The $30 Midweek Dinner Prep Secret I'm Bringing Back Before Fall Hosting Season Gets Busy – It Keeps Me One Step Ahead
The meal-prep bin system gives me one less thing to think about
As the days get shorter and colder, my motivation starts to nosedive. By the end of a long day, the last thing I want to do is rummage through the fridge trying to work out what to cook.
That’s why, ahead of peak hosting season, I’m adopting the meal-prep bin system to organize a refrigerator. This simple hack uses inexpensive acrylic fridge bins from Amazon to group the ingredients for each meal together, making everything I need easy to find and ready to go.
It’s a quick way to make midweek cooking feel almost effortless, while keeping meal prep and hosting more streamlined when my brain is already feeling cluttered.
With lids for easy stacking and cut-out handles for transporting around your kitchen, these clear acrylic bins are ideal for grouping food by meal, creating actionable meal plans to streamline prep.
When getting a kitchen ready for hosting, decluttering is first on everyone's minds. However, how you organize your kitchen can have a bigger impact.
The meal-prep bin system is simple. Start with clear, lidded plastic bins, such as the Vtopmart bins from Amazon, that are large enough to hold several ingredients. When you unpack your weekly grocery shop, group the ingredients for each meal together in its own bin. For a bolognese, for example, I’ll put the ground beef, garlic, tomato paste, and other ingredients together. For fajitas, I’ll group the chicken with the bell peppers and anything else I’ll need.
That way, when I’m tired at the end of a long day, getting dinner started is as simple as pulling out the right bin and taking it to the prep area. There’s no hunting through the fridge for ingredients and no standing around trying to decide what to cook, the meal is already planned, portioned, and ready to go.
It is a quick hack loved by professional organizers for keeping a fridge organized too. 'Deep bins help you group similar items, like snacks, produce, or condiments, and prevent them from getting lost in the back of the fridge, since you can simply slide the bin closer to you to reach whatever is in the back,' says Julia Foulk, founder at The Organizing Method. 'They’re ideal for maximizing space and keeping everything easily accessible. Stackable containers then allow you to maximize vertical space, making it possible to store more without cluttering each shelf.'
The trick works particularly well when hosting, too. You can group ingredients by course, making it simple to prep appetizers, entrées, and desserts without a jumble of ingredients taking over your countertops, especially if you have decluttered a fridge in advance, too.
Because the bins are made from clear acrylic, you can see everything at a glance, helping prevent forgotten ingredients from going to waste while making it easy to keep track of what you have on hand. They’re also simple to wipe clean between meals, making restocking and resetting the fridge wonderfully straightforward.
What Else to Shop For Meal Prep
To help you create more space in your fridge for holiday entertaining and make the most of your meal prep, I’ve curated a selection of the best fridge organizers for a more streamlined kitchen.
All prices correct at the time of publication.
Designed to stack securely, these pull out draws maximize your storage space while keeping everything visible and easy to access.
This magnetic meal planner attaches to the front of your fridge and corresponds to your meal prep bins, taking the mental strain out of planning dinner each evening.
These freezer organizer bins require zero tools or complicated assembly. When not in use, quickly fold them flat to stash away, saving precious storage space.
This drawer slides easily onto your fridge shelving to use dead space. The built-in stainless steel balls in the slide rail make the organizer drawer open and close easily, even if the storage box is full of items. No tools required; they install in seconds.
These dry-erase labels are designed for use in the fridge, sticking to the front of your meal prep bins without peeling. Simply write the name of the meal or the day of the week for easy grab-and-go cooking.
Water-activated ink allows easy removal with water, making it easy to clean off meal planners and dry-erase labels.
To help make the rest of your hosting experience as smooth as possible, consider creating a hosting closet so everything you need is to hand when your guests arrive.
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