6 Secrets from Meal-Prep Masters

Most of the meal-planning gurus we talked to have superbusy lives, yet they realize putting in two or three hours of cooking on a Sunday will save them hours later in the week. Merrill Stubbs, co-founder of Food52 and co-author, with Amanda Hesser, of the new book, Food52: A New Way to Dinner, says that once you add up how much time you'd spend on chores, such as chopping onions, peeling garlic and washing cutting boards on Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday (and maybe even beyond), you'll realize it makes more sense to do it all in one fell swoop. "In the end, your net time spent is going to be less," she says.