Yesterday I did a quick little IG story about buying warehouse packs of meat but preparing them differently. A lot of times when I tell my clients its important to meal prep, especially if they are working and live every busy lives I know they are thinking, Great, eat the same shit day after day. This is alllll wrong! Here are some of my favorite tips to make meal prep easy and quick!
#1: Buy large packs of meat and either separate them or cook them differently. I do a bit of both. Because Matt works away and My brother works away I find it easier to separate some and leave some together. This way if we are cooking tacos for everyone I have enough and can whip up the extra meat a different way, meatballs or beef patties. Cooking chicken breast in the oven with some BBQ sauce and spices and the other half in the crock pot with hot sauce and some ranch seasoning, giving you options. This also allows you to eat similar volume and making your logging go very smooth but you’re not eating the same flavors.
#2: DON’T by every veggie and fruit under the sun. Choose what you would like for half the week and then go back or switch to frozen for the rest of the week until you hit the grocery store. Purchasing it all and hoping to eat it all before it goes bad or having 7 days off steamed broccoli is NOT going to work. Be realistic. Keep veggies simple for a quick steam or oven roast and switch up every couple of days. It honestly takes ten minutes to steam a new batch of veggies a couple nights a week. If you say you don’t have time… that’s just an excuse. You have time.
#3: Don’t use salads as your main source of veggies. Have you ever really looked at whats in your salad, lettuce. So if you are going to so salads, skip the lettuce until the end, think more of like a marinated salad. Also, don’t get caught up in the hype of eating raw veggies all the time, this can be super difficult on the tummy to digest.
#4: Make a HUGE pot of rice. I like basmati. It’s a little more “fluffy” so I don’t feel like its so heavy. Its simple to make and easy to reheat. Also precooking some potatoes for morning hash browns will cut down your time in the morning. Have you ever read the nasty ingredients on the package of what you think is just “potatoes” Gross, make your own.
#5: Use fruit that is easy to grab on the go, apples, bananas, oranges. Things that you can pretty much eat anywhere.
#6: Purchase some “snack” type foods that you feel for an emergency. Protein bars, beef jerky, rice cakes, rice crackers, anything that you can keep that won’t go bad. Ya never know when a quick trip can turn into a whole day on the run!
#7: Pick a new recipe to try a couple times a month. This will open up some new flavors and allow you to replace some of the foods you love and crave with better options. A favorite in our house is sesame seed orange chicken on rice noodles with steamed broccolini on the side. I make sure that we ALWAYS have the ingredients for the night that we are wanting to eat out but wanting to stay on our macros. Its super easy to make and so so so good!
#8: Don’t fear food. Remember Food does not MAKE you “fat” If you have to go off a bit for one meal it’s not going to be the end of the world. Prepping works great most of the time but sometimes a quick lunch meeting pops up and NO you should not take your Tupperware into the restaurant.
#9: Don’t limit yourself to a handful of foods. If you have known sensitivities you should take those foods out but if you remove a lot of foods from your diet, it’s going to get very boring and you’re going to de-rail as well as you are you going to potentially have a hard time digesting those items if you bring them back. This tends to happen a lot with individuals who eat mostly a plant-based diet and then try to reintroduce meat.
#10: Consistency=results=motivation. Yes sticking to a diet can be hard, meal planning takes time, we could go on and on about why you shouldn’t do it. But have you ever thought about how great it will be if you did finally stick to something long enough for it to work? Set yourself up for success, meal plan if you need to and keep it interesting!