(upbeat music)
- Hey Munchies and Happy New Year!
Welcome to my channel if you're new or if you're not,
I'm Alyssia and I am so happy to have you here either way.
At the new year I like to focus on meal prep
because I know a lot people set goals and make resolutions
involving meal prep,
and with good reason.
It can set you up for success
with making your healthy lifestyle more accessible
and less stressful during the week.
Of course, that doesn't make it easy.
So I am spending time this month
sharing videos that show how meal prep
doesn't need to be complicated,
doesn't need to be time-consuming,
and it doesn't need to be expensive
if you do it right.
I created today's meal prep
by shopping at Trader Joe's.
It's for two people for four weekdays,
and it costs less than $40
and on top of that,
you aren't gonna believe how simple it is.
The entire prep will really only take one hour.
I wanted to start off with a bang.
I have got an easy smoothie for breakfast
and I'm storing a little differently than usual.
A simple but tasty soup and salad for lunch
that will keep prep time down,
and two different dinners
that are made using my brand new
3, 2, 1 meal prep system I designed
to keep meals versatile.
Stay tuned for that.
This meal prep is also vegetarian,
which helps keep costs down,
but you can easily add animal protein to this menu
if you'd like.
First I am making a peanut butter banana breakfast smoothie
and I'm doing it in bulk.
I have shared smoothie bags a few times in the past.
So you put everything in a bag
and you freeze it for the week,
and then you thaw it out
and blend the day you want to drink it with milk.
Easy enough but
you don't have to do it that way.
You can actually make your smoothie on meal prep day
and then store it in smoothie form.
I add bananas, peanut butter, yogurt,
and almond milk to a blender.
I love how few ingredients it requires,
making it easy and healthy without any added sugar,
and it cost me only about $5 for the week
to have eight of these available,
because all of these ingredients
are already typically not that pricey.
It's so tasty,
but we don't wanna drink it now;
we've gotta store it for the week.
I distribute it into freezer-safe jars,
and these can go into the fridge for up to two days.
You can just shake and drink and you're good to go.
Longer than two days,
and you'll wanna store them in the freezer,
and you can just thaw them out
the day before you wanna drink them in the fridge.
This method takes out the step of having to blend that day.
You could, of course, use any nut butter as well,
but peanut butter will always be the cheapest.
I want to acknowledge
that the reason I often choose to prep
for four weekdays
is that I prep on weekends,
and I like to go out a couple of times per week.
So leaving the meal prep flexible like that
makes it easier for me because
A, I have to prep less food,
and B, I don't feel bad about going out
and wasting the food I've prepped.
Wasting prepped food is one of the fastest ways
to get sick of meal prep.
So start by prepping less
and work your way up to more
if you want.
There's nothing wrong with only prepping
breakfast, lunch, or dinner for the week, either.
Lunch is the easiest prep of the day.
It's soup and salad,
and I am cheating,
but only sort of.
I am using a pre-made soup from Trader Joe's.
The lentil soup with ancient grains is clean,
which all pre-made items,
both at Trader Joe's and other grocery stores in general,
are not.
But this one works,
and it is filling because of the amaranth, quinoa,
flax seeds, and millet.
I also get some veggies in,
and you can also stretch the soup to be a larger serving
by diluting it with a bit of vegetable broth.
But the soup alone wouldn't be enough,
so I am adding the simplest kale salad of all time
to the side.
I bought kale that is washed and ready to use
for less than $2,
but I cannot eat kale raw.
I've got to add oil and salt
and then massage the kale to make it more edible.
I am talking three minutes of massaging
to really loosen it up.
It makes a huge difference in the taste.
I toss it with lemon juice and some cheese.
I would usually use Parmesan in a salad like this,
but I am using cheese in a dinner recipe,
and I didn't want to buy two cheeses.
Blocks of cheese and shredded cheese
are typically going to bring up your costs.
Trader Joe's carries an unexpected cheddar,
which starts by tasting like a creamy cheddar
but evolves into the taste of an aged Parmesan.
It is unexpected but it works here,
and this is also one of the most affordable cheeses
available at Trader Joe's.
That is my soup and salad,
and if you can spare an extra two bucks,
I would suggest adding avocado for a more satisfying dish.
A four pack at Trader Joe's is often
one of the best deals they offer.
So breakfast took five minutes to make;
lunch took five minutes to make.
Meal prep is not so bad, right?
Or it doesn't need to be.
So I've done meal prep videos in the past
where it only cost 25 or 30 dollars.
Meal prep can be done for less money.
Pre-made items like this soup
will put more of a dent in your budget,
but this is where you have to learn to compromise
and find what is worth it to you.
So if you only want to, or can only spend,
20 bucks for the week,
you are likely gonna have to do
more meal prep work.
So more planning, more cooking, more cleaning.
If that is worth it to you, great.
Now on the other side of the spectrum,
there are the people who say,
"Money is no object.
"I just want the food available"
and they might pay for food delivery
to have everything there and ready to go.
There is nothing wrong with that, either,
if that's an option for them.
I, and I think most people,
will fall somewhere in the middle.
We need to find a way to keep costs down
or to moderate,
but also to keep the prep manageable
so that we don't get too stressed out
and find that it isn't sustainable.
I teach this concept;
I call it the spectrum of meal prep
in my Meal Prep Ignite course.
We did spend the last year updating it
to be a Meal Prep Ignite 2.0.
We consolidated the information
so it's super easy to digest,
and it takes you very little time to go through.
It's broken up into four weeks,
where you learn to prep breakfast, lunch, dinner,
and a full meal prep along the way.
And one of the coolest parts
is we added an online application
that will help you plan your meals
and it will calculate your grocery list for you.
You can save old meal preps and edit them
to make your journey easier as you go.
All of the information is available at mealprepignite.com
if you're interested in learning more.
So back to today's prep.
Dinner is my favorite part of this prep
because it uses my new 3, 2, 1 meal prep system for meals.
The idea is you have three main ingredients
to draw inspiration from:
a protein, a vegetable, and a carb,
and that is an effort for a more balanced meal.
But you use those three ingredients
in two different ways
to have some versatility with your meals
if you don't wanna eat the same thing every day.
And the whole prep for that meal
is done in one hour or less.
So today we are doing the entire meal prep
in less than hour,
but I designed an e-book that shares
3, 2, 1 dinner recipes specifically
and ideas to make it easy on you.
It's available at mindovermunch.com right now,
but my Meal Prep Ignite students do get it for free.
So if you sign up, you would get it there.
The three ingredients I'm using in today's vegetarian prep
are tofu, bell peppers, and you have the option,
either pitas, tortillas, or rice.
All of these items at Trader Joe's are close in price,
so you could use the same item for the two different meals
or you could buy two of these and have more variety.
It's up to you,
but that is our carbohydrate for the week.
I will use those three items to make a fajita pita
and an Asian tofu wrap
or, of course, a bowl of rice.
Again, it is whatever calls to you.
You aren't going to believe how easy this prep is.
First, I've gotta press the tofu,
so I do recommend doing this
for longer than an hour if you can.
I don't think it really counts in our prep time
because it's just sitting there,
but this is why you've gotta plan ahead for prep day,
and I teach how to plan ahead in my course.
Once it's prepped, slice your tofu as you'd like.
It can be cubes or strips,
but if you want it crispy,
which I'm gonna show you how to do today,
I would recommend going thinner or smaller.
I cut the two differently,
which is just one more thing
to help it feel like a different meal.
If you have the time,
press it again for 30 minutes,
but it is not essential.
Prepare your trays.
I like to use foil to create a little divider in the middle
so I can cook everything on one pan
without mixing the flavors,
but you could also just use two smaller trays
if you aren't a fan of foil.
Tofu is not my favorite protein on its own,
because it's pretty bland in flavor and texture.
But when I make it crispy I enjoy it.
To do this I use corn starch or arrowroot powder,
which I am tossing with fajita seasoning for the first meal.
You can skip the coating,
but it will really add to the texture.
I have to make it taste crispy to enjoy it,
so I think it's worth it,
especially for a more affordable and vegetarian meal prep.
I take the tofu,
I toss it with oil,
and then the fajita seasoning mixture,
coating completely.
For the Asian-inspired tofu,
I mix corn starch or arrowroot powder
with garlic powder and onion powder.
The tofu gets tossed with oil
and a bit of gyoza sauce from Trader Joe's.
It's an Asian dipping sauce
that can also be a marinade.
Now you could totally marinate the tofu
if you wanted to spend a little bit more time
and it would give it more flavor.
It is sweet and savory and has a hint of vinegary tartness.
It's delicious and a great way to flavor meals
without much effort.
This is another compromise
that you can choose for meal prepping.
So pre-made sauces make cooking tasty food less stressful
because you don't have to waste time or energy
making your own.
Yes, you gotta pay for them,
but a little goes a long way.
This whole bottle will last a while,
so it's worth it.
And it becomes like a condiment
where you may have it on hand if you use it regularly,
which means it's not a weekly cost to you.
The corn starch mixture
coats that tofu as well for crispiness,
and the pan is ready to go,
but we still need the veggies.
For bell peppers I got green and red.
Green are always going to be cheaper than red
so I went for those,
but I want variety,
so I splurged for a few red, too.
To keep costs lower you could do all green.
I add oil to the pan for all peppers
and toss half with a little hot sauce, lime juice,
and Trader Joe's chili lime seasoning,
which is a staple in my house.
For the other half I toss with sesame oil,
Trader Joe's umami seasoning,
and salt.
Again, two flavors, one pan, boom.
Into the oven they all go together until cooked through
and it's ready to store for the week.
A note about bell peppers:
Once they are sliced they are not great for meal prepping
when they're raw.
But once they're cooked,
they will last you the week.
So learning these kinds of things
helps you figure out which foods you can prep
and which foods won't last.
I created a PDF called The Best and Worst Guide
that I'm gonna give to you for free today.
It is in my Meal Prep Ignite course,
but you can download it using the link in the description,
and it will help guide you on what lasts for meal prep
and what doesn't.
For the fajita pitas,
I store the peppers and tofu with some greens,
the unexpected cheddar,
and a small container of sour cream.
Assemble it the day of with your pita
to keep the components fresh.
For the Asian tofu bowl
you can store the rice, peppers, and tofu together,
and it will last just fine.
Or if you want the wrap or pita,
serve that along on the side.
So I have two different dinners ready to go.
I also wanted to have some snacks
and a healthy sweet available as a sweet treat or dessert.
I got carrots and hummus from Trader Joe's,
two affordable options,
and I am also making a fruit salad that will last the week.
So how do you make it last?
Lemme show ya.
I went with apples and oranges.
Produce at Trader Joe's is not typically the cheapest
because most of it is sold per item
or pre-packaged in set amounts
and not sold individually per pound.
Bags of produce are a better deal, though.
I chop oranges by slicing off the top and bottom,
removing the rind, and cubing.
I also cut the apples into cubes;
skin on or off is fine.
To preserve, I am going to make a citrus syrup.
It helps prevent oxidization of the fruit,
which makes the apples brown and disintegrate.
So the syrup prolongs the life and keeps it fresh,
even the apples.
You can also add mango, peach,
or other fruits you like to the salad.
I use additional oranges to get the orange juice,
and that goes into the saucepan with lemon juice
and a bit of honey.
Boil and then reduce to a simmer
and cook for five minutes or so until thick.
I add the apples in syrup and toss to coat,
followed by the oranges.
Then it's stored for the week.
Now, I know, some of you are gonna be mad
that there's added sugar in your fruit salad.
It is not essential to the preservation of the fruit;
you can skip it.
But the citrus syrup alone without the honey
is going to be tart and will make your fruit even more tart.
The little bit of sugar is going to help sweeten it back up
so that your fruit tastes,
well, tasty.
You could use regular sugar, coconut sugar,
honey, agave, whatever,
but just a little.
I'm talking one tablespoon will help.
And remember, that is for the entire week.
So if we have got eight or ten
or maybe 12 servings of fruit salad here,
that one tablespoon averages out
to about one gram of added sugar per serving or less.
I know that added sugar is not providing nutritional value
and it's been made out to be the devil.
And while, yes, we wanna stay away from it for the most part
this another example of compromise.
If having the fruit salad available
makes it easier for you to stay on track and eat fruit
and not grab the bag of chips or the box of cereal,
to me, that less than one gram of added sugar is worth it.
To you it may not be and that's okay.
That's why we all have to learn how to meal prep
to suit our needs.
I wanna teach you this concept
so that you don't feel
that you need to follow anyone's advice blindly anymore.
I hope you found this video helpful.
The goal is not for you to replicate this prep
but to inspire you.
Healthy meal prep can be done sustainably and affordably.
You can do it for even less cost than this
with a little more work
or for a higher cost with less work.
You've gotta find what works for you.
I'll be sharing more meal prep all month long,
so subscribe and hit the bell
and come back and see me.
I look forward to seeing you and remember,
it's all a matter of mind over munch.