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Learning how to keep vegetables fresh for meal prep can be good for you diet and your budget. Stop wasting time, money, and food with these tips for keeping veggies fresh for meal prep!
How I Keep Veggies Fresh For Meal Prep
It’s no secret that I love to meal prep…or rather I meal prep because it makes my life easier and I love that. In the past I’ve shared my tips and tricks for meal prep. I’ll link to that blog series below so you can check it out.
If you are new to meal prepping and planning you will definitely want to check out this four part series. It’s simple, guided, comes with free printables, and more! My meal planning and prepping course is a simple way to get started and find the level of meal planning that works for you.
- How to Meal Plan | 1 of 4 (VIDEO)
- How to Meal Prep Lunch and Snacks | 2 of 4 (VIDEO)
- How to Meal Prep Breakfast and Lunch | 3 of 4 (VIDEO)
- How to Meal Plan and Prep in Under Four Hours | 4 of 4 (VIDEO)
Did I mention that they’re also part of a YouTube series that I did? If you don’t want to read you can just watch the videos that are included in each post!
Why should I buy fresh veggies?
I like to buy fresh veggies because it gives me more options than frozen vegetables do. Frozen vegetables are usually already cooked to some extent. Not only do you get vitamins and nutrients from fresh vegetables you can also do more with them.
You can choose to cook them by steaming them in the Instant Pot or the Air Fryer or you can eat them whole and raw like I do for snacks, lunches, and more.
Another reason to choose fresh vegetables is for your nutrition plan. If you are on the 21 Day Fix, Weight Watchers, and even other Beachbody programs you will likely need plenty of fresh vegetables on hand to meal prep within those guidelines.
How to keep vegetables fresh for meal prep:
The first thing you should do is decide which vegetables you should prep and which you should leave whole. I only cut up my hearty vegetables. When learning how to keep vegetables fresh for meal prep half the battle is just knowing when you should leave well enough alone!
Vegetables like celery, carrots, and cucumbers can be washed, dried, and then chopped however you like them. For more delicate vegetables just wash them and dry them.
Peppers are tricky because they seem like something you should chop up, right? But they go bad so much faster once they are cut up. I just wash them and dry them and cut them up as I need them to avoid spoilage.
Use special containers to store vegetables:
Another tip is to use special containers to store your vegetables. You can find them in my Amazon store and they help to keep vegetables that you have worked hard buying, cleaning, and prepping crisp and delicious until you are ready for them.
For mushrooms you should use a brown paper bag to keep them fresh the longest (this goes for avocados as well). Place them in a cool, dry place stored at room temperature or below. This will give them a longer shelf life and help them stay fresh until you. need them.
Store vegetables in the right place to keep them fresh:
Knowing where to store your newly cleaned and prepped vegetables is important as well! Part of how to keep vegetables fresh for meal prep is storing them properly.
Keep your vegetables and fruit away from one another in the refrigerator. This will help keep them from ripening too quickly and spoiling prematurely.
Fruits and veggies are both stored in the fridge so it can seem like we can store fruits and vegetables together. That’s not entirely correct and you definitely don’t want to mix them in the same crisper drawer. The ethylene gas given off by fruit can cause everything nearby to ripen and spoil more quickly!
Did you know that root vegetables and potatoes really don’t need to be in the refrigerator? They can be stored somewhere cool, dark, and dry to keep them properly fresh for as long as possible…just don’t put them somewhere too dark where you forget about them until they start to smell :)
The same goes for tomatoes. They don’t need to go into the fridge until they are cut or cooked. The best place for them is at room temperature!
Add moisture to keep produce fresher for longer:
Leafy greens and even some herbs and spices can benefit from being stored wrapped in damp paper towels. Another method is to place the stems into a container with water so they will keep their crunch and crispness.
The washing process helps with this as well. It removes any dirt, makes them more convenient to eat, and adds moisture which they may have been lacking in the coolers at your local grocery store.
Done being stored in the refrigerator? Freeze them if necessary!
If you are trying to figure out how to keep vegetables fresh for meal prep, chances are that you will have some mishaps. If I notice something is getting to the end of it’s lifespan in my fridge or on the counter I’ll freeze it if at all possible for later use.
Vegetables should be blanched before they are frozen but fear not…that sounds harder than it is. Blanching is just boiling for 1-2 minutes and then immediately submerging in ice cold water to stop the cooking. Frozen blanched vegetables are less likely to get freezer burn and it allows you to store them for about a year!
Blanching and freezing vegetables is a great choice if the only other option is losing them entirely. It will keep you from wasting food, and money…the plus side is that you will then have some veggies stocked up in the freezer for later use when you are in a pinch.
Looking for more posts about vegetables?
I’ve been working hard to learn more about nutrition and I love being able to share what I’m learning with you! Here are some more vegetable posts that I think you’ll enjoy. We need to know more than just how to keep them fresh longer, right? I’m adding in some meal prep posts as well because we can never have too many of those.
