8 Tips to Half Your Cooking Time with Better Kitchen Organization | NJ

Cooking in the kitchen, especially for a family, can take up a big chunk of your day depending on how many meals you have to prepare every day. 3 meals a day can easily take 4-6 hours, and since time is precious it’s beneficial to integrate all the solutions we can to make the most of our days. There are 3 parts to making a meal: prep, cook and clean. Let’s explore some simple ways to free up a few hours of your time.

It goes without saying that depending on the type of meals you make, some items may or may not be good to bulk prep. Some families make very similar foods on a weekly basis and others may want completely new recipes on a daily basis. If time is precious, you may want to plan ahead to allow for bulk prepping for 2 days, and if a recipe takes a while to cook such as a stew or soup, you may want to make more and freeze it. Frozen foods can be stored much longer which allows for the flexibility to use whenever you wish.

Unless your refrigerator is completely full all of the time, it’s a smart idea to make leftovers when possible. If you’re constantly cooking 3 meals a day, it will be refreshing when there are leftovers to take its place, saving you precious time, even if it’s only a few times a week. If looked at in this way, getting a bigger fridge or having a second one - depending on the size of your household - can be a valuable investment.

This simple tip is often overlooked and can save valuable time! Whenever you’re waiting during the cooking or prepping stage, start cleaning in between. You may not get to all of your items, but you’ll be surprised how much of your cleaning can get done before your meal is finished!

Upgrading your kitchen pantry can help you find what you need quicker, gather your items quicker, and keeping all your items organized so that everything goes back the way they were taken out. Without proper organizers, it can be very difficult see all of your items, which results in moving other items to get to what you need. After everyone gets their hands on the items, your pantry can easily become a disaster if no one knows where they belong. Consider upgrading your pantries as it is essential for a functional kitchen.

Although this is intuitive, your needs in grouping items together may be different than another’s and therefore, understanding your family’s lifestyle is important. Do you have kids? Do you have a particular diet or routine? Are your lunch ingredients pretty much the same? Do you buy most of your sauces and seasonings or do you make them from scratch? Depending on your answers, you may want to adjust how you group your items to make gathering your ingredients faster and without much thought.

Depending the way you cook or the types and amounts of raw ingredients you have, having containers that are all matching with labels can make your search for ingredients much easier. For instance, you may have a variety of different flours, sugars, beans, lentils, rice, etc. Maybe you purchase many of your spices in packets or in bulk because they’re cheaper that way. Having spice containers can help.

Without intuitive kitchen workflow, you’ll find that your walking frequency is increased. If your ingredients for your meals are stored in many different locations, you’ll need to gather them all and then put them all away - all of which takes up unnecessary time. If possible, consider keeping your breakfast, lunch, and dinner ingredients separated and grouped together, or in a way that best suits you and your family.

If you’re cooking for others, it’s only fair that they all help in some way. Not only does it teach children to help, they will also take this courteous life skill and become a contributor in the world. I understand that in gatherings, it’s common to not let the guests do any work - and if you’re ok with that, no need to change anything. However, if you have frequent gatherings and you do not enjoy doing all the prep, cooking, andcleaning, it’s time to find creative ways to communicate and get the help you deserve. No one will/can be mad at the fairness of it all.

Now that you have some pointers, start implementing them right away! Does your kitchen pantry need a makeover? Check out some designs in the kitchen pantry section.