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How I Meal Prep: 3 Kitchen Essentials

Meal prep for your family more efficiently with my favorite kitchen essentials. From non-toxic cookware, to high-quality meat and safe cleaning products — these are my go-to kitchen essentials for easy, nutritious meals!

Women in her kitchen using her stainless steel caraway cookware set to meal prep for the week. Kitchen essentials.

I love to make easy, nutritious meals for my family. But I don’t love spending hours in the kitchen to meal prep. So I keep it simple, like following this easy 7-day meal prep plan.

Meal prep helps me save time, stay on budget and choose healthier options during busy weeks. I typically spend one hour meal prepping on Sunday so I can sit down and enjoy dinner with my family during the week.

If I don’t have time to meal prep over the weekend, I double batch dinner so we have easy leftovers (and lunch for me the next day)!

After years of meal prepping, I’ve found a few high-quality products that make my meal prep process much easier. An extra large sheet pan for all-in-one meals, a non-stick sauté pan, high-quality meat I can buy in bulk, and non-toxic cleaning products are staples in my home.

Women during her kitchen essentials, branch basics and geometry towels to clean a mess in the kitchen.

Meal Prep Kitchen Essentials FAQs

What Is Meal Prepping?

Meal prepping involves making full meals in advance, often in bulk. You may prepare an entire dish at one time or you may prepare some of a recipe’s essential ingredients all at once. For example, I like to make large batches of rice at once and freeze what I don’t need so I can easily reheat it later. Additionally, here are three easy meal prep recipes for breakfast and three simple meal prep ideas for weeknight dinners you can meal prep in advance and store in the freezer.

What Supplies Do You Need To Meal Prep?

Meal prep is all about saving time, so I recommend a few kitchen essentials to make your meal prep more efficient. I prefer non-stick, easy-to-clean cookware. My meal prep essentials are a large sheet pan, a sauté pan, and food storage containers. Some of my other top kitchen essentials are measuring cups, mixing bowls, a chef’s knife, cutting board, vegetable peeler, and food processor or powerful blender.

How Should A Beginner Meal Prep For The Week?

I keep meal prep super simple and prioritize what will set me up for a successful week. I regularly prep high protein snacks, breakfast sandwiches and spinach banana pancakes to make my mornings easier. My biggest hack for meal prepping lunch and dinners throughout the week is to double batch dinners so we have easy leftovers.

Kitchen Essentials for Meal Prep

Women in her kitchen ready to meal prep with all the butcherbox products. Kitchen Essentials.

My Top Picks

  1. COOKWARE: Caraway Cookware. 100% non-toxic cookware and food storage to make your life easier and healthier. Discount: Get 10% off when you use this link.
  2. BULK PROTEINS: ButcherBox. A delivery service that delivers high-quality, hormone-free and humanely raised meat directly to your door.
  3. CLEANING ESSENTIALS:
    Geometry Towels. Fast drying, super-absorbent kitchen towels for easy and efficient clean up. Use discount code: NOURISHMOVELOVE
    Branch Basics. Non-toxic cleaning products for safe cleaning made simple. Use discount code: NOURISHMOVELOVE

Caraway

Caraway offers 100% non-toxic cookware and food storage containers. I use the large sheet pan and sauté pan most. This ceramic-coated cookware has a naturally slick surface — you can use minimal oil and butter with this cookware and your food will still slide right out of the pan.

Caraway Cookware Set

The cookware set is Caraway’s best-selling set of four non-stick ceramic pans. The set includes everything you need for healthy cooking on the stove or oven.

If I had to choose one pan, it would be the sauté pan — it holds up to a whole day’s worth of meals and is a breeze to clean.

The cookware set comes with organizers (at no extra cost) to keep your cabinets or countertops clean and tidy.

Kitchen Essentials: Caraway Cookware set organized in a kitchen next to the stove.

Large Baking Sheet

Women in her kitchen meal prepping a sheet pan dinner for roasting vegetables and chicken, using her stainless steel caraway large sheet pan. Kitchen Essentials.

We make a lot of sheet pan meals in my house. I use Caraway’s large sheet pan to double batch meals so we have easy leftovers.

These sheet pans are one of my favorite purchases for so many reasons:

  • Naturally slick ceramic coating (non-toxic and easy clean up).
  • Aluminized steel body for even cooking throughout the entire pan.
  • Large baking sheet fits more than any other baking sheet I’ve had!
Kitchen Essentials. Caraway cookware set all set up in a white kitchen next to stove.

Cookware Set

100% non-toxic, ceramic-coated, non-stick ceramic pans. The best in home cookware (and so easy to clean)!

⭐️ No discount code needed. Click the link below to get 10% off!
Shop Cookware Set

ButcherBox

ButcherBox is a meat delivery service that delivers high-quality, hormone-free and humanely raised meat directly to your door; including:

  • Beef (100% grass fed and grass finished beef)
  • Pork (crate-free and vegetarian-fed heritage breed pork)
  • Chicken (free-range and organic chicken)
  • Seafood (wild-caught and sustainably harvested salmon, scallops, lobster, shrimp and more)

ButcherBox offers more than 25 different cuts of meat, including grass fed ground beef, ribeye steaks, filet mignon, roasts, boneless skinless chicken breasts, chicken drumsticks, pork tenderloins, boneless pork chops, wild salmon filets and more.

Here’s How It Works:

  1. Choose your plan. You have options of different boxes at various price points.
  2. Choose your delivery frequency. You can customize delivery frequency to match your schedule.
  3. Get your order delivered to your door. As soon as your order ships, you’ll receive an email with tracking information. Orders are packed with dry ice to keep everything at an optimal temperature during the delivery process.

For context, our family (two adults and three hungry kids) receives the Classic Custom Box every four weeks. I like being able to customize our box with some of our favorite orders that I know the kids will like as well as being able to try new things.

Learn more about my personal orders in this ButcherBox review.

Kitchen essentials: butcherbox products, meat delivery service, of high quality product. Including salmon, ground beef and chicken breast.

Try ButcherBox

High quality, humanely-raised meat – delivered directly to your doorstep. Click the link below to claim their current promo!
Claim Offer

Cleaning Essentials

Geometry Towels

With three messy little ones, Geometry Towels have been a game-changer in the kitchen. The quick-drying, super-absorbent design ensures I never have to worry about smelly towels left in the kitchen.

Geometry towels are truly the only towel you will ever need. After buying a bunch of these for myself, I always have them on hand as a housewarming gift, especially during the holiday season.

Kitchen essentials: Geometry towels. Including two kitchen tea towels and a set of bar towels.

Branch Basics

Kitchen essentials: Branch Basics and Geometry towels. Including the concentrate of branch basic, a spray bottle and a geometry dish towel.

As a mom who values having safe, non-toxic products in my household, Branch Basics is a must. I can easily keep my home tidy and disinfected without fearing the effects of harsh chemicals.

The concentrate model allows me to have one product that can tackle any of my cleaning needs, from washing the counters or fresh fruit to doing a load of laundry — I can use the same soap for everything.

If you are interested in trying Geometry Towels or Branch Basics products, you can use discount code ‘NOURISHMOVELOVE’ for a discount on your order!

Note, this review is not paid, I truly do love these brands, and use them on a daily basis.

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