then I'll be done, like, by after dinner. Sometimes I'll put it on in the morning and then have my nanny, like, shut it off just after lunch. Just keep it all warm. It'll be fine till you get home. You know what I mean? So anyways, I do that literally almost every week have shredded chicken and a little tip my sister in law taught me. If you put, like, a half a block of cream cheese into your hot shredded chicken, it is delicious.

‍

Tiffany Sauder [00:02:54]:

It's like a little treat. It's so good. So sometimes I just treat it up and we do that. So shredded chicken, I can do so many things. The kids can eat it in lots of different ways. I have been known to sometimes just, like, grab a fork and eat it cold out of the fridge, which is gross, but in a pinch, it makes me feel amazing. Okay, the second thing is prepping your fruits and veggies and throwing them in clear containers. Again, this is usually a weekend activity for us.

‍

Tiffany Sauder [00:03:21]:

I get the whole fam jam included. Not junior, but my girls all love being in the kitchen and knife skills. But I'll prep all of our fruits and veggies. So, like, literally half a head of purple cabbage. Shred it, don't cut cucumbers. They don't stay very good very long. But cabbage, radishes, pods, shredded carrots, cilantro, all that kind of stuff, I'll just chop it all up and put it in like, a big eight cup tupperware that has a clear bottom and put it in the fridge, and the girls will use it for salads. We'll throw it in some of our shredded chicken into, like, a wrap.

‍

Tiffany Sauder [00:03:58]:

You can use it in lots of different ways. I'll just, like, munch on it. So that is like a way that we just eat tons of produce. Oh, peppers. If you use like, a mandolin and shred those. So literally, I mean, 340 out of 352 days in a year. If you open our fridge, you're going to see a big thing of prepped veggies and prepped fruit. Same thing with fruit.

‍

Tiffany Sauder [00:04:21]:

And also, you probably know this, but if you line the bottom of your tupperware with paper towel, it will absorb the extra moisture and it will stay better longer. Your produce will because obviously have to wash it, but if you wash it, it'll do that. So prep berries. Pull grapes off of stems. My girls eat, like, pears and apples and all that stuff pretty, like, just whole. They'll just eat it, like, grab it and go. But sometimes I'll prep some of that stuff, too. So anyway, the way that we eat just a ton of produce, I find if everything is in the bag that we brought it home from the grocery store on, they don't eat it, like, hardly at all.

‍

Tiffany Sauder [00:04:56]:

Number three, make double and freeze the extra. So I like, when I have a little bit of time to make something like chili or curry or enchiladas or meatballs, I will just double the recipe and freeze the extra one so that in weeks like this, I have, like, meatballs and korean beef and enchiladas and stuff that I can pull out of the freezer and just, like, rock and roll. Or if I'm traveling, then I'll have stuff that's made ahead that they can pull out of the freezer or that a sitter can do. So just double up. It's like, I don't know, 10% more work to make twice as much. It's, like, pretty much the same amount of energy. So that is one of my hacks. And that way on weeks that are nuts or that I can't think or that I got behind or something went wrong, then I have things to pull out of freezer, so just make two.

‍

Tiffany Sauder [00:05:46]:

So easy. The other hacks that I do is freeze your protein in a marinade. So if you get, like, flank steak or a big, like, Costco has awesome, huge flank steak, they have awesome, big salmon filets. You can get, obviously, like, all those bags of chicken breasts. Freeze it and marinade. So you can make your own, or you can go to Trader Joe's and buy your favorite ones. But literally, like, unpack your big filet of salmon. I'll, like, hack it in half, and half of it will eat this week, and then half of it I'll freeze, and I'll pour, like, that soyaki marinade on it.

‍

Tiffany Sauder [00:06:23]:

And so I'll just put it in the ziploc bag, zip it up, obviously, and throw it in the freezer. And so then when I get it out to thaw, while the protein is thawing, it's also marinating. So then, like, by dinner time, when I throw it on the grill or in the oven or whatever the thing is, it's already, and it tastes so good. It's, like, deliciously marinated. So I do that with flank steak, I do that with salmon, and I do that with chicken breasts. Chicken thighs would be another one that would be really good. It would marinate really really well. We don't do a lot of pork.

‍

Tiffany Sauder [00:06:50]:

I don't know why. I just don't buy it that much. But those are the things just freeze your protein in a marinade. So when you pull it out, it has, like, a really deep flavor profile. My last tip is buy flavor. So go down, like, the international aisle and buy flavor profiles that are difficult for you to achieve on your own at home. So there's, like, madras curry. There's, like, a amazing canned refried beans.

‍

Tiffany Sauder [00:07:17]:

They're so good. Frontera is one of my favorite flavors. Siete is another really good mexican brand that's, like, all natural. It doesn't have a bunch of additives. So when you're in a hurry, it can be hard to get that, like, simmered all day long. Flavor. And so when I'm not busy, I'll go to the grocery store and buy three or four of some of the flavor profiles that I think we're really gonna enjoy. And then I can quickly be like, okay, have my shredded chicken.

‍

Tiffany Sauder [00:07:44]:

I have this jar of Madras curry that I bought. I'm just going to mix those together. I'm going to heat a packet of rice and, like, put a little fresh cilantro on it, and, like, bada bee, bada boom. That's just going to be dinner. So, anyways, I don't know if this makes any sense in a podcast format, but these are ways that I'm like, try to get good food consistently on the table as fast as possible and kind of give myself a little bit of help on weeks like this, where it's just kind of nuts, you know, just kind of is just how we're rolling. But these weeks can be really fun, too. Anyways, okay, I hope this was helpful. I'll save them again.

‍

Tiffany Sauder [00:08:19]:

Quickly buy flavor. Go to the international aisle and go look at things that have, like, really good, yummy flavor. Indian food, mexican food, asian flavors kind of thing. A crock pot of shredded chicken breasts every week. Yes. Please prep your fruits and veggies and put them in clear containers in the refrigerator. That is because when people open the fridge, we eat with our eyes. That will be the container that has the most amount of color.

‍

Tiffany Sauder [00:08:44]:

It will be very easy to just be like, oh, this looks good. And that's what they'll eat. I'm telling you, it, like, works. Make double and freeze the extra when there's seasons where you actually do have time to cook and freeze your protein in a marinade. Okay, here's your five food prep tips. Geez, can't say it. Go crush your week. Thanks for listening.

‍

Tiffany Sauder [00:09:06]:

Thank you for joining me on another episode of Scared Confident. Until next time, keep telling fear you will not decide what happens in my life. I will.

‍