The May Prep.

This is the Sunday afternoon that buys you the week. Three hours of work — most of it walking-away time, none of it complicated — and you come out the other side with six jars in the fridge and a loaf of bread on the counter.

The trick is parallelism. The broth simmers for two hours; in that two hours, you also make the sofrito (an hour), the tomato sauce (90 minutes), the lomein sauce (15 minutes), the bread dough (15 minutes of work + overnight rest), and a pickle (10 minutes of work + 24 hours of waiting). You’re not making one thing at a time — you’re juggling six.

Below is the exact schedule. I run it monthly. Each session has produced roughly the same set of outputs since I started running it in February 2026, when I finally got tired of running to the store every Tuesday at 6 p.m.

What you’ll need

• A 6-quart pot (for the broth)
• An 8-quart pot or Dutch oven (for the tomato sauce — both can simmer at the same time)
• A 5-quart pot (for the sofrito)
• A 2-quart saucepan (for the lomein sauce)
• A large mixing bowl (for the bread dough)
• A 1-quart glass jar with a tight lid (for the pickle)
• 4 × 250 mL jars, 6 × 500 mL jars, 1 × 500 mL jar (total: 11 clean jars)
• A clean kitchen towel (for the bread to rise)
• A pen — to label the jars with today’s date

You also need the ingredients for each prep. Pull the linked preps below and write a single shopping list before you start. Buying everything at once is the only sane way.

The schedule — 3 hours 30 minutes, 11 jars

0:00 — Start the broth (the longest cook)

Set up the broth. The cold-water soak with kombu and shiitake takes 30 minutes, during which you’ll start three other things. (See Mushroom-Kombu Broth.)

0:05 — Start the pickle (the fastest one)

While the kombu soaks, set up a 1-quart jar of quick pickle. Sliced radishes, 1/2 a thinly-sliced red onion, 6 sprigs of dill, 1 tbsp salt, 1 tbsp sugar, 1 cup rice vinegar, 1 cup water. Shake. Refrigerate. It’s ready in 24 hours and keeps a month. Move on.

0:10 — Start the bread dough

Mix the no-knead bread dough. 3 cups flour, 1.5 cups water, 1 tsp salt, 1/4 tsp yeast. Stir together with a wooden spoon until shaggy. Cover with a kitchen towel. It rises 12 to 18 hours unattended on the counter — set it in a corner of the kitchen and forget about it until tomorrow morning.

0:20 — Start the sofrito

Dice the onions, grate the tomatoes. Get the sofrito sweating. (See Sofrito.) The covered onion sweat is 25 minutes — during which you’ll move to the broth.

0:30 — Char the onions, build the broth

The kombu-shiitake cold soak is now ready. Char the onions for the broth (see broth recipe). Add everything to the pot. Bring up slowly. Once at a simmer, lid askew, leave it. Broth is now on auto-pilot for 90 minutes.

0:45 — Sofrito gets the tomato + paprika

Uncover the sofrito pot. Add garlic, then grated tomato, paprika, bay. Bring to a simmer. Now leaves uncovered for 30 to 35 minutes.

0:50 — Start the tomato sauce

Open the 6 cans of San Marzanos. Hand-crush. Heat oil + garlic in the 8-quart pot. Add tomatoes and salt. Bring to a simmer. Lid askew. Now on auto-pilot for 90 minutes.

You now have three pots simmering simultaneously. Time to make the fast sauce.

1:00 — Make the lomein sauce

In the 2-quart saucepan, run through the lomein recipe. (See Lomein Sauce.) Fifteen minutes start to finish. Pour into a clean 500 mL jar, label, refrigerate.

1:15 — Mid-point check, sip something

Three pots simmering. One sauce jarred. One pickle on the counter. One bread dough resting. You’re 1:15 in. The dishes you can clean now should be cleaned now — the back third of the afternoon is for jarring, not washing.

1:20 — Sofrito finish, jar

The sofrito has been uncovered for 30 minutes. Test with the wooden spoon line. If it holds 2 seconds, pull it off. Cool 10 minutes. Pour into 4 × 250 mL jars. Label.

1:30 — Slice a salad base for the week

A simple long-lasting salad base while the other two pots still simmer:

• 1 head romaine, washed, spun dry, chopped into ribbons
• 1/2 head red cabbage, finely shredded
• 1/2 a fennel bulb, finely shaved
• 1 watermelon radish or daikon, julienned
• 1 cup of cooked chickpeas (drained from one of the chickpea cans you’ll use elsewhere)

Store in a glass container with a damp paper towel on top, sealed. It keeps 5 days. Adds 30 seconds to any weeknight dinner.

2:00 — Broth strain and jar

Ninety minutes since the broth went on. Strain through cheesecloth. Add soy sauce and salt. Cool 10 minutes (or longer — broth doesn’t care). Pour into 6 × 500 mL jars. Label. Two go in the fridge for the week; four go in the freezer (lay flat in freezer bags if jars are at capacity).

2:20 — Tomato sauce finish

The tomato sauce has been at a low simmer for 90 minutes. Stir in the basil. Cool 10 minutes. Pour into 6 × 500 mL jars. Label. Two in the fridge for the week; four in the freezer.

2:40 — Stop. Clean. Sit down.

Eleven jars on the counter. Three pots still hot but emptied. A loaf of dough proofing. A salad in the fridge. A pickle on the counter starting its 24-hour clock.

Forty more minutes of cleaning. The dishes are the last act of the afternoon — pots first, while they’re still warm and the residue lifts easily, then the cutting boards, then the bowls.

You are done by 3:20. The kitchen is clean. The bread will bake tomorrow morning. Total active work: about 2 hours 45 minutes. Total elapsed: 3 hours 30.

The next morning

• 7:30 — Pull the bread dough. Shape into a round. Final rise 90 minutes.
• 9:00 — Preheat oven to 475°F. Bake the bread 45 minutes in a Dutch oven, lid on 30, off 15.
• 10:00 — One loaf of crusty bread on the counter, cooling.

Total Monday-morning involvement: 10 minutes of actual work.

What you can cook this week

With these jars, the salad, the pickle, and the bread:

• Monday: Aglio e olio with the tomato sauce (jar 1) — 15 minutes
• Tuesday: Lomein noodles + mushrooms + the lomein sauce — 12 minutes
• Wednesday: Risotto with the broth (jar 1) + sofrito (jar 1) — 30 minutes (most of it stirring)
• Thursday: Sheet-pan vegetables + bread + the salad base — 25 minutes
• Friday: Aglio e olio with the tomato sauce (jar 2) — 15 minutes
• Saturday: French onion soup with the broth (jar 2) — 60 minutes (most of it caramelizing)
• Sunday: Whatever’s left + the salad + the pickle

Seven dinners. Average actual cooking time: ~22 minutes per dinner. Total cost across all groceries: roughly $80 for a household of two. The Sunday session itself: 3.5 hours.

Cook fast on a Tuesday because you did this on a Sunday.

The line I draw

I will not skip the broth. Of every prep in this plan, the broth is the most leveraged. The 90 minutes of simmer is the difference between a Tuesday risotto that takes 20 minutes and tastes like a restaurant, and one that takes 40 minutes and tastes like rice in water. If you must skip something, skip the pickle. Never the broth.