My meal planning centers around a constant struggle between wanting to cook food at home and debating whether I have enough time to make something from scratch. Even without children, a dog, or many commitments beyond work and socializing, I frequently find myself short on time in the kitchen, so I can’t imagine how people with obligations must feel.

From pre-marinated proteins to jarred pasta saucesI rely heavily on shortcuts to cook delicious meals quickly. Don’t get me wrong; when I have a full day to prepare for a dinner party, I love dicing a mountain of mirepoix and slowly simmering something according to exact recipe instructions, but that’s not realistic on many weeknights. Instead, I often turn to TikTok hacks.

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The prevalence of cooking content on social media has given us millions of ideas for what to cook and how to prepare it. Many are terrible, but some are surprisingly smart, and a select few suggestions have even become a regular part of my meal prep strategy. Here are five of my favorite hacks for saving time while cooking, all courtesy of TikTok.

Shred your rotisserie chicken in a bag

Picking up a rotisserie chicken from the grocery store is already an easy way to cut down on cooking time, but you can speed things up even . Instead of painstakingly cutting the meat off the chicken, many content creators have showcased their favorite way to quickly debone it: putting the rotisserie chicken in a Ziploc bag.

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Squeeze any air out of the bag, close it tightly, then roll the chicken on your countertop while pressing down on it. The meat should separate from the bones fairly quickly; once all the meat has come loose, transfer it to a bowl and remove the bones. As an added bonus, this technique will help you get meat off the chicken, so none of it goes to waste.

Stop peeling shells when making egg salad

To me, few make-ahead meals are better than egg salad. It’s high-protein, good on a sandwich or scooped with chips and veggies, and it’s just plain delicious. At the same time, the prospect of peeling an entire carton of eggs has historically kept me from making a big batch every week — until I learned this trick.

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In lieu of boiling whole eggs, content creators have demonstrated how to bake eggs without their shells, so they don’t need to peel them later. Crack the eggs into a well-greased, oven-safe container, such as a cake or loaf pan. Set that container in a larger pan and add water to the bigger vessel, creating a water bath that surrounds the eggs. (The water bath is optional, but it yields a softer texture that comes closer to boiled eggs.)

Bake the eggs until they’re firm throughout, then remove them from the pan. You can chop the protein without spending 30 minutes on tedious peeling.

Core a head of iceberg lettuce easily

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This hack will only save you a few seconds, but when you’re prepping dinner in a rush, every second matters. Most importantly, this trick for quickly coring a head of iceberg lettuce will make breaking down the leafy green a little easier.

It’s not a new technique, but it’s all over social media, and it actually works. As dozens of influencers have demonstrated, after banging a head of iceberg lettuce on the counter — with the core facing down and hitting the hard surface — you can simply twist and remove the core; no quartering or carving out is needed.

Give yourself the gift of minced garlic at any time

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If you hate peeling and mincing garlic cloves every time you need them, or find yourself often skipping garlic in a dish because you’re in a rush, this strategy will help you add flavor to meals without having to chop an allium every time you cook. It does require a little preparation in advance, but using a weekend afternoon to set yourself up for success later is worth it.

To start, you’ll need to snag a large container of pre-peeled garlic cloves; you can find these at bulk stores like Costco and Sam’s Club, or pick up several smaller containers of peeled garlic from most other major grocery chains. Pulse the garlic in a food processor until finely minced, then transfer it to a gallon-sized Ziploc bag. Remove as much air as you can from the bag, seal it tightly, then flatten the garlic into a thin layer.

Next, use a chopstick or the back of a long knife to score indented lines through the garlic, dividing it into sections of about two square inches each. This makes the garlic squares easy to separate later, so you can store the bag in your freezer and break off a single serving of the allium whenever you need it.

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Use your rice cooker for than just rice

This isn’t a recommendation for one specific rice cooker meal, but rather an endorsement of the appliance’s ability to cook than just a grain. TikTok is full of easy rice cooker recipes that use the tool as a set-it-and-forget-it method for making dinner in one pot. Most rice cooker meals are also customizable, so if you don’t have time to chop vegetables, you can use frozen ones instead. Use the time it takes to cook the meal to get something else on your to-do list done, then eat dinner straight from the rice cooker to reduce cleanup.