Budget meal prep for Indian kitchens

By the FeedMeNot team. Updated 20 October 2026.

Most weeknight orders happen because cooking from scratch feels like too much. Meal prep takes that effort out of the evening. You do the heavy part once and assemble meals in ten minutes after that.

The Sunday hour

Pick three or four bases and cook them together. Here is a plan that suits most Indian kitchens:

• One pot of dal or rajma or chole. Cooks while you do other things.
• A big batch of rice or a pot of khichdi base. Cool it quickly before storing.
• One dry sabzi. Cauliflower, beans, capsicum or cabbage hold up well for two or three days.
• A chopped vegetable box. Onions, tomatoes, peppers and green chillies ready for quick cooking.
• A masala or chutney. Coriander or mint chutney turns plain food into a meal.

Storage basics

Cool food before it goes in the fridge, use airtight boxes and eat cooked food within about three days. Freeze what you will not eat by then, such as dal or cooked rajma. Reheat until steaming hot.

Weeknight combinations

• Dal, rice and the dry sabzi.
• Rice with dal, a fried egg and chutney.
• Roti with sabzi and curd.
• Veg pulao made from the rice, chopped vegetables and a spoon of masala.
• Chole or rajma with toasted bread or rice.

Keep a few emergency meals

Stock things that cook fast: eggs, poha, oats, instant dosa batter and frozen peas. When you are too tired for anything else, these still beat a Rs 400 order.

Count the saving

Estimate the cost of a home meal against a typical delivery total. Even a modest gap, repeated a few times a week, adds up over a year. The spend calculator shows the number for your own pattern.

For the nights you still crave an order

Meal prep does not remove cravings. For those nights, a pretend order in FeedMeNot lets you browse and wait for a rider while your real dinner reheats.

Common questions

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