Meat for all Seasons: Meal prepping at its finest

I’m one of those people who mostly buys food in small quantities. At home, it’s just me and my fiance and I don’t like a crowded fridge so I only buy the produce I plan to cook for the week. This is why I go meat shopping at least twice a week. While this process will yield you a less cluttered fridge, it can get time consuming or just plain inconvenient in the wake of all these winter storms we've been having. If my fiance wasn't opposed to most vegetables, I think I’d be a wintertime vegetarian.

I finally decided to get smart about my meat shopping last weekend. I purchased a large pack of boneless skinless chicken thighs and decided to season them all at once so I wouldn't have to worry about that on weeknights. Then I thought, well, I don’t want to eat the same thing every night – I’ll separate portions and then season each batch differently. The wonderful thing about chicken is that it’s so versatile, it’ll take on whatever flavors you add to it, so even though you’re eating the same protein, you’re experiencing different flavors if you change up the seasoning.

I tackled this head on. I lined my counter tops with plastic wrap to protect the surface and cleaned the chicken by lightly rinsing it with some unfiltered apple cider vinegar. Then I separated them into different sections on the surface and washed my hands. I took out and uncapped all of the spices, oils and seasonings I planned to use. Next, I added sea salt and pepper to each portion as well as their individual spices – without rubbing them in yet. Afterwards, I took out four different freezer bags, labeled them, opened them and set them aside.  Then I went in, seasoning each of the four sections and rinsing my hands in between.

When I was done, I just put the seasoned chicken in its matching bag and stored them in the freezer and fridge. Clean up was as easy as putting the spices away and removing the plastic wrap from the counter top.

While, I just eyeballed the seasoning, I’ll share with you the spices I used for each batch.

Dominican Sofrito Chicken:

• Salt
• Pepper
• Lime juice
• Oregano
• Dominican sofrito
• Canola oil

French Lemon Chicken:

• Salt
• Lemon Zest
• Lemon Pepper
• Lemon extract
• Herbes de Provence
• Minced freeze dried shallots (you can also use onion powder)
• Lemon juice
• Minced garlic
• Grape seed oil

Spanish Paprika Chicken:

• Salt
• Pepper
• Paprika
• Minced garlic
• Cumin
• Onion powder
• Olive oil

Indian Yogurt Chicken:

• Salt
• Pepper
• Garam Masala
• Sweet curry powder
• Ground coriander
• Turmeric
• Avocado oil
• Plain fat free Greek yogurt

Some questions you may have:

1) Why did I use oil with the seasoning? Oil helps prevent freezer burn while being a good catalyst for the flavors to meld together.

2) Why did I use different types of oil? I tried to use oils that meld best with the seasonings provided. Canola oil is very common in Dominican cooking, while grape seed oil is heavily used in France and it's light flavor wouldn't mask the aroma of the lemon. Olive oil is common in Spanish cuisine. I used avocado oil for the Indian chicken because I felt that it was strong enough to stand up to the curry flavors without making it taste Mediterranean like how olive oil would.