10 Helpful Tips to Food Prep & Storage

It's pretty common to have trouble figuring out the best way to store and prepare foods that they commonly purchase. So here's 10 tips to point you in the right direction!

Nuts & Seeds
Tip #1: As soon as a nut is removed from it's shell, it begins to go rancid. Though buying nuts with their shell is ideal, I doubt that your busy life is conducive to cracking all those shells every time you want to eat a salad or oatmeal. That said, when you get your pre-shelled nuts and seeds home, put them in an airtight jar (as pictured to the left which are reused) and place the jars in the fridge or freezer. The colder the temperature, the longer they'll stay fresh. Same thing goes for nut and seed butters. If you don't have any jars around, just put the bag right in...better to keep them cold then make excuses not to do it.

Tip #2: If you want to add flaxseeds to your diet, make sure to buy them pre-ground or use your coffee grinder to do so. Your body doesn't have the capability to break down the shells, so that Omega-3 goodness is passing right through you without doing a thing when flaxseeds aren't ground up.

Beans
Tip #3: Whether you buy canned pre-cooked or uncooked dried beans, rinse them before use. Who knows what's been lurking around dried beans! Canned beans usually contain syrup-y looking water with some sediment...rinse that all off including any excess sodium that may have been added to the water.

Tip #4: When cooking beans from scratch, wait until the end to add your sea salt. Adding it in the beginning makes the beans tougher to digest.

Grains
Tip #5: Whether buying your grains from the bulk section or from a nicely labeled package, you still don't have any idea what was lurking around them. Do yourself a favor and rinse away any excess soil, dust, pebbles, etc. that may be mixed in.

Tip #6: Soaking your whole grains overnight or for a day can dramatically reduce cooking time, improve digestibility, and remove unwanted acids such as phytic acid in brown rice which leeches zinc from the body. Remember, rinse your grains before soaking and rinse them again before cooking.

Greens
Tip #7: Buy your greens still attached to the base from which they grow. This helps to maintain their freshness longer.

Fruit
Tip #8: Buy what's in season. I know that I say this a lot, but it makes such a difference. Right now, buy your apples and pears in bulk and store in the fridge until you want one. Maybe set the pears out a couple of days ahead to soften. Both store well in the cold.

Vegetables
Tip #9: Never, ever, EVER put tomatoes in the refrigerator. I cannot stress this enough. They are meant to sit on your counter out of the way of harsh sunlight. When they get too cold, tomatoes become 'mealy' in texture.

Tip #10: If you plan on using only half of an avocado on your salad or meal, make sure when you cut it in half to keep the pit in place on the side intended to be saved. The pit keeps the avocado from going bad. In certain parts of Mexico, they actually put the pit in the bottom of homemade guacamole to keep it fresh longer without needing too much citrus juice.