Learning how to meal prep vegetables and fruit is a big game changer. There are so many different kinds, and some do better with one kind of prep versus another. But whether we’re talking about chopped sweet potato for curry and or sliced celery for serving alongside Crispy Baked Cauliflower Wings or snacking, or we’re dicing some mango for a bowl of tropical Overnight Oats, it’s hard to meal prep without fruit and veggies. So it’s a good idea to know the best way to do it.
The downside? It can seem a little overwhelming to chop, dice, and slice up fruits and veggies for multiple recipes at once, but it doesn’t need to be. With a little forethought and a few handy tips, you’ll be a produce-chopping and produce-storing machine. And then you can look back with deep satisfaction at your work and know you’re set for the week!
We’re breaking down everything you ever wanted to know about the best ways to prep vegetables and fruits. We’re being both pragmatic and efficient, along with keeping an eye on food safety and taste, too! In other words, we’ve got you covered.
How to Meal Prep Vegetables & Fruit
What Fruits & Vegetables Work for Meal Prep?
The short answer: almost anything!
You really can use almost any type of fruit or vegetable in your meal-prepped dishes. It’s first important to consider what the best type of preparation best suits the veggie or fruit in question, and how it will behave for prepping.
For example, if you’re adding zucchini noodles to a hot dish (think stir fries or soups), when you reheat, they may get a little mushy. Same goes for soft fruits such as berries; they are pretty perishable and won’t last forever once they’ve been washed and cut. Chop them six days before you need them and you may get squishy (but totally safe-to-eat) berries. Almost all of the time, what you’re looking at after those 5 or 6 days isn’t a question of food safety—it’s likely fine to eat—but just texture. But texture is a big deal, we get it!
Favorite Veggies That Work Best for Meal Prepping
Harder veggies that take longer to cook are typically the ones that hold their texture and shape best in meal prep dishes with longer storage (think: freezer meals), or in cooked meals that will be reheated. Here are some of our favorites:
- Sweet potato, baby red potatoes, fingerling potatoes, and Yukon gold potatoes
- Broccoli and cauliflower
- Carrots, onions and celery
- Hardy greens like kale or chard
- Bell peppers, jalapenos, serranos
- Asparagus, peas, and green beans
- Squashes like zucchini, butternut squash, and summer squash
Softer veggies like tomatoes and mushrooms can work in meal prep as well, depending on the recipe. For example, you can meal prep a pasta dish with cooked mushrooms or canned tomatoes with no problem, but tossing together a spinach salad with grape tomatoes and fresh mushrooms (and then refrigerating it) might reduce in veggies that get soggier faster than you’d probably like.
Tips About Meal Prepping Fruit
When it comes to meal prepping fruits, slightly harder tropical chopped fruits like pineapple and mango are best used in stir fries (but can also work in breakfasts, too). Slightly softer fruits such as peaches, pears, mandarin orange and apples are great salad toppers. And as you might imagine, bananas and berries of all kinds are the final touches on a filling meal prep breakfast. With fruit, unless you’re cooking it, it’s best to chop it as close to mealtime as possible.
Getting a variety of fruits and vegetables in your diet is important in terms of health. It also helps you eat more seasonally and keeps your meals exciting, so definitely experiment and switch it up!
Pairing Fruits and Veggies in Meal Preps: Think Seasonally
Sure, we’ve got lots of recipes here that are helpful, but often the best part of cooking (and the most rewarding) comes when you’re making substitutions that suit your family–or maybe just use up what’s in your fridge or pantry without you having to go to the store. Either way, it’s satisfying when you hit a home run! So, when you’re faced with a meal to prep and you might not have all the ingredients, or maybe you want to just wing it for the week, think about that old adage: what grows together, goes together. There’s a reason why citrus fruits all taste great mixed together, and tomatoes, eggplants, basil, and peppers are perfect in summer. Cooler weather crops like carrots, radishes, and lettuces love to be served together in a salad. Heck, even strawberry and rhubarb: they’re growing together and that’s why those flavors go together well.
Make Produce Prep Safe
Before we get into the specifics for produce prep, let’s set some basic rules for meal prep food safety, courtesy of Talia’s No-Reheat Meal Prep:
- You don’t have to reheat fully cooked meal-prepped food.
- Refrigerate all meals and keep them below 40º until you’re ready to eat.
- It’s perfectly safe to eat fully cooked food stored in the fridge for up to four days without reheating it.
- Heating your food in BPA-safe plastic containers is 100% safe.
- Heat does kill off some bacteria, so if you’re not able to reheat something questionable (i.e., something that might be sticking around in your fridge a little longer than you planned), you’re not able to kill off unwanted bacteria.
How to Store Produce
You’ll notice some common fruits and vegetables in Workweek Lunch recipes, and they each have their particular preferences when it comes to storage. We created this handy guide to storing produce for easy reference. Download, print, and hang on your fridge for easy reference after every grocery shopping trip. Eventually, it will become second nature, all of this knowledge.
General Tips for Cleaning Produce
Cleaning your produce is pretty simple across the board. You’ll want to avoid washing most fruits and veggies until you’re ready to use them. The exception to that rule is greens (wash and dry thoroughly and store with a paper towel to absorb excess moisture, but if you’re buying from the farmers market, for example, ask if they’ve already been rinsed (often farmers will rinse before selling.) Similarly, greens you buy in plastic containers are typically triple washed before they’re shipped.
You’ll also want to consider brushing surface dirt off extra-dirty potatoes, squash, or other root vegetables (use a slightly damp paper towel to clean – excess dirt can make root veggies spoil faster). And with mushrooms, you’ll want to just wipe them gently with a damp paper towel before cooking or using. For everything else, right before you are ready to use them, simply rinse with cool water and dry thoroughly, especially if you’ll be adding oil directly to the veggies for roasting (oil + water = ❌).
Have you ever realized the spinach you grabbed from the store was already on its last legs on the day you bought it? Or maybe you have kale hanging out in your fridge from last week that you’d really like to use up? Whatever the case, there are a lot of great ways to use less-than-ideal vegetables up, without sacrificing taste. Think stir fries, soups, and other big-batch, veggie-packed meals to incorporate some of your forgotten produce. They’re also great in frittatas or just chopped and stirred into simple scrambled eggs.
When in doubt, freeze vegetables you might not use up in time. Most are totally freezer-friendly, but beware that the freezer will change the texture. Defrosted veggies are best in soups, stews, sauces, smoothies, and chilis.
Make Produce Prep Easy
Every Workweek Lunch recipe features at least one fruit or vegetable, so we take easy produce prep pretty seriously.
Preparing your produce before you start cooking doesn’t need to be an ordeal or even that complex. There are many methods of prepping produce that you probably already do, like washing greens and other veggies after getting home from the store, but there are a few more that can really help make prepping produce super easy.
“Mise en Place” a.k.a. Prepping Your Prep
One of my favorite tips for easy produce prep is called mise en place (French for “everything in its place”). It’s the practice of preparing all of your ingredients before you start cooking. You’ve seen Talia do this in her Instagram Live videos – whatever she needs for her recipe is pre-chopped and pre-measured so she can grab, add, and keep cooking.
To streamline this, take stock of all the recipes you’re making and see where there’s overlap. If you’re cooking two recipes that each need one onion, break out your Onion Goggles, and chop two and separate into two bowls (then promptly send us a selfie with your Onion Goggles, THANKS). You’ll likely have recipes where multiple veggies and fruits are going in during the same step, so feel free to put those in the same bowl.
Ever been stuck with half an onion at the end of your meal prep? You’ve already cooked all your meals for the week, what the heck are you going to do with half an onion?!
The Workweek Lunch Meal Prep Program is a great option here. Talia takes out all the planning and guesswork ensuring that each week you’ll have five days worth of delicious, produce-packed breakfasts, lunches, and dinners without having random half-vegetables or fruits leftover.
Work On Your Knife Skills
A dull knife is usually the reason people struggle with prepping produce. A sharp knife is a must, as is having a knife that’s an appropriate size for whatever you’re cutting (think trying to cut a butternut squash with a paring knife – no dice). A dull knife is actually more dangerous than a sharp one.
Talia recommended two great sets of knives: the Misen Knife Set (a splurge) and the Amazon Basics (a steal at under $50!). We strongly recommend getting some decent knives and sharpening them regularly. Good, sharp knives are safer to work with and will make prepping produce a breeze.
Once you have a good knife, it’s time to practice your technique. There are all kinds of videos out there on the best techniques for chopping, slicing, and dicing, but the best technique is the one that feels best for you.
The “right way” to dice an onion involves a lot of careful slices and I just don’t have the patience. I dice my onion in a way that’s maybe less technically efficient, but it works for me. Do you, boo.
If you’re interested in how to select, chop, and cook a wide variety of vegetables, I love the book The Vegetable Butcher, which breaks down literally every vegetable and variety and teaches step-by-step how to purchase and prepare it.
When it comes to fruit, you really can eat most fruit totally whole, so focusing on portioning it out instead. Our motto: don’t chop if you don’t have to. #LazyWin
What hacks do you have for prepping vegetables and fruits for your weekly meal prep? Let us know in the comments or on Instagram!
