Managing Meals as a Freelancer
Balancing work and life is always going to be a challenge and freelancing offers its own set of work-life challenges.
Luckily, when it comes to self-care, freelancing also offers its own advantages. One of the best of those advantages is the opportunity to cook while you work. By taking advantage of the small steps you can take in cooking, you can cook a meal throughout the course of a day, all in five or ten minute blocks away from your desk. Whether you like slow cooking with a crock-pot or quickly sauteing a rich one pan meal, a well planned schedule can allow you to cook your favorite meals without losing productivity.
Timing Everything
Time and timing are crucial in cooking, you can save yourself a lot of time by planning ahead. Take your recipe, break down what you have to do, step by step, and time manage.
For example, let’s say you are planning to make a shepherd’s pie for dinner. You can chop the vegetables when you have small blocks of extra time throughout the day and store them in the fridge. Then an hour or so before you want to eat, all you have to do is assemble the pie from the ingredients and cook it. For a few minutes here-and-there you can take care of dinner without losing much of your day.
Choosing Recipes
It can be tricky to understand how a recipe will play out in real life, especially when you plan to cook while you work. When looking at recipes, it’s best to look for ones that are mostly familiar to you. You won’t have much time to learn technique during your workday, so it makes sense to take it slow.
Choosing recipes that only have a few basic steps is a great way to ensure you give yourself enough time. If you only have to prep and cook a little you have a lot more wiggle room and a lot less to think about.
Buying Ingredients
It may seem obvious, but planning several days worth of meals at once is essential if you want to make the most of your time. Picking recipes based on what you already have can be tricky and lead to disappointment and waste. Planning a week’s worth of meals to go shopping once minimizes the time you spend on food between meals and lets you double up on ingredients you can buy in bulk.
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