Meal prepping is one of the biggest things that helps me stay on top of cooking for a large family.
When you’re feeding a family every day, deciding what to cook can sometimes feel like half the work! Preparing several meals at once means that during the week I can simply take something from the freezer, defrost it and have dinner ready without starting from scratch.
For this week’s meal prep, I prepared several family dinners including chicken curry, lamb curry, homemade kebabs, a minced meat pasta sauce and chicken pilau.
I also made one of my favourite cold-weather desserts — apple crumble and custard!
But one of the biggest time savers was making one large curry base and using it to make three different meals.
Make One Curry Base for Several Meals
If you regularly cook curries, this is such a useful meal-prep trick.
Rather than chopping and cooking onions, tomatoes, garlic and ginger separately for every curry, I made one large batch and divided it between three dishes.
For my three curries I used approximately:
- 6 medium onions
- 12 tomatoes
- 3 tablespoons garlic and ginger paste
- Sunflower oil
- Salt and spices to taste
I finely chopped the onions using my mini chopper and sautéed them in some sunflower oil until softened and lightly browned.
Next, I added the chopped tomatoes and allowed everything to cook down until the tomatoes were soft. Because this was quite a large batch, it needed a little longer than a normal curry base.
If you find the mixture beginning to stick, simply add a splash of water.
I then added the garlic and ginger paste along with my spices and seasoning.
Once everything had cooked together, my curry base was ready.
Instead of making one enormous curry, I divided it between different pans and turned it into several completely different meals.
Such a simple way to save time!
Chicken Curry
The first meal was a straightforward chicken curry.
I added approximately one-third of the prepared curry base to a pan and added my chicken pieces.
Once the outside of the chicken had changed colour, I added some water and brought everything to the boil.
I then reduced the heat and allowed the curry to simmer gently for around 30 minutes.
And that’s dinner number one done!
I like to freeze curries in containers and take one out in the morning on the day we’re going to eat it.
Serve with plain boiled rice, naan or whatever your family enjoys.
Creamy Lamb Curry
The second portion of curry base became a lamb curry.
After heating the curry base, I added the lamb pieces and allowed them to cook for a few minutes.
I then stirred in some Greek-style natural yoghurt. You don’t have to add yoghurt, but I find it gives lamb curry a lovely creamy texture.
I added some water, brought the curry to the boil and then reduced the heat.
Lamb takes slightly longer than chicken, so I allowed this one to simmer for approximately 35–40 minutes.
That’s another family dinner ready for the freezer.
Homemade Lamb Kebabs
I also prepared a batch of homemade kebabs.
These are really handy to have in the freezer because you can cook however many you need rather than defrosting an entire meal.
I combined lamb mince with:
- 1 finely chopped onion
- 1 finely chopped tomato
- 1 tablespoon garlic and ginger paste
- 1 egg
- Salt
- Red chilli flakes
- Garam masala
- Gram flour
- A little lemon juice
- Mint sauce
Mix everything together thoroughly.
I usually press the mixture onto baking paper and use a cutter to make the kebabs, but this time I simply shaped them by hand.
I placed small pieces of greaseproof paper between the kebabs before stacking them in a freezer bag. This helps prevent them sticking together and makes it much easier to remove only the amount you need.
Easy Minced Meat Pasta Sauce
I had some mince left over, so rather than putting it back in the fridge I turned it into another dinner.
Meal prep is a great opportunity to use everything while you’ve already got the chopping boards and pans out!
I browned the mince in a pan before adding:
- 2 chopped red onions
- Garlic and ginger
- Salt
- Spices
- Passata
I cooked everything together until I had a lovely rich, tomatoey mince sauce.
This can be frozen and later served with pasta or spaghetti for a really easy family dinner.
You could also use it for something like a pasta bake.
Chicken & Potato Pilau
The final portion of my curry base was used for our dinner that evening: chicken and potato pilau.
I added chicken niblets to the curry base along with some additional whole spices.
Once the chicken had cooked for a little while, I added a couple of tablespoons of Greek yoghurt followed by chopped potatoes.
I let everything cook for approximately 30 minutes before adding soaked and drained basmati rice.
Once the liquid came to the boil, I reduced the heat and cooked the rice for around 10 minutes.
One little tip: once the pilau has finished cooking, leave the lid on for another 10 minutes before serving.
The rice came out lovely!
Apple Crumble & Custard
Meal prep doesn’t have to be all about dinner.
I was in the mood for apple crumble, so while everything else was cooking I made a quick dessert.
I chopped some Bramley apples into chunks and placed them in a baking dish.
I covered the apples with caster sugar and a little cinnamon.
For the crumble topping, I used:
- Softened butter
- Plain flour
- Porridge oats
- Caster sugar
I rubbed everything together to make the crumble mixture and scattered it over the apples before baking.
We served the warm apple crumble with custard.
Perfect when the colder autumn and winter days start arriving!
My Large Family Meal Prep
By the end of this meal-prep session I’d prepared:
Chicken curry • Lamb curry • Homemade lamb kebabs • Minced meat pasta sauce • Chicken & potato pilau • Apple crumble
And that’s why I love batch cooking.
You don’t necessarily need to prepare seven completely different dinners in one day. Even making two or three meals while you’re already cooking can make the rest of the week considerably easier.
The biggest time saver from this particular meal prep was definitely the curry base.
Instead of chopping onions and tomatoes and starting from scratch three times, I did the work once and turned the same basic mixture into several different meals.
For a large family, little shortcuts like this really add up.
If you’re new to meal prepping, don’t feel as though you need to fill an entire freezer in one afternoon. Start with doubling one dinner or making one extra meal for another day.
Future you will be very grateful! 😊
