Meal Prep 101- Chicken and Turkey

Ground Turkey and Vegetable Nachos

Hawaiian Chicken and Broccoli Pizza

What if I told you you could take 30 hours of cooking and condense it into 2 hours??
This is not a trick, we make 30 meals in 2 hours, freeze, and save them for dinner all month!
This is extremely handy for when you need something healthy to eat after work and are not in the mood to cook or wait for an hour.

Meal prepping saves:
TIME – Two hours of cooking, instead of 30.
ELECTRICITY-  Two hours of your oven heating up and working vs. 30 nights of preheating and cooking
MONEY- Buying in bulk gets chicken breast prices from $4-5 per pound, down to $2-3 per pound.
 CALORIES- how much mindless munching do you do while waiting an hour for your dinner to cook?

Having chicken and turkey readily available to you also makes it where you won’t miss an opportunity to fill you body with amazing nutrients and protein that boost immunity and bone healthy. How would your body benefit from eating this?

Now let’s get down to the prep!

For the chicken prep, you will need:

-4 baking pans sprayed with non-stick spray
-18 lbs of chicken- We use six 3lb. bags of frozen chicken breast (If your chicken is not frozen, cooking temperatures and times will not be the same!)
-Olive Oil
-Salt
-Pepper
-18 Sandwich bags and 3- one gallon freezer bags

Begin by preheating the oven to 375. Spray 4 pans with nonstick cooking spray. Take the frozen chicken out the bags and place directly into pans. THERE IS NO NEED TO MARINATE OR SEASON.

Cook for 30 minutes, then remove. Stir all chickens around (they will not cook evenly if you skip this step!) and rearrange on the pan, then put back into the oven for another 15-30 minutes, until cooked thoroughly.
Allow to sit in the pans for at least 10 minutes before cutting (This allows the chicken to soak up some juice and cool)
Cut the chicken breast into strips or dice into chunks then throw into BIG mixing bowl. (We use a big cooking pot)

Add olive oil, salt and pepper to your liking into the bowl and use your hands (time to get dirty) to mix well. You may want to add back some juice from the pans if you feel the mixture is a little dry.
Allow mixture to cool completely. Then bag into individual sandwich bags and place 6 full serving bags into one freezer gallon bag.

This is a messy process, make sure to rinse your bags as needed before putting into the gallon freezer bag.

Pop into the freezer and thaw when ready to eat. Please see specific thawing instructions below for best taste and quality.

FOR THE TURKEY PREP YOU WILL NEED: