Perhaps you’ve seen meal prep posts popping up all over your social media and thought “I can never be that organized!” but we are here to tell you, you can! By prepping everything at the beginning of the week and portioning out your meals in separate containers, you not only have delicious food on hand, but you also avoid reaching for (or ordering up) unhealthier options. If you are on a 21-Day Cleanse, easy meal prep can make all the difference in feeling set up for success.
SHAKE IT UP, SHAKE IT UP
You can even prep all your cleanse or Daily Shake smoothies at the beginning of the week by adding all of the ingredients into a Ziploc bag and keeping them in the freezer. Add a small handful of spinach; mixed berries, and about 1/3 cup of frozen coconut meat or avocado. In the morning, you only need to add the shake mix, and 1 cup of almond milk into the blender.
TIPS AND TRICKS
We suggest buying a variety of vegetables to roast, raw veggies to shred and slice (also to top off any salads you’d like to make during the week. You can also make ahead any salad dressings, we like to keep it simple and clean with a little oil and balsamic. You can keep these in your fridge for a week or two and add flavor.
Meal prepping typically takes about 2-3 hours, but it will end up saving you so much time. Invest your time in this and you will notice that you eat out less, which saves money as well as allows you to see quicker health and fitness results. By eating awesome homemade foods, you’ll get to enjoy healthy vegetables and proteins such as salmon – a great source of Omega 3’s and fatty acids (that can also be found in EPA-DHA supplements).
We recommend the following method:
1. Choose 3-4 proteins that you’d like to eat that week
2. Cook a grain (like wild rice)
3. Roast 4 different vegetables
4. Buy greens to have on hand for salad
For this post we have roasted salmon in lemon white wine sauce, chicken thighs in lemon, avocado oil and rosemary, and more chicken thighs roasted in a maple-dijon sauce.
Roasted Vegetables:
1 head of cauliflower
1 head of broccoli
2 cups of green beans
1 large sweet potato
6 tablespoons avocado oil
1/2 tsp. salt
1/2 tsp. ground pepper
Prehead the oven to 400 F.
Wash and chop your vegetables: sweet potato, cauliflower, broccoli, and green beans. Line on a cooking tray and lightly toss in avocado oil, and sprinkle with salt and pepper.
About every 20 minutes, turn the veggies over. The sweet potato takes the longest time to cook, the other vegetables can be scooped into separate bowls when they are fully cooked.
After about 45-60 minutes, the sweet potato should be fully cooked and browned. Place them in a separate bowl also.
Roasted Lemon Chicken Thighs:
4 chicken thighs (1/2 package of chicken thighs)
Juice of 1 lemon
1 tablespoon avocado oil
Salt and pepper to taste
Fresh hebs (we used rosemary)
Preheat the oven to 400 F.
Place chicken thighs in roasting pan and marinate in lemon juice, avocado oil, rosemary, salt and pepper for about 10 minutes.
Bake in oven for about 30-40 minutes until cooked through.
Roasted White Wine Lemon and Salmon:
1/2 lb wild salmon
1/2 cup white wine (omit if cleansing)
2 tablespoons avocado oil
Juice of 1/2 lemon
Salt and pepper to taste
Preheat the oven to 400 F.
Place salmon skin side down and pour in the avocado oil, white wine and lemon juice and make sure both sides have marinated a bit before placing in the oven. Sprinkle salt and pepper on top.
Roast about 20 minutes until coked through and the meat is flakey and cooked through in the center.
Roasted Maple-Dijon Chicken Thighs:
4 chicken thighs (1/2 package of thighs)
1/4 cup Dijon mustard
3 tablespoons maple syrup (or coconut nectar if cleansing)
1/2 tablespoon rice wine vinegar
Fresh rosemary
Salt and pepper to taste
Preheat the oven to 400 F.
Place the chicken thighs in a baking dish.
Mix together in a bowl the Dijon mustard, maple syrup, rice wine vinegar, fresh rosemary, and salt and pepper.
Pour the mixture over the chicken thighs and mix.
Place chicken thighs in the oven and bake for about 45 minutes until golden brown on top. Spoon the sauce over the thighs about every 15 minutes.
Mix and match from the dishes to keep things exciting and healthy throughout the week!
Recipe and photos by Dorit Jaffe
If you like this article, you might also be interested in The Best Trader Joe’s Products on a Budget
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