After moving in with my husband, I had a long commute. I would have to leave the house by 5:45am and I would get home at about 7:00 or 8:00 most nights. If I went to the gym I was out of the house by 4:45. A couple nights a week it was after 9:00. Weekends were spent cleaning, doing laundry, and setting up life so that we could survive the week. One vital piece was food prepping. It seems everyone talks about it but I can tell you it is how we didn’t starve or live off fast food and we still do it to an extent now because it just saves so much time and stress.
I keep seeing a post going around Facebook that says something about the hardest part of being an adult is deciding what to eat for dinner every day for the rest of your life. When you get home from a LONG day at work it is nice to already have that decided. Although we often would have more than one choice for most nights. Sometimes it is difficult to decide what to have for the week but that’s where the good ol’ Pinterest comes in. Even scrolling through all the recipes I pinned years ago would spark ideas and inspire the week’s menu. Plus, food prepping helped me avoid all the foods that don’t agree with my body and the ones that people should probably be avoiding in the first place, or at least only enjoying occasionally.
I now work fifteen minutes away from home and get home around 4:00 on the days I don’t stay late or have anything in the evening. Monday is my only night where I am busy and I have a side hustle of tutoring which keeps me out until about 8:00 but that changes every so often. Still, food preparation on the weekends is key, even if it is just coming up with a plan for the week.
Last year with the commute and working out in the mornings I was hungry earlier in the day. I used to not really eat breakfast and would last till lunch but the added time awake and pushing my lunch hour back an hour caused me to have to start eating breakfast more. Now that I’m pregnant I have to eat breakfast… and second breakfast. These “egg muffins” are a quick and easy go to. Normal people might just call them mini quiche. I don’t use a specific recipe but there are a lot of ideas on Pinterest. I start with sausage or bacon, scramble eggs, toss in some veggies if they sound good and bake. They do get old sometimes or I don’t feel like cooking them so I’ll mix it up with a scramble and some roasted sweet potatoes. Or, some other random breakfast item. Pregnancy has included a lot of oatmeal because it is easy to toss some in my lunch box and eat it when I get hungry and last till the next day if I don’t.
Lunches used to consist of salads. I really would survive on a pure protein diet but feel like I should get some veggies in once in awhile. So, lunch would start with lettuce, veggies that were on sale and typically some meat left over from the weekend food prepping. I would also toss in a hard boiled egg to help with extra protein to stay fuller longer. Salads get old some weeks too but then I just grab extra dinner prep and take that instead. This year it seems to be less salads and more leftovers just because I feel like warm food or something that is more filling.
Dinners can be all sorts of things and we started this year strong with the food prepping. I was down with “morning” sickness. Side note: Pretty sure it wasn’t a woman who named it that, she would have named it something like “death sickness” or “pure torture daily flu.” My poor husband would prep what I said sounded good on the weekend but by Tuesday I couldn’t stomach any of it. One week all that sounded good was canned soup, not even homemade. Another it was only potatoes, the only thing I actually have cravings for. But the weekends would make so many tasty dishes sound delicious.
Luckily now it has gotten better so prepping is working again. We also stopped preparing for the entire week and instead get one or two nights worth taken care of and have ingredients in the fridge. This week the husband was out of town for most of it but it is still a good example. I had stuffed squash in the fridge left over from the weekend, a delicious tom kha gai soup, and some meatballs and spaghetti squash. Plus there was a package of chicken which was planned for chicken in a roasted red pepper sauce. Friday the husband was home and leftovers were gone so it was chicken night! But, by the end of the day nachos sounded better. It wouldn’t be difficult to turn the chicken into nacho meat except that between 2:30 and 5:00 I went from excited and full of energy to napping on the couch. Plus, the heartburn that kicked in early didn’t make anything seem appetizing. Then when I did find some leftovers to eat I couldn’t seem to eat enough. Making a human is hard work.
So, how do I recommend starting to food prep? Start small. If you’re new to it plan out one thing for the week. Maybe it is lunch to pack and save money from going out daily? What do you normally go out for? See if you can make that and pack it. Just for three or four days the first week maybe? Or plan a dinner for one night that week. When you cook, cook a double batch and put the leftovers in containers for lunch or dinners later. Need ideas? I always start by checking the weekly ads and seeing what is on sale. It helps to save some money but also might provide inspiration. Chicken on sale? What’s your favorite chicken dish?
I’ll be posting more soon about meal prepping as I’ll be getting to work on it again this weekend and will be sure to share my thoughts. For now follow me on Pinterest to see some of the recipes I use even if it is just for an idea. I’ll be working on posting more to my Facebook page too so be sure to stop by and follow me there!