Yesterday I spent several hours cooking and doing food prep for the week. I wrote out a list of things I might want to eat this week and I set about making them all ahead of time so I would be prepared for the week with healthy things on hand to eat. I’ve been doing this on a small scale every Sunday and wanted to ramp up my efforts a bit to make sure this week is a good week.
The biggest win of the whole day yesterday? I did this all while a yummy strawberry cream cheese cake was sitting nearby. Instead of pouncing on the cake like part of me wanted to, I controlled my compulsive eating side and focused on making healthy foods to fuel my body. I let my brother enjoy the cake instead.
I was extremely proud of ignoring the cake and preparing healthy foods for the week.
I cooked and prepared:
Protein Muffins
Tuna Salad
Chicken
Quinoa
Sweet Potatoes
Spicy Kale Chips
Cut Peppers
I like the food prep Sunday thing I have going on. It helped me get my breakfast and lunch and snacks for today ready in less than 5 minutes. Plus I can do the same thing several more days! With only a few tweaks I can use the basic foods I made in yummy and different healthy meals. Food prep for the week is an awesome idea!
Do you do a weekly food prep day? What do you normally prepare?
Great job preparing all the food and ignoring the cheese cake! :)
During the academic year (I teach), I prep a lot of food on Sunday. I roast a lot of veggies, wash and assemble salads, cook pasta (I know it seems it is so quick, but it helps so much!!!), grill chicken and salmon or other fish, boil eggs, cut up fruit…. It makes a HUGE difference! I feel less stressed, and we always eat better when I do a lot of prep on Sunday!
Way to go!!! Good job on the cake! Nibbling while preparing food is a bad habit for me too. I don’t have a food prep day, but I make sure I always have more portions of what I cook to put in the freeze. That way, it’s easy for me to put the container in the fridge in the morning, and hop just have to reheat when I come back from work. I also try to have cooked rice or quinoa on hand, so easy for lunch, I only need to add fresh or frozen veggies and some proteins. Have a good week Mary!
I do this kind of thing a lot on Sundays, too. If nothing else, I at least bake some muffins to keep in the freezer to heat up for breakfasts and cook meat for the week’s meals. I also make my meal plan for the week.
Wow, way to go on the cheesecake front!
I don’t normally do any food prep to prepare myself for the week but seeing all of the awesome stuff you’ve made I might have to start!
I tried to make kale chips once but they didn’t turn out :( Mine were bitter and soggy even though I made sure they were dry. What’s your secret and how do you spice them?
I don’t think I have a secret or anything. I lay them out on a pan and lightly spray them with olive oil spray (you can skip this even but I like them better with a list mist of it) then season them. The batch I made had onion powder, salt, pepper, and red ground pepper for a kick. They are crispy and yummy!
I do my food prep the night before. I enjoy being in the kitchen a little bit every night. Those protein muffins look yummy. When I was pregnant I use to make the meals every Sunday and freeze them for the week.
I do think ahead a few days but since I am looking for work & not working, I don’t have to be quite where you are yet BUT I still make for a few days for sure. I LOVE my homemade protein muffins & bars – portable & ready to go in a pinch for any mini meal if necessary! Even a snack. ;-)
Love the look of your food!
I usually do hummus, a grain like quinoa, millet or rice, and some veggies. Then I just add some protein and I am set. I’ve also been adding a sauce lately. Usually based on the Mama Pea mmm sauce recipe! Yum.
Wow, you’ve given me the kick I needed to start thinking (and doing of course) this!
It makes so much sense and your photos show how good all the food looks. I would look forward to eating all that this week – can you send me some ;)
Ok, this post has inspired me !
I have a new goal for Sept…food prep!
I love the idea of having sweet pot,
rice/quinoa, etc ready to go!
Smart cookie you are :)
Hehe. Thanks! I got the idea from someone else though I chose different foods than they did. Already I’ve noticed it’s SUPER HELPFUL to have sweet potatoes and quinoa cooked already. Those two take a while so it’s nice to be able to just throw them in a dish already done! Saves so much time each night/morning!
There is nothing more awesome than having stuff you’ll need all ready to go. I love to throw a batch of fat trimmed chicken breasts into the crock pot and let them fall apart to use for sandwiches, pizza toppings, quesadillas, etc. Every Sunday night we prepare all of the fruits and veggies for the week (I eat a TON of them) and I dice up stuff for easy prep like onions, red peppers, jalapenos and zucchini. I just put all of those thing in my fritta for breakfast this morning and in 3 minutes they were cooked and ready for the eggs. Love it!
I’m really wishing I had a crock pot here. There were several things I wanted to make in a crock pot but since I don’t have one I had to let them go. When I get back to NZ I’ll definitely be making some crock pot stuff!
I definitely need get to planning. Prepping food on a sunday for the week is a great idea and so practIcal. As I am getting back on track I definitely needed to read this.
Hey! It’s so good to hear from you!! :)
Congrats on skipping the cheesecake. I am at my weakest around lucky charms cereal or peanut butter and chocolate ice cream.
I have dropped 50 pounds in the last 12 months and have learned to skip over high calorie snacks for healthy options. I have never tried kale chips so I am looking forward to trying them out soon. Have a great day
Every single time I go grocery shopping, I come home & cut up all my vegetables. This usually consists of de-stemming & slicing kale, slicing mushrooms & peppers, onions, zucchini, cutting corn off of the cob, etc. & placing them in tupperware. I also regularly make brown rice to store & pinto beans. Every time I run out of more rice (or vegetables, etc.) I just make or buy more! It’s become such a habit for me, & it’s SO essential that I do this so when it comes time to make a meal & don’t have an excuse to not throw in vegetables because I don’t want to cut them up-it’s already done!
Hi Mary, I haven’t done a weekly prep. This foods looks flavorful, I wanted to make those foodies too. I hope you can post the recipes specially the protein muffins. It’s inspiring to bake or cook with a read of a post like this. I’ll be looking forward to more of you’re healthy ways and achieve your goal. :)