Meal Planning Tips

Now, you may be thinking, “I don’t have time to plan out all my meals and prep all my food!”  But it isn’t as hard as you think and having a plan really helps me stick to my nutrition and not cheat!

So I wanted to go through how I plan and prep my meals for the week!

On Sunday’s I sit down, open my excel spreadsheet and plan write out my 3 meals and 2 snacks for each day the following week.  I have been following the Insanity Max 30 (or essentially the 21 Day Fix) nutrition plan so I know the amount of each food group (or containers) that I am to eat each day.

Now, this will take some time the first time you do it, but if you are like me (I am a creature of habit), my breakfasts, lunches, and snacks are essentially the same each day (maybe a different fruit or veggie item here and there), so after the first time I am really only changing my dinners.  Here is what my meal plan for the week looks like!

It can be HARD to come up with new healthy meal ideas on your own and I hardly ever do!  Anything I try and make without an official recipe seems to turn out pretty gross!  So where do I turn to for inspiration?  I two favorite places:

1.  Pinterest-  Pinterest is super easy to use and has basically anything you are looking for.  You can search anything and different ‘pins’ will come up.  Say you want to make a healthy salmon dish, simply type in “healthy salmon recipes” and TONS of recipes will pop up!  From there you can “pin” the recipe to your profile so it will be there any time you want it!

2.  The book “The Eat Clean Diet- Recharged” by Tosca Reno – This book is AMAZING!! Not only does it have tons of clean eating tips and strategies but it also has a bunch of great clean eating recipes!  If you want to know more about clean eating check it out!

So once I make my meal plan, I make my grocery list right from it- I keep it as a note in my phone so I only have to change a few things 🙂

After grocery shopping, I will come home and cut up all my my vegetables and fruits for the week and cook my proteins and carbs (if necessary) for the first few days.  I eat anything that will go bad early in the week to make sure I don’t waste any food.  Having everything already cut up makes it easy to throw lunches and snacks together or to grab something when I am running out the door!

The little bit of extra time on Sunday really makes the rest of the week so much easier!

So like I said I am doing the Insanity Max 30 meal plan (which is very similar to the 21 Day Fix!)  I have been doing a hybrid workout plan consisting of Insanity Max 30, the 21 Day Fix Extreme, and PiYo!  I like doing complete programs but after completing a round or two I get bored and need a change up!  This also keeps your body from plateauing which can happen as your body gets used to certain exercises. I followed this hybrid workout plan and nutrition plan last week and it seemed to workout really well!

I honestly love eating clean and though you may think everything is bland and not satisfying, that is so not true! Here is one of my favorite meals!

For my exercise regime for now, I have found that I like switching it up between to body weight only cardio and strength in Insanity Ma 30 and weighted cardio and strength of the 21 Day Extreme to keep it interesting!  Through in the lengthening and strengthening of PiYo and it is perfect! 🙂

Everyone is different, so you just have to figure out what works well for you!  Many people quit their nutrition and exercise plan because they haven’t found the right combination of nutrition and exercise, get bored, or are simply unmotivated.

That’s why I love having the support and accountability of my challenge groups to encourage me to stick with it and give mew new ideas!  When I first started eating clean and working out, I didn’t know what to eat or how to plan, and that’s why the challenge groups have helped me so much!

You have the power to change too, you just have to find what works for you, and have the right motivation and support to keep you going!  This is why you should consider joining my next challenge group beginning May 18th!  The extra support and accountability is what is missing for so many people.

If you would like to join or want more info on my May 18th challenge group, fill out the application below or e-mail me at casey.ohara7@gmail.com.