It's that time of year when the days get chillier and darker for longer. A time when we naturally turn in earlier, eat out less, and stay in more. This time of year is perfect for turning on the oven and devoting time for healthy meals. But who's got the time!?
In our busy lives, it's easy to give the boot to eating healthy meals because of the meal prep. In this post, I'd like to offer a few tricks of the trade to making meal prep easy, relaxing, and fun!
1. Decide what to eat -- for me this is always the hardest part. I often gravitate towards the same 10 foods at the grocery store and stick to my staple routine of oatmeal and roasted veggies. But sometimes I like a little more adventure in my life. Check out some of my favorite whole-foods plant based blogs:
**Choose only 2-3 recipes per week**
2. Shop -- head to the grocery store ready to conquer the world. A trick for staying focused and nourished at the grocery store is to shop the perimeter of the store first. This is where all of the whole, unprocessed foods live. Then venture inward for the extras. **Buy enough ingredients per meal to feed each mouth 3 times. This means, double or triple the recipes so that each person gets 3 servings.
3. Prep -- this step gets individualized based on time and energy. If both time and energy are lacking, start by chopping all the produce, place in containers, and come back later. If you're ready to cook, follow your recipe and go big! Serve what you want and save the rest for later in the week.
Making large quantities of healthy meals helps to save money by eating out less. Helps to make healthy decisions throughout the week because the food is already made. And saves time, so that you can do more things that bring you joy.
Keep an eye out for my blog post next week on cheap, easy, wholesome recipes to keep up the healthy meal momentum!