Vegan Meal Prep Ideas For The Week It does not have to be a burden to consume home-cooked meals during the whole week. You may save time on those hectic days by preparing these straightforward meals in advance. This list has suggestions for breakfast, lunch, and snacks, among other things.
Vegan Meal Prep Ideas For The Week
Benefits of Meal Prepping
- Nutrition: If you’re finding yourself hitting up the fast food lines too frequently, you might find you’re lacking some variety and vegetables in your diet. Prepping your meals ahead of time ensures that you’re getting all of your nutrition needs in.
- Save money: Convenience foods are typically more expensive in the long run than buying ingredients at the grocery store. You can usually stretch your dollar and make several meals for the price of what one takeout meal costs.
- Time management: While you will spend more time in the kitchen initially, you will end up saving time on a daily basis. Instead of having to spend half of your lunch break driving to grab lunch, you can just eat or reheat what you’ve premade. You also won’t have to wake up super early to prepare a healthy breakfast if all you need to do is grab and go.
- Reduce food waste: Meal prepping, especially using the same ingredients throughout the week for different meals (like a big batch of rice), will reduce your food waste. Plus, you’ll be less likely to forget what you purchased at the grocery store.
Read also: Insulin Resistance Diet: Benefits, Foods, And Recipes
Meal Prep Containers
Picking the right containers for meal prepping can take some trial and error. Here are my personal favorites:
- Pint jars are the perfect size for overnight oats.
- These 4-ounce containers are great for sauce and salad dressing.
- Glass Snapware is my favorite for storing full meals. The lids snap closed on all 4 sides, making the lid super secure, and you can reheat your food right in the container. If you don’t like to use glass, they also have plastic Snapware.
- For salads, I LOVE my Bentgo stackable container. It keeps the dressing and ingredients separate from each other so your salad doesn’t get soggy.
Ingredient Prepping
One of my favorite ways to meal prep is to simply prepare items. Instead of creating a whole dinner, you prepare select items that may be used to construct a variety of meals. This is ideal for when you don't want to eat the same thing all week or don't have a lot of time to prepare complete meals.
I enjoy preparing the following ingredients:
- Roasted sweet potatoes.
- Baked Tofu.
- Roasted vegetables or diced fresh vegetables.
- Rice Tofu Taco meat.
- Roasted chickpeas.
Just with that list of 6 ingredients, plus sauce or dressing, you could quickly whip up:
- Tofu tacos
- Chickpea tacos
- Tofu and rice bowls with veggies
- Roasted chickpea and sweet potato bowls
- Taco salad with tofu meat, chickpeas, rice, and veggies
- Tofu wraps (like chicken caesar wraps) with lettuce and caesar dressing.
Below, I’ve compiled a list of my favorite vegan meal prep recipes to make meal time easy, nutritious, and super tasty all week.
Read also: Healthy Eating For Beginners: Eating Well Made Easy
Maple Pecan Overnight Oats
Overnight oats are the ideal breakfast recipe for meal prep! In only 5 minutes, you can prepare a nutritious breakfast to grab and go in the morning. This vegan overnight oats dish asks for only six basic ingredients.
I am always thankful to my former self when I have meals ready to go in the fridge. However, preparing dishes ahead of time may be daunting, especially when bulk cooking. While it saves so much time during the week, meal preparation a large amount of food at once might take many hours.
Aside from granola, I mostly make overnight oats for breakfast. They take only a few minutes to prepare, and you may tailor the recipe to your flavor preferences or cravings. Then, refrigerate overnight and you'll have oats ready to eat in the morning.
Vegan Banana Nut Muffins
Vegan Banana Nut Muffins are delightfully moist and naturally sweet, with crunchy walnuts for extra texture. They are an excellent plant-based breakfast to have on the run!
They're even delicious if you reheat them up briefly in the microwave. These muffins have the perfect balance of soft, supple texture and nutty taste for a substantial and pleasant vegan breakfast. These are ideal for school lunches, coupled with a Buffalo Chickpea Salad Sandwich.
Read also: The Scientific Truth About 10 Controversial Foods And Drinks
Carrot Cake Overnight Oats
These carrot cake overnight oats are ideal for busy mornings with little time to spare! This dish is vegan and easy to adapt to your preferences. Looking for a healthy, tasty breakfast on the go? These vegan carrot cake overnight oats are a healthy and delicious way to start the day. Additionally, they have a carrot cake flavor, making them ideal for morning desserts.
Chocolate Peanut Butter Granola
Crunchy and tasty chocolate peanut butter granola for a nutritious breakfast or snack!
Do you enjoy those peanut butter no-bake cookies?Because I do. I have a variation of them on my blog. If I haven't convinced you yet, in a public speaking class in college, we were required to write a demonstrative speech, and I opted to prepare and discuss no-bake cookies. The love is profound.
This chocolate peanut butter granola recipe tastes just like those delicious cookies. Which makes sense because the ingredients are practically the same, only prepared differently. Oats, PB, cocoa powder, vanilla essence, maple syrup or agave, and a pinch of salt.
Read also: A Complete Low-Carb Diet Guide For Beginners
