Last weekend, my wife and I enjoyed a day at the brewery. Eating out is fun as hell — no dishes, no cooking. But I've scrubbed my fair share of dishes in my day.

In month 2 of culinary school, our instructor made us wash and hand dry anything we used. We’d spend 16 hours in the Coast Guard training kitchen in California, learning a new skill and recipe daily. At the end of each day he’d check the drying rack. If there was even a single piece of kitchenware with a droplet of water in it, we had to redo the ENTIRE shelf. Sometimes that meant 100+ items. Sucked. Especially after a long day. But it taught us attention to detail. And cleaning as we go.

If those dishes stacked up, we were much more likely to have some with a droplet of water on them. We’d get overwhelmed and someone would rush through drying a cup that was hard to push a dry towel into. I still have nightmares about spraying scalding hot water into a ladle the first time.

The method we learned to mitigate the wrath of our instructor is called “clean as you go”. Instead of letting 100 dirty dishes pile up, all to be washed and dried at the same time — simply do this process every 25 dishes or so.

This same concept applied to every part of running a high volume kitchen.

After enough reps working this way, it became like a reflex.

In month 3 of culinary school, our cohort is in charge of feeding the entire Coast Guard training center. Around 500 people a meal. 1,500 meals total on any given day. This meant no screwing up, or the base operations might come to a stop. Nobody likes training for intense search & rescue operations on an empty stomach. Our team were either the heroes of the day for serving 3 delicious hot meals, or we were getting lined up to walk the plank on the next ship leaving.

At first our team was a bit clumsy. Stumbling through cooking enough meals at this scale. But as we progressed (after messing up enough), it became like a carefully orchestrated ballet in the galley. Just as graceful. Less spandex.

Everyone knew their position and executed with precision. Any item that was taken out of the utility closet was put back in its place as soon as it was done being used. The kitchen counters were sparkling clean the entire day. And you could literally eat off the floor at any given hour.

This “simple” strategy of cleaning up as you go made our galley an efficient machine.

All of this compounds. And this is exactly how I run my kitchen in my own home. It’s a boring meal strategy that actually works.

You can use this same strategy to keep your week of meal planning running at a high level. Sure, you’re not producing 1,500 meals a day. But you are making 100+ tough decisions daily and running your household. Whether it’s non-stop zoom meetings, running your kids around town, or hours of heads down work.

Same goes for dinner. If you let the decision pile up to 5pm every night, you're scrubbing 100 dishes at once. Decide on Sunday, and the week runs itself.

This is a rule to put in place that you ALWAYS follow. That way you do it on auto pilot every day, even on the days you're too tired to think. It'll become a reflex after enough reps.