Upon completing my first year of college there was one thing I was for sure about—I did NOT want to stay on campus the following year. So here we are, Spring semester of my Sophomore year and I have my own apartment. I couldn’t be more happy being in my own space but it does come with more responsibility of course.

Just to name a few of those things, I’m completely in charge of my own housekeeping, laundry, and my favorite has to be getting to cook for myself. Growing up, I was always fascinated watching the FoodNetwork channel and in love with idea of being able to cook myself one day. When I say cook I don’t mean popping some pizza rolls in the oven or heating up some ramen noodles, no I mean preparing legitimate meals for myself.

I go the whole 9 yards with my meals; for Thanksgiving this past year I even went as far as cooking Thanksgiving dinner for my family in the surrounding area. That was definitely a lot of work ( I was in the kitchen for 4 hours+) but I felt satisfied afterwards knowing that I had pulled off something most college kids my age probably couldn’t—not to sound cocky! But with the crazy schedule I have between school and both of my jobs, I hardly have time to cook dinner every night.

So, I’ve found a life-saving technique that I feel could work for ANY busy person or someone who just doesn’t feel up to cooking every night. Meal Prepping is my secret and it’s honestly the best thing ever in my opinion. I’d say you definitely have to have patience and discipline in order to succeed with it. Patience while you’re preparing you’re meals for the week because you could be in the kitchen for anywhere from 1 and 1/2 to 2 hours and discipline to actually get up and cook.

Growing up in the household I did, there were hardly any nights we would eat out. My mom always made to sure to have a hot, home cooked meal waiting for all of us at dinner time and as I get older that’s something that I a value and want to honor. You definitely won’t catch me eating out more than once or twice a week!

The technique is actually pretty simple for those thinking it's challenging. First you need to narrow down what exactly your meal is going to be that you’re going to fix prep for the week; I do my meal prepping a little different than what's the norm. I like to pick a protein/meat (usually I’ll do chicken, salmon, ground turkey, tilapia, or shrimp) and prepare two similar meals with that protein/meat that will last Monday-Thursday.

For example, a few weeks ago I did a shrimp meal prep and the first meal included garlic Parmesan shrimp with sauteed asparagus and brown rice, and the second meal included garlic Parmesan shrimp tossed with thin spaghetti noodles. I find the most challenging part for me is narrowing down what exactly it is that I want to cook. My inspiration for each of the meals I want to cook comes from my Pinterest, and once I have my mind set on something then comes from the creative part of putting this and that together. My most recent meal prep consisted of spinach and feta turkey meat burgers with roasted potatoes and spinach and feta turkey meatballs with grilled corn, yum!

So, why meal prep? The man three reasons I've concluded incorporating this technique into my lifestyle is that it's a huge time-saver in the kitchen, obviously, it'll keep you from spending excess money on dining out, and this may be a bias reason but it helps you showcase individuality and creativity. It doesn't matter what your cooking experience level is, all it takes to get started is a little bit patience, discipline, and the willingness to cook to try something new;

Who doesn't like saving a little cash? I can assure you that if you try this technique out for yourself you won't think about dining out every night. Just think, dinner will already be fixed, all you'll have to do is grab a plate, pop your food in the microwave to heat it up, and then viola! Dinner is served.

As I stated, it'll allow you to showcase your individuality and creativity. I can back this statement up 100% because I know I've grown so much since my first meal prep. Starting out I didn't know much about seasoning food, other than salt and pepper and now with most of the food I cook I'll consider an assortment of seasonings that I'd like to use beforehand.

See what did I tell you, it's so easy that literally anyone can try it. I guarantee you'll love it once you try it--so what do you say, let's get to prepping!