Vacation Meal Prep
Recently, my family had the opportunity to go to Disney world for a week with our closest friends. It was an absolute blast! Our group totaled nine people and we had planned to stay in two condos. Unlike hotels, condos normally do not offer complimentary breakfasts. We also knew we would want to be able to grab something quickly in the mornings on our way to the parks. I decided meal prepping breakfast food was our best option!
The week before we left, I set to work. I’ll go ahead and admit that I slightly over prepped food, but I would rather have too much than too little anyway! Each day that week, I picked one food to focus on that day for prepping. It was not overwhelming and all of the recipes are very simple. I knew I wanted foods that were easy to grab, not packed with sugar, but were still filling. Make sure to click on the food below to find the link to the recipe!
Here is a breakdown of what I prepped:
- 16 homemade biscuits
- 18 croissant egg, ham, and cheese sandwiches
- 24 blueberry muffins
- 24 banana muffins
- 18 chicken sausage links
- 1 gallon of cold brew coffee
- 1 pint of vanilla syrup for coffee
- *Bonus lentil soup and french bread to have when we returned home
Tip #1: For the croissant sandwiches, you want to make sure the eggs are completely cooled before assembling the sandwiches. Once assembled, wrap tightly in plastic wrap then place in freezer.
Everything else on the list except for the coffee and syrup went into the freezer. I did this by making each item, letting it cool completely, then flash freezing it.
Tip #2: To flash freeze, you simply lay out your food on a large cookie sheet without the food touching. Sit in the freezer for about 30 minutes until the food begins to slightly freeze. Then add to a bag or freezer container. Flash freezing helps prevent the food from sticking to each other in your freezer containers.
*The lentil soup was made in a crockpot before we left then added to quart freezer containers and frozen for when we returned. Such a lifesaver to have a comfort meal to come home to!
To reheat:
When it came time to reheat everything in the condo, the process was simple! Everyone grabbed what they wanted for breakfast, wrapped it in a paper towel, then microwaved it for 1 to 3 minutes. And ta-da! A warm breakfast in no time.
Coffee:
The most important part for me was the coffee! I love my cold brew and knew everyone else loved coffee in the morning too. This had to be planned ahead more than the others as cold brew takes about 24 hours to make. I began making this a week before we left and just added each batch to a gallon container. You can warm up cold brew as well and it tastes delicious! The vanilla syrup was brought along as a way to sweeten the cold brew since sugar does not dissolve in cold liquid. A recipe for this is included below!
Extra food and drinks:
- Bagels
- Bread loaf
- Cereal
- Cream cheese
- Apples
- Grapes
- Bananas
- Perfect Bar Protein Bars
- Granola bars
- Trail mix
- Chocolate chip cookies
- Peanut butter
- Jelly
- Orange juice
- Milk
- Creamer
As mentioned above, we did not eat all of the food. I brought back about two dozen muffins, half the biscuits, some cereal, apples, bread, sausage links, and a few bagels. This was still cheaper and easier than eating out for breakfast every morning. And we were able to continue snacking on food once we got home!
The cookies listed above were made mainly as a car ride snack for the road trip. It’s always fun to have a nice little treat to surprise the girls with when we are traveling!
Vanilla Simple Syrup Recipe:
In a medium sauce pan, combine 1 cup of water with 1 cup of sugar over medium high heat. Stir constantly until the sugar dissolves completely. Remove from heat and stir in 1 tsp vanilla extract. Let cool completely before transferring to refrigerator. Just add to your coffee when you are ready to enjoy!
If you have anymore questions about meal prep or vacationing, please ask away! I love questions and will answer them the best that I can. I hope this post was helpful for you!
