If you are new to my blog. I am a Chef. I have both a culinary and baking and pastry degree. I am on a fitness journey that I will be on for the rest of my life.
I like to cook, and like any chef I like to eat. Now I try to eat with the thought of fueling my body for my fitness journey. We truely are an amazing bio machine and we need good foods to fuel it.
I train Martial Arts 5 to 6 days a week for upwards of 10 hours a week total. So to support that I need to eat well. Now do I always eat well? Do I always pass up that cupcake. Heck no! But I do try to make good decisions.
Enough rambling so here is what I made. A chimichurri burrito bowl. This bowl is full of protein, gluten free, dairy free, low fat, contains lots of veggies, slow digesting carbs, and most importantly has lots of flavor.
I took a short cut and got chicken that was pre marinated at the grocery store, but I regularly make chimichurri sauce on my own and will include that in this recipe.
Chimichurri Burrito Bowl
Yield: 5 servings for lunch
Ingredients:
3 bell peppers that I charred on the gas stove, and placing them in a bowl with plastic wrap to steam
1 jalapeno that I charred on the gas, and placing them in a bowl with plastic wrap to steam
1 onion that I charred on the gas stove, and placing them in a bowl with plastic wrap to steam
1.5 lbs of chicken marinated in chimichurri
3.75 cups of brown rice cooked
10 tablespoons of black beans
5 tablespoons of salsa – Optional
5 pinches of cilantro – Optional
salt and pepper to taste
granulated garlic to taste
Directions:
Cook brown rice to directions on package
Char your veggies over a BBQ or on a gas stove. Place them in a bowl with plastic wrap to steam them.
Cook your chicken marinated in chimichurri
Chop up veggies, and lightly sautee them in a pan, adding pepper, salt, and granulated garlic to taste
Heat up canned black beans, drained
Add 3/4 cup/ 112g of brown rice to bowl, add 1 cup/130 g of chicken to each bowl, add 1 cup/148 g of veggies to bowl, add 2 tablespoons/52g of black beans, add 1 tablespoons/32 g of salsa.
Chimichurri sauce
Ingredients:
1/2 cup olive oil
2 tablespoons red wine vinegar
1/2 cup finely chopped parsley
3-4 cloves garlic , finely chopped or minced
2 small red chilies , or 1 red chili, deseeded and finely chopped (about 1 tablespoon finely chopped chili)
3/4 teaspoon dried oregano
1 level teaspoon coarse salt
pepper , to taste (about 1/2 teaspoon)
Directions:
Mix all ingredients together. Let sit for at least a few minutes. Letting it sit for 2 hours before use is much better. Marinate meat over night, reserve some for topping.
Nutritional Stats: Calories 555, Fat 8.7 g, Fiber 11.7 g, Carbs 65.1 g, Sodium 1553.5 mg, Protein 45.8 g
I hope you get a chance to try this recipe. You can reduce the sodium if you are concerned by omitting the salsa, and taking some of the salt out of the chimichurri sauce.
It was/is delicious and easy to make. It took about 40 minutes to prep for a whole week of lunches.
Try it out. Thank you for reading, if you liked this please let me know and feel free to share.
I often meal prep just for our lunches. I make our breakfasts and Dinners a la minute. This is a fancy schmancy way of saying, prepared to order, or not made in advance. (Gotta use my fancy degree for something. =) ) I just meal prep our lunches. Lunches are the hardest meals to get in, and I will often just not eat if I am to busy. So here is a lunch I prepped for this week, for me and my husband.
This weeks lunch is gluten free, nut free, but has animal protein and dairy.
If you have never had spaghetti squash before you are in for a treat. The flesh is mild in flavor, but pulls apart in strings, much like spaghetti. I am guessing that is where the name comes from. (said tongue in cheek =) )
Everything in this recipe is roasted. Also people season your food! I get a lot of my friends saying oh I don’t like X, or I don’t like Y. Then I get a hold of them, cook for them, and their tune changes. Why you might ask?… 99% of the time people don’t know how to season their food, and don’t know how to prepare their food. Eat well, eat healthy, and make your pallet happy as well as your body.
Enough talking/writing on to the recipe.
Spaghetti Squash and Chicken Not Pasta (yeild – 6 portions, or 3 meals for two adults)
Ingredients:
10 lbs or two good sized Spaghetti Squash
3 large chicken breasts, cut in half width wise
1 jar of pasta sauce you like, or a can of tomato sauce works as well ( I used pre canned sauce to make my prep a little easier)
Parmesan shredded
3 large sweet potatoes pealed and cut in to coins for roasting
Olive oil for roasting
Salt and Pepper to taste
Seasoning you like for your chicken ( I used the Mrs. Dash original, salt free seasoning we have here in the states. I like salt free cause I can control the salt in my food better that way.)
Directions:
Pre heat oven to 425 degrees F, or 218.33 degrees C
Cut the squash in half, scoop out seeds, drizzle cut side with olive oil, sprinkle salt and pepper, and place them cut side down on a pan prepared with parchment paper. Be sure to oil the skin of the squash so it does not burn in the oven. No need to salt the skin of the squash.
Cut each breast in half, drizzle oil on breasts, add salt and pepper, sprinkle with other seasonings, and place in a oven proof pan.
Peel and cut sweet potatoes into coins, drizzle with oil, salt and pepper, and sprinkle with cinnamon.
Place each of these in the oven, and cook for 45 minutes to an hour.
For the chicken I cut one open to see if it is cooked. For the squash I poke it with a fork and see if it is soft and done cooking. For the sweet potatoes I poke with a fork and see if they are soft to the touch.
Portion out and save for the week days and enjoy.
Thanks for reading and I hope you have a great weekend. Let me know if you tried this and how you liked it.
Where to start? That is pretty much always the question. When you start something new, it can seem daunting and overwhelming. Here is how I started meal planning for myself and my husband. It does help that I am a chef and know about nutrition in the capacity of a professional chef.
Change only one type of meal for 3 weeks then add on. Whether its snacks, breakfast, lunch, or dinner, the meal only matters in whatever is easiest for you to stick to. For me I started with lunches.
I looked at what I wanted to do or what my goals were. There are so many people out there that will tell you their way is the best way, and it may be for them. But here is a tip, you’re a biological animal, and as such you are a complex creature. That means what works for one person does not always work for another. I wish it were so. I teach cake decorating and Baking and Pastry, and I often tell my students, that I wish I had a magic wand that I could wave and they would all be able to decorate a cake like a pro. However, what is required is experimentation and practice. The same goes for meal prep, and getting into the groove.
There are several ways to meal prep, but here are a few core
things I focus on.
Decide if you are going to count your calories
only, watch/count your macros, or just eat intuitively.
Get yourself a food scale if you are going to
count your calories or macros.
Decide what your goal is: Bulking, leaning,
maintaining or something else
Choose a protein, complex carb, and veggie/fruit
Learn to prepare those things/gather recipes
Get your Tupperware/lunch containers ready.
Weigh and write down what you put in the
containers, so that food entry into a tracker is much easier.
Now to count calories, macros, or eat intuitively. If you
are newly embarking on a fitness journey, you may not be familiar. I will touch
on these subjects to give you an base understanding, and tell you what I do. But first if you are going to count calories
or macros you are going to want to calculate how much your body needs to eat to
function. Here is a great website that will do that for you. It has a calorie
calculator on it, that will give you your total daily energy expenditure or (TDEE).
This is the amount of energy it would take your body to just lay in bed all day
long, respirating, and living. Not getting up and mowing the lawn much less
going to the gym to pump out a few sets.
Here is my recommendation: If you are just starting out. Count your Calories and Macros. The structure will be good for you. I have been doing this for years so I can eyeball some things.
Counting calories, has been done for many many… so many years. It is just that. You log your food, and figure out that a large boiled egg is about 75 calories. The calories in a medium apple is about 95 calories. Add those two together and you get 170 calories consumed for that snack. Simple right? Yup! There is more to nutrition than that of course but that is a good way to get your toes wet as it were. Counting calories alone though falls short, in that you can eat 300 calories of grapes, and 300 calories of doughnuts and it would be basically the same from a numbers standpoint. However, the nutritional value of 300 calories in grapes and 300 calories in doughnuts is extremely different. “
“DOES IT MATTER WHERE MY CALORIES COME FROM? Human metabolism is complex, and gaining or losing weight takes more than hitting your calorie goal. Fat, protein, and carbohydrates all have different nutrient functions in the body, and an effective diet will include at least a little of all three macronutrients.
Protein builds muscle and maintains other body tissue. Fat provides energy, regulates hormone production, and keeps you full. Carbohydrates also provide energy and help you sleep at night.
Theoretically, eating fewer calories than you expend can help you lose weight, but the type of calories you eat influences your results. For example, if you eat very low-carb and have trouble sleeping, your hunger levels could rise and you might struggle to keep your calorie intake low enough to lose weight. Or if you don’t eat enough calories from fat or carbs to power your workouts, you could end up burning fewer calories than you think, because you’re not giving it your all in the gym.”
I could not have said it better. So we know that calories
count and where they come from counts. So now we go to learning what our macros
are. Macros is a over view of what your body needs to run. Macro Nutrients are the
carbs, proteins and fats your body needs. Just as I said earlier the kind of
calorie you take in is important. While bacon is fun to eat and tasty, its
protein and fat content are completely different than say the equivalent amount
of chicken breast.
These are the Macros I need to hit every day to meet my
goals. So not only do I need to make sure I eat enough calories, but I need to
make sure I get this much protein in, and this much carbs in and this much fat
in for my body to function like a well oiled machine.
👇 WOO! YOUR
MACROS ARE BELOW 👇
MY MACROS
2337CALORIES
155PROTEINS
238CARBS
85FATS
Last kind of eating change would
be intuitively eating. It sounds ridiculous at first, but eating when your body
tells you that you need it. It sounds stupid but, we (especially Americans) are
very bad at telling when we are hungry or when we are just having cravings. Do
you want that piece of cheesecake cause you are hungry and skipped a meal, or do
you want it cause you are craving sugar and your body needs protein and healthy
fiber. That is usually my problem I don’t get enough protein given my own
proclivities. I will eat more plant based. I will dedicate a blog post to what
your cravings may mean you need later.
Now you will need a scale, and this is the one I use all the time. It is inexpensive and does what I need it to do. It is call Ozeri.
Now to the meal prep I did… This post has been long enough.
I prepped Sunday night for both myself and husbands,
lunches. Lunches are the hardest meals for both of us to get in. This is the
meal that helps us most to have prepped.
Protien – Chicken, black beans
Carb – brown rice, black beans, veggies
Fat – Chicken, black beans, and oil used in cooking
Southwestern Chicken
Yield 6 servings
Ingredients:
5 x Chicken breast
1 tbs – Mrs. Dash Southwestern Chipotle seasoning
2 tsp – ground cumin
2 tbs – vegetable oil
salt and pepper to taste
Garlic powder to taste
Brown Rice – (Cook as directed on package)
1 can – Black Beans
6 cups – Broccoli and Cauliflower mixed veggies
cherry tomatoes
Directions:
Cook your rice as the directions tell you
chop chicken in to bite size pieces, heat pan up with two tbs of veggie oil. Season chicken and cook till chicken is done.
Cook Broccoli and Cauliflower mixed veggies
Open can of black beans and heat up in sauce pan. I added some garlic powder and a pinch of salt.
Assemble into lunch boxes, I measured each item and wrote it down for easier entry into food tracker.
And last but not least, you will need a food tracker. I use the one that goes with my FitBit watch, but there are free ones out there. One of the best I have heard about is My Fitness Pal.
I track my macros, and this is what I prepared for myself and husband this last Sunday for lunches. I hope this helps if you are just getting started and if you have already been doing this. I hope this gives you an idea of what you can put into your lunches. Its simple just make things you will like to eat.
This has been a long post. Thanks for reading, and I hope you have a great day!
