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Meal Planning & Prep


Gloves

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Administrator · Posted

So I suck at this whole meal planning and prep thing. I like to cook and bake, but when it comes to deciding what to make/eat, I just find it so taxing. Especially for the last year or so I've basically flushed away... let's say too much money on ordering in. My wife and I have gotten into the habit of ordering from Uber Eats many times multiple times a day (Starbucks in the morning, then whatever dinner is).

I've made purchases to make the morning coffee routine easier, so we've started to ween off the habit of a morning Starbucks order, moving that into "occasional treat" territory. However dinner is still a bit of a black box. As a 2 person family there's a high potential for waste if our meals are too big, unless we specifically plan for "leftovers". I'm down for having leftovers if it's something I can toss in the microwave, or (preferably) in my countertop oven.

Anyway. Do you all do any sort of meal prep? Planning? Any thoughts or guidance on stuff I can start to just sorta have around so I can make things, and/or any recipes you like to make that don't include a ton of very perishable ingredients that'll go to waste?

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I am in the same boat as you. I dont mind cooking, but dont want to plan and shop. Dont find enough time either to make it to the store to buy fresh shit. 
 

we use hello fresh, which is basically a delivery service that delivers meal kits and recipe directions so we dont have to shop or think. Meals can be set up for 2-4 people so we often have no leftovers, or enough for a small lunch the next day. 
 

About 7-10$/meal per person. 20-40 minute meal prep -> eating. Been using it for a few months and it works great. We order 3-6 meals a week and order out or go out the other nights. 
 

if they offer it in your area, and you can afford it is highly recommended.  

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4 minutes ago, MrWunderful said:

I am in the same boat as you. I dont mind cooking, but dont want to plan and shop. Dont find enough time either to make it to the store to buy fresh shit. 
 

we use hello fresh, which is basically a delivery service that delivers meal kits and recipe directions so we dont have to shop or think. Meals can be set up for 2-4 people so we often have no leftovers, or enough for a small lunch the next day. 
 

About 7-10$/meal per person. 20-40 minute meal prep -> eating. Been using it for a few months and it works great. We order 3-6 meals a week and order out or go out the other nights. 
 

if they offer it in your area, and you can afford it is highly recommended.  

+1 for hello fresh. My wife and I have been using it for about a month. We do the 3 meals a week plan which works out to somewhere between $8-$10 per meal per person. You can probably do better cost wise at the grocery store but hello fresh has a ton of options and their recipes so far have been on point for me. They send all the ingredients and you just need to have a few things on hand. I wouldn’t say, at least for me, the portions are big enough for leftovers but I’m a gym rat and always hungry so everyone is different. There is no obligation and you can cancel whenever, not sure about operations or a similar service in the great white north though. 

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Administrator · Posted
9 minutes ago, MrWunderful said:

I am in the same boat as you. I dont mind cooking, but dont want to plan and shop. Dont find enough time either to make it to the store to buy fresh shit. 
 

we use hello fresh, which is basically a delivery service that delivers meal kits and recipe directions so we dont have to shop or think. Meals can be set up for 2-4 people so we often have no leftovers, or enough for a small lunch the next day. 
 

About 7-10$/meal per person. 20-40 minute meal prep -> eating. Been using it for a few months and it works great. We order 3-6 meals a week and order out or go out the other nights. 
 

if they offer it in your area, and you can afford it is highly recommended.  

 

1 minute ago, a3quit4s said:

+1 for hello fresh. My wife and I have been using it for about a month. We do the 3 meals a week plan which works out to somewhere between $8-$10 per meal per person. You can probably do better cost wise at the grocery store but hello fresh has a ton of options and their recipes so far have been on point for me. They send all the ingredients and you just need to have a few things on hand. I wouldn’t say, at least for me, the portions are big enough for leftovers but I’m a gym rat and always hungry so everyone is different. There is no obligation and you can cancel whenever, not sure about operations or a similar service in the great white north though. 

We do have Hello Fresh here in Toronto, and I've considered it, so thanks for the shout on that. I've had a GoodFood subscription for a while (cancelled now) and it was decent. The food got repetitive though, and we basically started to tire of the same meal/main ingredients all the time. My wife doesn't wanna see sweet potatoes again for a long while lol.

I'll take another look at Hello Fresh to compare, thanks a lot guys!

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A simple routine will go a long way. My wife does all the cooking since I’m usually at the office. We have to cook for us and three kids. So, we buy much more than you would, but we have almost no food waste. 
 

We keep it simple. We have a few choices of meat (ground beef, chicken, sometimes pork), salmon for Fridays, and then a few vegetables like carrots, parsnips, broccoli, cauliflower, beats, zucchini, squash, peppers, green beans, and sweet potatoes. We rotate these things. We’ll use quinoa or lentils as well. Fruits are pretty simple (apples, pears, and bananas). 
 

We don’t overly complicate the recipes. We just do a little salt and pepper and some herbs and spices with some olive oil. I’ve perfected the mixes and taught my wife. These meals are all simple and don’t take that long to make. I’d start by buying enough food for say 3 days and seeing how far it gets you. That will give you and idea of what you need for a week so you don’t have a lot of waste.

 

In terms of quantities for a dinner meal, a pound of ground beef or ground turkey and one zucchini and one yellow squash feeds the two of us. You could probably do a broccoli head or half a cauliflower head and two or three carrots instead. I’d say two peppers and an onion would also work. That should give you an idea for portions.

 

 

Edited by ICrappedMyPants
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Administrator · Posted
34 minutes ago, ICrappedMyPants said:

A simple routine will go a long way. My wife does all the cooking since I’m usually at the office. We have to cook for us and three kids. So, we buy much more than you would, but we have almost no food waste. 
 

We keep it simple. We have a few choices of meat (ground beef, chicken, sometimes pork), salmon for Fridays, and then a few vegetables like carrots, parsnips, broccoli, cauliflower, beats, zucchini, squash, peppers, green beans, and sweet potatoes. We rotate these things. We’ll use quinoa or lentils as well. Fruits are pretty simple (apples, pears, and bananas). 
 

We don’t overly complicate the recipes. We just do a little salt and pepper and some herbs and spices with some olive oil. I’ve perfected the mixes and taught my wife. These meals are all simple and don’t take that long to make. I’d start by buying enough food for say 3 days and seeing how far it gets you. That will give you and idea of what you need for a week so you don’t have a lot of waste.

 

In terms of quantities for a dinner meal, a pound of ground beef or ground turkey and one zucchini and one yellow squash feeds the two of us. You could probably do a broccoli head or half a cauliflower head and two or three carrots instead. I’d say two peppers and an onion would also work. That should give you an idea for portions.

Thanks for the tips, makes sense!

One minor annoyance is that my wife is vegetarian and I am not. So like, a pound of beef really has to do me two meals. So I need two days (in a row, typically) of ground beef themed meals (they don't really come in half pounds). That's a very specific scenario, but suffice it to say in general that often I find myself having to both double up on the protein purchases (fake chicken nuggets for instance, if I've bought chicken breasts/wings/thighs) as well as sometimes having trouble with waste (especially my own proteins - they tend to come in 2 person+ servings).

Admittedly some of my trouble is a general pickiness. I could definitely stand to get over myself and eat some damn leftovers like an adult every so often.

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2 minutes ago, Gloves said:

Thanks for the tips, makes sense!

One minor annoyance is that my wife is vegetarian and I am not. So like, a pound of beef really has to do me two meals. So I need two days (in a row, typically) of ground beef themed meals (they don't really come in half pounds). That's a very specific scenario, but suffice it to say in general that often I find myself having to both double up on the protein purchases (fake chicken nuggets for instance, if I've bought chicken breasts/wings/thighs) as well as sometimes having trouble with waste (especially my own proteins - they tend to come in 2 person+ servings).

Admittedly some of my trouble is a general pickiness. I could definitely stand to get over myself and eat some damn leftovers like an adult every so often.

If you go to a butcher you can get ground beef in any qty you want. 

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19 minutes ago, Gloves said:

Thanks for the tips, makes sense!

One minor annoyance is that my wife is vegetarian and I am not. So like, a pound of beef really has to do me two meals. So I need two days (in a row, typically) of ground beef themed meals (they don't really come in half pounds). That's a very specific scenario, but suffice it to say in general that often I find myself having to both double up on the protein purchases (fake chicken nuggets for instance, if I've bought chicken breasts/wings/thighs) as well as sometimes having trouble with waste (especially my own proteins - they tend to come in 2 person+ servings).

Admittedly some of my trouble is a general pickiness. I could definitely stand to get over myself and eat some damn leftovers like an adult every so often.

Split out the meat and only cook half of it one day and half of it the other half two days from now. It should last. Also, freeze the meat you don’t plan on using right away. Stuff lasts in the refrigerator a few days. You should be able to alternate.

 

You could always freeze a leftover  and eat it later.

Edited by ICrappedMyPants
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I make a week's worth of lunch at a time and portion it out into containers. Once you get into a habit, cooking large quantities often isn't much more involved than making one or two dishes imo. You do need tools to handle it - measuring cups, a big spoon, one or two 6-quart saucepans and baking sheets, maybe a large mixing bowl, and storage. A lot of stuff can be had at the thrift store; I just recommend avoiding aluminum pots. 

One of my go-to setups is very little work. Boil vegetable broth and simmer barley in it for 45 minutes. Once that cools down, stir in a bag of frozen vegetables. Divide up portions, put 'em in the freezer and and fridge. 

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Editorials Team · Posted

We keep stocked in noodles, beans, frozen meat, and all the dried/canned stuff.  And if I'm going through town I'll usually grab peppers, onions, eggs, cheese, etc.

Then I can easily plan kid-friendly stuff like chili, spaghetti, breakfast for dinner, or stir fry because it's all on hand.

And since I cook for 5 I always do extra large quantities so that leftovers eliminate future cooking or eating out.

 

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I keep it simple. I just keep my freezer and pantry stocked so I can just grab produce and dairy for the week for the most part. Of course I'm a chef by trade so I can bang out a nice meal for 5 pretty quick and without much thought. Family meals are mostly easy ones though. Things like roasted chicken with Mac and cheese, spaghetti and meatballs, chicken and broccoli Alfredo, tacos, meatloaf, fast food style lo mein, braised pork butt, burgers and brats on the grill, that kind of stuff. I usually make enough food for one meal and leftover portions later in the week giving me 2 dinners for one meal cooked. I stock up on whatever proteins are on sale and plan my meals around that. For example, I have 10 pounds of boneless breast I got on sale for $2 per pound and 20 pounds of ground beef in the freezer that I got for about $3 per pound as well as chicken drumsticks that were .99. Those will get used in a few different ways over the course of the next couple weeks and I'll just grab produce and dairy for whatever meals I make.

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I meal prepped a bit last year, ate more or less the same thing for a few months straight. Lunch was a whole cooked chicken breast and a cup of white rice with butter. I kept different hot sauces at work and would eat the chicken with whatever I felt like that day. Then dinner was salmon and a sweet potato. Breakfast was kind of random, but usually either 2 slices of avocado toast or a banana.

I baked the salmon with butter and garlic, made the rice in a rice cooker (short grain white rice), but boiled the sweet potatoes and (gasp) boiled the chicken breasts. I've cooked them all sorts of different ways but since I am eating them with sauce anyway, boiling actually gave a consistent quality with minimal effort.

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37 minutes ago, Alder said:

I meal prepped a bit last year, ate more or less the same thing for a few months straight. Lunch was a whole cooked chicken breast and a cup of white rice with butter. I kept different hot sauces at work and would eat the chicken with whatever I felt like that day. Then dinner was salmon and a sweet potato. Breakfast was kind of random, but usually either 2 slices of avocado toast or a banana.

I baked the salmon with butter and garlic, made the rice in a rice cooker (short grain white rice), but boiled the sweet potatoes and (gasp) boiled the chicken breasts. I've cooked them all sorts of different ways but since I am eating them with sauce anyway, boiling actually gave a consistent quality with minimal effort.

@Alder Did you lose a lot of weight doing this or see an improvement in health? This sounds very similar to what my body builder friend suggested, and I'm thinking about giving it a go for a month or so, despite it sounding horrible.

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8 minutes ago, fcgamer said:

@Alder Did you lose a lot of weight doing this or see an improvement in health? This sounds very similar to what my body builder friend suggested, and I'm thinking about giving it a go for a month or so, despite it sounding horrible.

I lost a little bit, but I was mainly doing it for convenience. Chicken and rice never gets old for me, lol. I didn't make a point to stop snacking at home though, and I usually ate something else on the weekends. I liked not having to think about what to eat during the week though. I haven't been doing it since I've been able to work from home more but I should probably get back into a routine.

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