1. Make it a team sport
Cooking is always more fun with friends and family. More hands on deck means you get to enjoy the fruits of your labor faster, too! Experimenting in the kitchen is also a perfect date-night, especially during quarantine! Have you ever used the trick of throwing your spaghetti on the cabinet wall to test if it’s done? Kids (and adults alike) love this! Have you ever tried to spiralize a zucchini? It’s extremely simple and it makes your food look beautiful!
2. Plan ahead
This sounds obvious, but preparing (measuring, washing, cutting) your ingredients before you start cooking is a great way to save time while cooking. Planning multiple meals at once is also a great tip to save time in the kitchen. If you’re already cooking, you might as well cook ahead- try doubling the recipe and you’ll have food for two or three days!
3. Wash all produce at once
Washing produce is an extremely important step to make sure that you’re staying healthy when you’re consuming fruits and vegetables. However, if you’re like me, you don't like this step. So, might as well get it all done at once! Set aside everything that you need to wash and rinse it all at one time, one and done! You can even do this step after returning from the grocery store and before you put everything away, a huge time saver when it comes to actually cooking!
4. Clean as you go
I hate a dirty kitchen and I hate cooking in a dirty workspace. Cleaning as you go is a simple way to keep the kitchen clean as you cook! It’s also much easier to clean dirty dishes right away rather than waiting until they dry out and get crusty.
5. Invest in good knives
A super simple way to make prepping time go by faster is by using good knives. Cutting with a sharp knife is much more efficient (and fun) than using a dull one. Not to mention safer, too!
6. Smaller foods cook faster
If you’re short on time, cutting your vegetables into smaller pieces makes them cook faster! Whether you’re roasting a sweet potato or searing chicken, cutting the pieces a bit smaller will cut your cooking time in half! And it gives you the chance to use your Cutco more! Plus, cutting frozen foods into smaller chunks means they’ll thaw faster. You’ll need a good Cutco knife to do a tough job like that.
