If you’re looking for one major secret to making progress with your health and fitness goals, look no further. The answer, quite simply, is food prep.
Whether you love it or hate it, food prep is a seriously useful tool (if not the most useful tool) for ensuring that you hit your dietary goals which in turn helps you achieve your health and body goals.
It is important that you are always well prepared with a healthy, nutritious meal to stay on track, but it can be difficult to keep up with all of the cooking and washing up especially with a family and other work and life responsibilities.
Food prep doesn’t need to be time-consuming or boring, and neither does the food you eat.
The following tips will help you to master the art of prep and enjoy your food with minimal stress.
SHOP SMART & BUY IN BULK
Prep is all about being organised, so it’s no use walking into a supermarket, with no shopping list. Take 10 minutes to write down exactly what you need to get and then don’t deviate from it.
If possible, buy in bulk to save money and when you return home, portion things up that won’t keep for long and put them in the freezer.
For example, dice up chicken, beef, fish into zip lock bags before freezing. You could even marinade them like this to get ahead.
Frozen vegetables are fantastic when it comes to food prep and avoiding food waste – and because they are picked fresh, triple washed and immediately frozen they retain a lot of the nutrients that fresh vegetables can lose hanging around on the shelf.
COOK IN BULK & USE YOUR FREEZER
This is another major time-saving tip. Certain dishes and food types will freeze well and better than others so research and choose carefully. Things like chilli, bolognese, broths, soups and stews work incredibly well. What I tend to do is block out a bit of my weekend, get cooking, portion it out and freeze.
USE A SLOW COOKER AND/OR NINJA MULTI COOKER
When you have a busy schedule, fitting in a few hours of food prep every week can be a challenge. That’s where your slow cooker comes in handy. Fill it up in the morning with diced vegetables, a protein of your choice and a little stock and leave it cooking throughout the day so you have a pot of delicious food to come home to.
I’m a bit new to the Ninja Multi-Cooker trend but I’ve heard lots of great things about it. Again healthy saves you a lot of time and minimal washing up. It gets the thumbs up from me!
HAVE SNACKS AT THE READY
If you get hungry or peckish you don’t want to be tempted by unhealthy alternatives hence the importance of having snacks at the ready. You could prepare some CACAO PISTACHIO & ALMOND ENERGY BALLS or simply slice up some vegetables and store them in zip lock bags in the fridge. You could also pre-portion nuts into small containers or bags, as they can be easy to overeat. For other snack ideas check out this old blog GUILT-FREE SNACKS.
USE QUICK HEALTHY RECIPES
Overnight oats such as OVERNIGHT CHIA OATS WITH COYO YOGHURT are so easy and quick to make.
Another great ‘go to’ for me is Chia Puddings. Simply take your favourite dairy-free yoghurt like Coyo (single portion size) and stir in 1 ½ to 2 teaspoons of chia seeds. Cover and pop in the fridge for 3-4 hours or overnight. It’s delicious and takes less than 5 mins to make.
Both these recipes are a bulletproof way to ensure you have a healthy breakfast and start to your day.
Skewers are easy to do as well … cut your chicken, beef or fish into cubes and add to a bowl with your chopped vegetable chunks.
Season with your favourite marinade or herb blend and then skewer onto a kebab stick. You can store these uncooked or cooked in zip lock bags in the fridge or freezer.
So lots of hacks and ideas here to help you get ahead and stay on track with our goals !!!
Love Gaynor x
