Keeping yourself on track with both a health and fitness routine and a full-time job are pretty difficult things to do. We usually fall off the wagon when life gets too busy and suddenly we’re starving and find ourselves in line at the McDonalds Drive through ordering a “McHeart-Attack Deluxe”. Over the past few months Lauren and I have weened ourselves off of fast food, and most prepared foods in general, and have found that our biggest challenge to eating healthy are those moments when we look at each other and say, what’s for dinner? To combat that we’ve taken some steps for healthy meal planning and use our down time to prepare food for those moments where we find ourselves with no time at all.
One of the problems that we have is that neither of us like typically “easy to prepare” foods like pre-made frozen foods. That means that when we cook, there’s usually a lot of veggie chopping and prep involved along with cooking time. This was just as true for us when we were working in retail and still is true as full-time travelers. One day we finally figured it out! What if we could get all of our cooking done for the whole week in just one day? Well, we tried it and it worked like a charm! Here are a few things that we’ve learned along the way.
Planning is Key
Making this work requires a little bit of forethought and commitment. You’ve got to sit down and pencil out a rough idea of what you want your week to look like food wise. Now you can get all crazy and cross reference recipes, coupons, and grocery store ads if you want, or just write down what you want to eat. The key here is to think a little like a restaurant manager and make a bunch of dishes that all use the same types of ingredients. That way you can save money by buying in bulk and you are prepping the same things.
Go Shopping
When you get to the grocery store stay on the outside of the store. Seriously, everything in the middle of the store is packed full of preservatives and chemicals. Also make sure you don’t go to the grocery store on an empty stomach. I know that sounds goofy, but it’s a lot easier to buy healthy things like fruits, veggies, and whole ingredients and skip over that bag of Oreo’s when your stomach isn’t growling.
Prep- Time!
Once you get back from the store the real work begins. Take the time right now, as you are unpacking your groceries to seperate your meats and veggies for each dish. Then start all of your prep cooking. Take the meats for each meal and separate them into zip loc baggies and add whatever seasonings or marinade you want. Then throw it in the fridge or freezer. Do the same with baggies of your different veggies. Now when you need to cook on a Wednesday Night all you need to do is pull out your little baggies and viola, you have dinner more than half made.
Cook Big and Cook Once!
If you want to take this idea one step further, start cooking some of your meals immediately too. Lauren and I do this all the time with dishes like stews and soups that keep well in the freezer as well as sides like black beans. We will also do this for large roasts like a whole chicken or a pot roast. Then we’ll use the leftover chicken for things like chicken salad sammies or the pot roast for a salad topping or fajitas. We just did this over our weekend when we made a huge pot of stew. We had some for dinner that same night, then followed the next tip on our list.
Pack it Up!
Now there’s no real secret to packing up and saving leftovers, we’ve all done that for years. The trick is HOW you pack them. If you put all your leftovers in one big tub, it’s not very convenient when it comes time for that quick meal, or packing your lunch for work. What we do, is divide up all of our leftovers into single serving containers immediately. This gives us the chance to measure it all out and helps with portion control. It also allows us to throw some containers in the fridge and some into the freezer. Then after cooking a couple of big meals, we now have a variety of meals to choose from when we are on the go, preservative and artificial ingredient free.
