Food Prep Sunday

One of the most practical ways to make sure that you “pay attention” to what you eat is to take an hour or so each week at a regular time (“Food Prep Sunday”) to do two things.

1. Plan what you are going to eat for the week ahead.  Make a shopping list and buy the things you need (apart from anything you would prefer to buy fresh closer to the time you prepare a particular meal).
2. Think about what things you can do ahead of time to speed up preparation of the meals and snacks during the week.

These are some of the things you might like to prepare on the weekend (or when you have time):

• Boiled eggs – I boil up a carton of eggs to have with breakfast or for the kids’ lunches or to go in salads.  If you have a boiled egg in the fridge you will always have a mini protein hit on hand.
• Roast vegies – I cut up and roast a couple of large sweet potatoes (the purple ones are the best) and sometimes a pumpkin or beetroot.  Roast vegies always come in handy to add to salads, as a side with dinner or even for breakfast with eggs.  Roasted tofu is easy too and handy to have in the fridge.
• Pesto, nut paste, or paleo mayonaise.  These are really easy to make and they last for a couple of weeks in the fridge.   They are handy additions to salads, vegetables or protein dishes during the week.
• Healthy vegetable soup.  Make a big batch and freeze some.
• Chicken breasts or other protein for salads and kids’ lunches.
• One or two healthy meals that can be put in the fridge and heated up for an evening when time is tight – for example a shepherd’s pie topped with sweet potato, a bolognaise sauce, tacos mince, meatballs, lamb kofta.  Make a double batch and put one lot straight in the freezer.
• A quantity of quinoa for salads or side dishes or even breakfast.
• Cut up a watermelon, a pineapple or a rockmelon so its ready to serve up.

Spending a couple of hours on a Sunday doing some planning and preparation is the key to a healthy week. For weeks when you don’t get time to plan and prepare – you will have a freezer bursting with healthy meals to get you started.