Chef Shares Holiday Meal Prep Secrets to Avoid Kitchen Stress

As the holiday eve approaches and guest lists grow, the pressure to prepare a large feast can be overwhelming. Chef Eitan Mizrahi, who also handles nutrition for the Israeli national football team, offers advice to avoid spending the entire holiday in the kitchen. He emphasizes a relaxed approach, starting with menu planning before shopping.

Mizrahi recommends a focused menu, suggesting four to five well-prepared appetizers and two excellent main courses to avoid complexity and expense. He advises purchasing meat and fish three days in advance, and vegetables two days prior, to maintain freshness. The day before the holiday is ideal for time-consuming prep work like chopping and peeling, keeping the kitchen clean for the actual day.

Dishes like beef stews and braised meats benefit from being made a day ahead, allowing flavors to meld and textures to improve. Conversely, fresh salads should be prepared closer to serving time to ensure they remain crisp. Mizrahi also outlines a strategic approach to reheating food, warming dishes sequentially according to the meal's progression, soup first, then fish, and finally meat, to prevent drying out or burning.

Setting the holiday table and preparing serving dishes should be done the evening before. Mizrahi suggests matching serving platters to specific dishes and labeling them to streamline the process on the day of the event. He concludes by recommending a schedule that begins with salad preparation two hours before the meal and reheating side dishes and mains an hour prior, ensuring hosts can enjoy the celebration with their guests.