If you’re someone who’s used to cooking for a family or for a larger group of people, suddenly finding yourself having to cook for just one person can be a stark change. And while cooking for a group can be stressful at times, learning how to scale back and cook for just yourself can be a tough shift to make. But luckily, whether you’re newly single or moving into a senior living community where you’ll be cooking for yourself, there are tricks you can try to make this transition easier to manage.
To help you see how this can be done, here are three tips to make cooking for one easier and more enjoyable.
Simplify With Meal Kits
For those who find that, in addition to cooking for one, shopping for one is a challenge, a great place to start is with prepared meal kits.
One of the main goals of these kinds of meal kits is to cut down on food waste. So if you’ve noticed that you’re always cooking way too much for yourself, meal kits might be the way to go for you. Additionally, meal kits are delivered to your door, keeping you from having to go to the store and find what you need. And because everything is proportioned for you, cooking these types of meals may also prove to be faster and easier for you, so you can get out of the kitchen and get on with your day.
Embrace Batch Cooking For Certain Items
If you still want to be very involved in the cooking process but you’re just having trouble with making enough food for just one person, you might want to start embracing batch cooking.
With batch cooking, you cook a larger amount of certain foods at the same time and then just use what you need out of that larger amount when actually creating your meals on a daily basis. This can help save you from having to cook just a small amount of the same thing a few times a week and can help you get past the mental block of portioning down the amounts that you’re used to cooking.
Plan With Leftovers In Mind
Similar to batch cooking, something else you could incorporate into your cooking for one person is how you make use of your leftovers. For example, if you want to make a roast for one of your meals, you can plan to use the meat that you have left over in another meal the next day, like tacos or stroganoff. This way, you can cook less each day while still eating healthy meals and have less food waste.
If you’re cooking for one now and have found yourself struggling with it, consider using the tips mentioned above to help you find some solutions to the problems you’ve been having.
