With the current high cost of groceries, everybody is looking for ways to cut costs, but still maintain the same high level of quality of their food and nutritional content for their meals.

Since time is a valuable commodity as well, a way to save money and time is to purchase your food items in bulk.

But how do you make your own prepackaged meals and soups?

It's simple.

Make a "Soup in a Bag," add its fresh ingredients, and you're good to go.



So what is "Soup in a Bag?"

Simply put, it's all the ingredients you need for a big (or small) pot of soup.

Although summer is right around the corner, you might not want to have the stove on for hours and hours. For this reason, I've included some soup recipes that won't take you too long to cook.

The best part of this is that you don't have to dig in all of your cabinets the next time you want to make soup; you'll be able to just pull out a proportioned bag, add a few fresh vegetables, and you're good to go.

How to make Soup in a Bag

1. First download the recipe cards (from Iowa Avenue); I've attached some cool recipes cards for each of these recipes. They are 100% printable and ready to go.


2. Next, purchase all of the required dry ingredients.


3. Make sure to properly measure the amount of necessary ingredients and then put them into the proper bags. You'll have a Lentil Soup Bag, a Split Pea Soup bag, and a Quinoa Soup bag. Or you can make multiple bags of each and then store it to have on hand.


4. Each of the attached recipes has a similar vegetable base of onion, celery, and carrots, all of which are cooked with 1 or 2 tablespoons of vegetable or canola oil. For the most part, these basic ingredients are in your house all the time.


5. Purchase the additional ingredients, such as crushed tomatoes, frozen spinach, potatoes, or cabbage, and have them in your freezer or pantry.

Lastly, to jazz up these recipes, you're welcome to add more spices and fresh herbs like dill, cilantro, or thyme.

What type of time and money saving ideas do you use for your meals? Do you work to ensure that you have the proper nutrition and ingredients even with your busy schedule?

About the author: Lisa Newton is founder of IowaAvenue.com and HealthyLifestyleBloggers.