Having a partner in crime is great but having a partner when it comes to health and fitness goals is even better one of the best ways to stick to your resolutions or promises to yourself to get into better shape and eat better is to have someone doing it with you side-by-side. This weekend was another great one to meal prep and hopefully many of you are starting to do this every weekend as well, it is NOT as hard or as time consuming as you might think it is. This week I aimed to keep my grocery shopping to one store and to under $100 and I was able to do it!

I am very lucky and thankful that my husband believes just as much as I do that the best way to live a healthy life is to eat well and work out daily we do everything together but working out is a really great way for us to make each other accountable in sticking to our routines. Well me and my husband don’t work out together as partners we do make sure that each other is going every day and encouraging and motivating one another to reach our goals. Of the two of us I am the cook and I have to admit that for a very long time he just wasn’t into meal prepping like I was. I would make my meals and take them with me to work every day but my husband would usually just buy a healthy meal near his job and not want to pack his meals with him  thankfully over the last month he’s gotten more into enjoying taking the Tupperware to work and so in this week’s meal prep post I’m going to show you how I made meals for the both of us with a budget of only $100.

If you follow my blog you know how big of a fan I am of meal prepping but I truly believe it’s the best way to make you stick to a diet that you enjoy and also help with portion control. So for this week’s meal prep I’m using my brand-new meal prep containers which I bought on Amazon and absolutely love because they allow for two compartments to fill with food and really keep you sticking to portion control and sizing. These containers are awesome and they also come in three compartments as well. I did all of my grocery shopping at Trader Joe’s and as you will see for my received my bill came under $100. This even includes some of the vegetables that I use for dinner at night like brocolli, string beans, onions and others.

 
I love to start my day with a hot cup of organic green tea with slice of lemon. I drink this right when I wake up on an empty stomach before taking any vitamins or food or other drinks. There is a lot of great research on drinking lemon water first thing in the morning so I’ve been doing this lately as part of my morning, pre-workout routine.

 

For breakfast I use tiny Ziploc bags and measure out 1/3 cups of organic oatmeal with a dash of cinnamon. This makes it really easy each morning to put the oatmeal and a coffee mug at some water and 1 tablespoon of natural almond butter. I use the D’s Natural Fluffbutter which is high in protein and uses all natural sweeteners and ingredients. I put my mug in the microwave for about one minute and when it comes out it’s nice and creamy and perfect to give me energy throughout the day and fill me up.

 

Every morning I also make four organic egg whites and add 2 tablespoons of mild salsa. I pack this in a container and take it with me to work and have it about an hour after I’ve gotten to the office to hold me over until lunchtime. Are you salsa in place of catch-up because catch-up is usually a bunch of added sugars and I prefer the salsa because it’s made up of tomatoes and onions that really just taste delicious with the eggs.

 

Moving on to lunch this week I need a combination of 1/3 cup of brown rice, broccoli rabe made with olive oil, garlic and sun dried tomato and lean chili made with half organic ground turkey and half organic grass fed beef. I have really been enjoying eating ground meats for my lunch because it doesn’t feel so heavy and of course it’s very lean. To make my chili I use a little bit of organic low-sodium chicken broth, red bell peppers, diced onion, organic spinach, organic tomatoes, Trader Joe’s taco mix seasoning and Himalayan pink sea salt.

For my midday snack I pack organic small carrots and slices of organic cucumber. I pack these in Ziploc bags to take with me on the go and they make for a great crunchy snack that’s fresh and delicious. If you’d like you can bring a tiny tupperware of organic hummus or guacamole to dip in, but personally I find that eating these raw and alone are just fine for me.

In the morning I also make a protein shake in my Nutribullet just in case I’m still hungry during the day I need something in between my meals. I am currently using the NutriWhey Belgian Chocolate protein powder which does not use any artificial colors or sweeteners. I also add one half scoop of the Garden of life raw chocolate greens powder. I combine these two powders in my shake with ice and water and 1 tablespoon of natural almond butter. (D’s Naturals Fluffbutter). I also recently bought a lid container that allows me to drink my shake on the go. I also keep strawberries on hand to throw a few into my shakes. I got my nutribullet drinking lid on Amazon for under $8 and this is great since the regular lids don’t allow you to be able to drink on the go.

 

When it comes to dinner I make that fresh each evening and usually it consists of a cup of some type of green vegetable paired with either organic chicken breasts or a wild caught piece of fish like salmon or cod. I also like to make a great fresh salad made with vegetables and use balsamic vinegar or apple cider vinegar as my dressing. For seasonings I also love Bragg’s Liquid Aminos for a stir fry or Bragg’s Nutritional Yeast seasoning for veggies.

 

And the last thing that we have at night for a before bed snack is fat free cottage cheese parfaits. I mix 1/2 cup of cottage cheese with a half a scoop of protein powder at a handful of raw almonds a dash of cinnamon and place it in the freezer for about 25 minutes to make it a nice cold frozen treat. If you don’t like the taste of cottage cheese alone adding the protein powder to it allows it to take on whatever flavor the protein is so for example if I mix it with a strawberry protein it will taste like strawberry ice cream. Cottage cheese is really great to have before you go to bed because it is a slow release protein that allows your body to use that and feed on throughout the night and keep you feeling full and prevent you from waking up and running to the cabinet in the middle of the night. I always look forward to having this in the evening. You can also sub the cottage cheese for organic fat free plain Greek yogurt which I always have in my fridge.

 

The only difference between my meals and my husbands is that typically I’ll make his portion sides a little bit larger than mine because he needs more calories than I do. I have been trying to stick to a diet between 1600 to 1800 cal per day and most of my calories come from protein. I aim to eat about 1.5 g of protein per pound of my body weight. I like to try out new protein snacks so I also had a few Mighty Muffin’s in my cabinet that I pulled out to have on hand this week if I wanted a sweet treat that is high protein.

One of my biggest pieces of advice when it comes to meal prepping is to make sure that what you’re cooking is food you will actually enjoy and look forward to having every day. The reason many people fall off of the wagon when it comes to their diet is the foods that they’re making our things they don’t really want to eat. For example if you really don’t like brown rice and try using sweet potato as a substitute for your good carbohydrate in your meal prep. There are a lot of swaps that you can make and still have the same macro nutrients and calories per day without feeling like you are starving yourself or preventing yourself from eating foods you love.

Just make sure that the food you’re buying,especially when it comes to meats and vegetables, are organic. I truly believe that eating clean healthy foods that are organic can help heal your body and let it perform to its maximum potential. If you had to choose between the two my biggest thing would be to really start buying organic meats. The taste and look of organic meats versus nonorganic is just so noticeable and I truly believe that what you put in your body can greatly affect your health.

This weeks meal prep took me less than an hour and a half and it truly saves me a ton of time every day from deciding what to make and doing food preparation the day of. Let me know some of your favorite dishes to make for your meal prep and how your meal prepping is going so far in the new year.

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