Tips

I recently lent my friend, Sarah, one of my Tosca Reno books. She has been reading it and she asked me for some tips and recipes. I decided that I would blog all of it since other people have asked me about what I eat and how I have time to eat clean. I have posted some recipes on my blog, but most of my recipes I find on The Gracious Pantry, Eat Clean Diet, Jamie Eason on bodybuilding.com, and Tosca Reno. I also adapt my recipes to make them as clean as possible. I have bought some books and magazines on clean eating but they tend to be more complicated than I like.

Life gets crazy and the only thing that saves me from feeding myself and my family from eating junk is food prep. Most of my days start at 5 am. The only time I watch TV during the day is to fold laundry. My kids seem to get easier but harder at the same time. They are self-sufficient to some extent, but they are also very busy. When I finally get to sit down at night, I'm exhausted. So I get it. I get that this all seems overwhelming, but there are little tricks that I am learning along the way.

I started writing this post earlier in the week, and added to it as I thought of things, so I hope that it makes sense.  It was a crazier week than usual (my washer died so I have been going to a Laundromat or using my mother-in-laws washer until our new set gets delivered, everyone has had some type of appointment that has fill up my "extra" time on my days off, and I started my new training program).  In the midst of all of the craziness I found little snippets of time to prepare food for the next few days. I promise you that if you just take an extra hour or two a few days a week to take care of yourself, it will pay off. Trust me! I'm running out of pants that will stay up, so I know it works;)

Food prep: I do my food preps whenever I have time. All of this might seem complicated and time consuming, but I have found that it is just like exercise. I have to set aside a block of time for my food prep and then I it done. There are certain foods that I try to have on hand at all times.

Lean proteins: baked chicken tenderloins (I cook it and then freeze), boiled eggs, almonds, Cottage cheese, Greek yogurt, protein powder, turkey meatloaf muffins (Jamie Eason's recipe), all natural almond/peanut butter and plenty of eggs/egg whites for recipes. I really like hard boil eggs whites. I will cook up about 16 at a time. They are best if stored in their shells with a damp paper towel. I usually eat at least 4 eggs a day, so they get eaten up pretty fast. I also keep ground turkey breast, salmon, shrimp, and chicken breast in my freezer for recipes.  Tonight as I was making my family soup for dinner, I also boiled eggs, and made turkey meatloaf meatballs.

Fruits/veggies: apples and bananas are the perfect portable foods. Grabbing a handful of almonds and an apple is the easiest snack ever. I hate to waste food so whenever my bananas start to get a little soft, I peel them and freeze them. On the days that I go grocery shopping I chop up all my veggies to make it easier to make salads, such as celery, cucumbers, tomatoes, and peppers. I will also chop up a large bag of peppers, mushrooms, and/or onions and saute them in a small amount of olive oil. Then I divide the veggies into one cup containers and freeze them. When I need a quick meal, I am able to pull out a lean protein and veggies and throw them into my cooler for lunch the next day or warm them up in the microwave. I also keep lemons on hand to slice up and put in my water. I keep a lot of frozen veggies and fruit on hand too, such as steamables and stir fry, Costco's bag of mixed berries, and blueberries.  It's so easy to throw some berries, banana, spinach, and protein powder together for a quick snack.  I keep a large container of spinach available for salads, smoothies, soups, and anything else I can create.

Other carbs: I love rice cakes and I found some from Quaker that have 35 calories and 7 grams of carbs. They are a great snack with cottage cheese and cinnamon or almond/peanut butter with a dribble of honey. I also like sweet potatoes. Since sweet potatoes are large, I will bake or dice and saute one and then divide it up into smaller portions. I eat oats nearly every morning. I cook them in the microwave and then add chia seeds, cinnamon, and either blueberries, applesauce, or 1/2 banana for breakfast.  Other than that I'm not a big potato fan and I can pass up pasta, bread, and rice pretty easily (unless it's pizza or popcorn).

Packing a cooler: when I clean up dinner on the night before I work, I pack up my cooler for the next day. It's pretty simple with all the food that I prepped. I include a morning snack- usually a smoothie, lunch, and an afternoon snack and an emergency snack - such as an apple and almonds. I also get my bottles of water with lemon ready.

Most important:  If it's not in my house I can't eat it!  I tried making clean treats and then I froze them so that I would only eat small portions at a time.  This did not work.  I have no self control.  I can't even keep sugary items such as prunes on hand.  I honestly will eat the entire bag.  Even though something is clean, doesn't mean that you should eat 600 calories of it in one sitting.   I drink quite a bit of herbal tea.  When I am feeling a craving coming on, I will first drink a cup of tea.  If that doesn't work, I will make a smoothie with chocolate Shakeology, ice and water.  It really helps with my sugar cravings and munchies.

If you have any tips or recipes that you would like to share, please comment on the blog or on Facebook.  I would love to hear from you.  Happy prepping!