How to Minimize Time in the Kitchen as a Mom

I’ve found 10 ways to minimize time in the kitchen as a mother to toddlers and preschoolers:

1. Simplify Breakfast and Lunch Options
2. Pre-Wash and Prep Produce for Snacks
3. Use Produce to Supplement Lunches
4. Decide Your Snack Strategy in Advance
5. Work While the Kids Eat
6. Streamline Adult Meals
7. Delegate Meals for Other Adults
8. Meal Plan and Batch Cook
9. Make the Most of the Grocery Unload Process
10. Embrace Crockpot and Simple Dinners

Taking care of little people is a lot of work. And if you’re a caregiver to toddlers and preschoolers, you probably find yourself in the kitchen a LOT. I was there, spending a lot of time in the kitchen making meals or snacks and cleaning up from meals or snacks. Today I’m sharing the ways I’ve found to minimize time in the kitchen.

We have three kids (currently – Baby #4 is due in April 2024), ages 5, 3, and 1. And I stay home with them while my husband works away from home most days. We’ve decided to try to live frugally so that I can be home with the kids. But that also means that I try to avoid convenience foods and pre-packaged snacks as much as possible. This definitely reduces the grocery costs, but it also means there is more work on my part to prep food.

Since I don’t want to spend every waking hour making, serving, or cleaning up snacks and meals, this is what I’ve figured out that works for me!

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Simplify Breakfast and Lunch Options to Minimize Time in the Kitchen

For breakfast, we have a rotation of meals that we use, they are:

• oatmeal or oatmeal bake
• yogurt parfait
• green smoothie with toast
• oatmeal/chia bowls with fresh fruit

Lunch also has a rotation of meals, and they are:

• peanut butter and jam sandwiches or wraps
• quesadillas (with cheese and beans)
• wraps with deli meat and cheese
• bagels with cheese
• (sometimes) leftovers

I don’t make different meals for different kids. Everyone gets the same meal, with minor customizations as desired (if one child prefers no raisins, that’s fine!).

We do a more elaborate breakfast on Saturday for our family Sabbath day. (Usually a meal I can make in advance on Friday.) Sundays are usually the same rotation as the rest of the week so we can get out the door to church sort-of on time.

We don’t stick to the same order of meals each week. It varies depending on what we have supplies for, but in general, when it comes time to make breakfast or lunch, it is one of those options to minimize my time in the kitchen. (Unless inspiration strikes for something out side of the rotation, then, of course, I’ll follow the inspiration!)

Pre-Wash and Prep Produce for Snacks to Minimize Kitchen Time

We predominantly do fresh fruits and veggies as snacks. (With three exceptions: I have a bin of pretzels and a bin of roasted peanuts on hand for truly urgent snack needs, and we almost always have sourdough bread on hand for toast with butter!). When I get home from the grocery store, before I put food away, I try to wash all my produce (using vinegar and water, following www.thecrosslegacy.com method), and then let it dry completely (usually overnight) on towels.

After washing the produce, I try to front-load and ultimately minimize my time in the kitchen by pre-preparing some of it for snacks. Carrots I will cut into carrot sticks, and the same with celery and bell peppers. For melons or pineapple, I’ll cut them into chunks. I try to store them in glass jars, so they last longer. My goal is to pre-prepare enough produce to get us through at least 4-5 days of snacks. I don’t worry about pre-cutting produce that doesn’t keep as well once cut, but I like to have them washed.

Use Produce to Supplement Lunches and Add Variety

Since our lunches are pretty similar each week, I will add some of the pre-prepped produce to lunches to make them a bit more healthy and to diversify them. This also minimizes time in the kitchen for each lunch meal. I can serve up veggies very quickly while I’m making the wrap or sandwich. Then the kids are eating something healthy as the first “course” of their meal while I spend a few minutes doing more hands-on work.

Decide Your Strategy and Limit in Advance for Snacks

I do two snacks per day (if they kids remember to ask me for them – if nobody is asking, I don’t serve them!). One snack mid-morning, and one mid-afternoon. If the meal previous to the snack hasn’t been eaten, I cover it with a plate or a towel. The remainder of that meal becomes the kid’s snack. If they’ve eaten their meal, then I’ll pull out some of those pre-prepped fruits or veggies, and add a handful of pretzels and peanuts.

If the kids are still claiming to be hungry after the snack, I encourage them to drink water and go outside to play for 20 minutes. Then, if they are genuinely still hungry at that point, I’ll give them another handful of peanuts to eat. But almost always they are distracted enough that they don’t ask for more food. Implementing this strategy alone is key for me to minimize my time in the kitchen, since my kids seem to like to eat when they are bored!

I think consistency is key for this to work. If I give my kids two or three snacks between breakfast and lunch one day, they start to expect lots of snacks. Or, if I let them not finish their meal and then get to snack on something more appealing, they tend to want more snacks. I find sticking to a similar rhythm and routine for snacks and meals every day gives my kids the structure they (and I) need to thrive while I also minimize time in the kitchen.

Work While the Kids Eat to Minimize Time in the Kitchen

I know this one may be a bit controversial (sitting down for meals together can be a valuable part of parenting little ones), but one of my strategies to minimize my time in the kitchen is to work WHILE they eat. Maybe it is just my kids, but they sometimes take FOREVER to eat. I, on the other hand, am not a slow eater. So sitting with my kids while they eat (s l o w l y ) can make it feel like the meal time/kitchen time is never ending.

So, I usually don’t eat breakfast and lunch sitting down with my kids. We have a bar that allows the kids to sit and face the main work zone of the kitchen. So while they eat, I am either prepping the next part of the meal (or a future meal), or I’m cleaning up.

We have a dishwasher, so I load the dishes immediately after the meal or as they are finished being used. I also like to use the kids’ breakfast and lunch eating time as time for me to prep things for dinner. I can stand and chop veggies for a salad or prep food for the crockpot on the same counter top surface as where they are eating, so I can supervise, make conversation, engage with the kids, AND get some of my kitchen work done all at once.

Streamline Adult Meals (If Different From the Kids Meals)

In our house, we all eat the same thing for dinner, but we don’t always all eat the same thing for breakfast and lunch. For myself for breakfast, I make an egg-bake in a casserole dish (sauteed veggies, nutritional yeast, eggs, cottage cheese, and colby cheese on top) about once per week. I cut it into 6 or 8 equal squares (depending on if I used the 8×10 inch casserole dish or the 9×13 inch casserole dish), and then I just eat that all week. (Since I’m currently pregnant, I’m trying to get lots of protein in my diet and avoiding excess carbs first thing in the morning). This is a big way I minimize time in the kitchen – cook once, eat all week!

For myself for lunch, I either eat leftovers, or I cook a frozen (and thawed) chicken in the crockpot once a week, de-bone it, and make 4-5 salads in a jar with lettuce, chicken, feta cheese, bell peppers, carrots, onion, and whatever other veggies I have on hand. I do a splash of olive oil, some lemon juice, and Mrs. Dash seasoning on it for a dressing.

Having a plan for myself for what to eat from breakfast and lunch helps me prepare that food in advance to streamline the process. If I can pull everything out of the fridge and do all the chopping and prepping once and then eat from that for 4-6 days, that seems to significantly minimize time in the kitchen!

Delegate Meals for Other Adults

While I am usually the only adult around for the lunch meal and dinner prep, Gabe is around for breakfast. He often will either get breakfast started or even do all the prep for it. As a result, he usually does his own breakfast which can minimize MY time in the kitchen. Typically, he’ll eat whatever the kids are eating, although sometimes he will have some of my egg bake if he’s in a hurry. Whatever the case, I typically don’t need to prep his breakfast.

He usually eats his lunch at work – his workplace has a plan for lunches. About once or twice a week he’ll come home for lunch, but usually only when he’s texted and asked if there’s leftovers that need to be eaten up. So when he does come home, he takes care of preparing his own leftovers lunch.

For dinner, we all eat the same thing, and we eat together, so I am in charge of preparing and executing that meal. And since I’m the one that does the grocery shopping and meal planning, I take responsibility for keeping the house stocked with food options. (We have a piece of paper on our refrigerator were we write down things we are getting low on, and Gabe certainly contributes to that as he makes his meals or the kids’ breakfasts). But for 2/3rd of Gabe’s meals, I’m not spending time in the kitchen making them.

Meal Plan and Batch Cook to Minimize Time in the Kitchen

Since I am the primary caregiver during the day for our kids, as well as the main dinner-maker in our family, I shoulder the mental (and physical) load of grocery shopping.

I like to stick to a monthly grocery budget, since Gabe and I have tried to organize our finances and we want to be able for me to stay home with the kids. So I am an avid meal-planner. For me, I take inventory of what is in our house (the freezer, the fridge, the canned goods, the dried goods, etc) and make a list of meals around what needs to be used up or what we have on hand (for whatever amount of time I’m planning to shop for – a month or a week or 10 days or two weeks, etc). And then I make a detailed grocery list of ingredients and foods we need for the meals I’m planning. Then I load up the kids and hit the grocery store (or place a Click-and-Collect order – depending on how urgently I need stuff, and how much energy I have!).

When I make my list of meals, I don’t plan to cook every night. Usually I plan to cook 4 or at most 5 times per week. I plan to make MORE than what we will eat (ideally doubling or at least cooking 50% more than what I think I’ll need to feed our family), and then we have enough leftovers to skip cooking one day during the week, use leftovers for lunches, and go a day or two without having to cook at the end of the week.

This has the advantage of getting more meals out of every cooking session which is a great strategy to minimize time in the kitchen.

Grocery Shop Unload + Prep Simultaneously

Whenever I can I try to combine time in the kitchen when I’m unloading and putting away the groceries with some preparation time that will cut down on cooking time later.

So, I fill my sink with vinegar water, and then as I unload each type of produce, anything that needs to be washed gets dumped into the sink for a few minutes before I lay it out to dry before putting it away. I feel like this saves me from putting away a bunch of produce, only to pull it back out again and wash it, to then put it away a second time. This works great for all those snack foods I pre-wash and prep as mentioned above.

I apply the same principle for other unloading tasks. If I have spice jars that need to be refilled from bulk spice purchases, I just do that as I’m unloading. Then I don’t have to hunt around for refills in the middle of cooking. And sometimes I can refill a jar AND measure out what I’ll need for a meal or two that I know I’ll be cooking that week.

And when I’m unloading meats and things that are going to go in the freezer, I try to take them out of their plastic trays wrapped in cling wrap, and portion them into the sizes I want for specific meals or even pre-slice or chop them. So, for example, if I’m going to make fajitas during the week, I’ll chop the two chicken breast I allocate for that into strips before I freeze them. And I may even slice up a few onions and bell peppers to throw in the gallon-size baggy that the chicken is going into, dump in the spices for the fajita flavor, and freeze everything together.

Embrace Crockpot and Simple Meals to Minimize Time in the Kitchen

I try to cook as many food groups together as much as I can to minimize time in the kitchen.

In the winter, I make a lot of soups that have protein + veggies, and I’ll serve it with sourdough bread, such as:

• Pumpkin-Sausage Soup with spinach, pumpkin, onions, and sweet potatoes
• Beef Barley Soup with carrots, celery, onions, tomatoes, and cabbage
• Asian Beef Noodle Soup with carrots, bok choy, onions, celery, broccoli, and cabbage (sometimes I even skip the bread on this one, since I use rice noodles or bean noodles that add starch)
• Lasagna Soup with lots of spinach, onions, cauliflower, broccoli, or zucchini
• Taco Soup with onions, corn, different kinds of beans, bell peppers, carrots, and broccoli (sometimes I substitute the bread for cornbread with this one)
• Lentil Stew with onions, tomatoes, carrots, celery, cauliflower, and broccoli or cabbage

I also do lots of crockpot dishes like a loaded vegetable curry, or sweet and sour chicken with bell peppers and broccoli in it, or roast with carrots and potatoes. Usually this means a few minutes of work early in the day, and then the rest of the day is pretty hands off. Typically I’ll just add ONE side thing: naan to the curry, or rice to the sweet and sour chicken, or a fresh salad to the roast with carrots and potatoes.

And in the summer, I make entire meals mostly around a single dish. Some of my current favorites are:

• a cold quinoa salad (with cucumber, tomatoes, bell peppers, carrots, black beans, and chopped chicken)
• a cold pasta salad (with fresh veggies, some cans of tuna, chunks of cheese, and pesto sauce)
• a cold broccoli salad (with broccoli, chickpeas, cranberries, and sunflower seeds)
• a cold kale salad (with beetroot, feta cheese, chopped chicken, and pumpkin seeds)

Results of Implementing These Strategies

I’m not going to say I don’t spend any time in the kitchen, because I still definitely do. But by shifting as much work as possible earlier in the day (during the times the kids are eating, when we’re already in the kitchen), or by pre-prepping as much as I can on grocery unload days, I have been able to minimize my time in the kitchen. I am usually able to have at least 45 minutes to 2 hours between snacks or meals on most days that I don’t need to be in the kitchen. Obviously, on days I am cooking for dinner, I do spend a bit more time there. But on days when we are eating mostly leftovers for lunch and dinner, sometimes there are 3-4 hour breaks in kitchen duties!

Personally, I’ve found if I can have a long break or two from actively being in the kitchen on most days, I FEEL like my whole life doesn’t involve constantly being a short-order cook. And that helps me feel a bit more sane and able to do other things I want to do, like read books to my kids, or take them to the park, or organize or clean, etc.

I hope these tips are helpful. If you have any other ideas to add that work for you, please let me know in the comments below. I’d love to learn from your wisdom!