Use this tip from French cooking to be more efficient

Gather what you need before you start

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:03):
Welcome to Before Breakfast, a production of iHeartRadio. Good Morning.
This is Laura. Welcome to the Before Breakfast podcast. Today's
tip is to use the French cooking technique of meson
plas to be more efficient at all things. It is

(00:27):
good to be prepared, and by setting the stage before
you undertake projects, you will feel less stressed as you
get more done. So. In the questions after our recent
speech of mine, an audience member asked about the concept
of meson plas and whether it applied to productivity and

(00:48):
time management. Now, I did not know that I was
going to be quizzed about French and cooking, but I
love this concept and I think it's a good one.
On plas means to set in place or gather and
fancy French restaurants, chefs pull together all their ingredients and

(01:09):
equipment and organize them before they begin cooking. Now, as
someone who has had to drive to the grocery store
in the middle of cooking dinner, I'll admit that I
don't necessarily follow this in my kitchen, but it is
a good mindset for anything that requires a lot of
moving parts. For instance, let's say that you are generally

(01:32):
responsible for getting three kids out the door in the morning.
You could be running around all over the place finding
shoes and backpacks and coats. But what if the children's shoes, coats,
and backpacks are always gathered in the mudroom or foyer
or whatever space is right by the door where you exit.

(01:53):
You will be able to grab your things and leave
in a far more calm fashion. Let's say you have
a big meeting coming up. You could walk in and
realize that you haven't read everything, or that a key
person didn't get a key document. You might waste time
and not accomplish what you meant to. But if you

(02:14):
have copies of any important documents and summaries to hand
to people if they haven't read something, and you have
gathered any extra information you might need for the meeting
before it starts, you'll be more prepared. You won't be
doing the metaphorical equivalent of running to the store because
you realize you're out of eggs. I'd recommend doing something

(02:36):
similar for a trip that requires a lot of special equipment.
As we discussed on a recent episode. I'm not a
huge fan of packing too far before packing like email,
expands to fill the available space. But if you're say, skiing,
best to lay out the entire outfit, including mittens and goggles,

(02:57):
so you know you've got it all. You're running a marathon,
best to lay things out so you know you have
your socks and sunglasses now. It might not be a
disaster if you don't. My husband and I once went
to Walmart in a town where we were racing to
get running pants, but best to avoid it if possible.

(03:18):
In most cases, we are going to be smart enough
to figure something out if we're not prepared. But generally
it's better to be prepared, So measure out your ingredients
and lay them out that way. When you start cooking,
it's all smooth sailing from there. In the meantime, this
is Laura. Thanks for listening, and here's to making the

(03:41):
most of our time. Thanks for listening to Before Breakfast.
If you've got questions, ideas, or feedback, you can reach
me at Laura at Laura vandercam dot com. Before Breakfast

(04:05):
is a production of iHeartMedia. For more podcasts from iHeartMedia,
please visit the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you
listen to your favorite shows.