The last time I spent significant time tracking my food and nutrition was from June 2018 to Sept 2018. Over 12 weeks I wanted to keep my calorie intake at 2800-3200 everyday (This was net calories and on days I trained I would consume more than 3200). At the start of this time, I weighed 201# and after the 12 week I lost about 7#. To lose 1 pound of fat you must cut your caloric intake by 3500. Since I lost 7#, in 12 weeks this means on average I was on about 300 calorie deficit every day. Since September I have gained little to no weight, I see the scale fluctuate from 194 to 197#, depending on the time of day. In September I would see the scale swing from 192-196#. I am planning to start tracking closely again to lose a couple more pounds in the next 12 weeks. The key to maintaining, losing, or gaining weight is planning. Nutrition planning is almost more important than going to the gym. I would say if you are going to the gym or exercising consistently, but you are not seeing the results you want then you should start planning your nutrition. My challenge would be to pick one training session to skip and use that time to plan your meals for the next week. We spend all this time planning our week and making time to go to the gym, but we won't spend a couple hours a week planning the food we should eat.
I wrote a post last week about my favorite breakfast meal prep. This
week I am going to cover my entire week of meal prep. I normally spend
Saturday planning out my week for food by first trolling the weekly
adds for Sprouts, Kroger, and Publix to determine what is on sale.
When you need to get on average 180 grams of protien a day, meals can
get expensive if you are getting higher quality products. Shortly after I moved in
my house, my parents found a deep freezer at an estate sale for $40. This
was a no brainer for me, I purchase meat in large amounts when it is
on sale. I like to always have a selection of chicken, beef, and pork in
the freezer. I eat more beef than anything else.
On Saturdays, I load up my son, Charlie, and we hit up all the grocery stores getting everything for my meal prep for the week, including other things the family will need for the week. This is one of my favorite times of the week because I get to spend a couple hours hanging with my buddy. Some days we bring Cooper, but he can make things a little more difficult because he is not quite old enough to go with the flow.
We destroy some produce in my family. We easily go through 20 bananas and apples a week. The kids love cucumber, peppers, and carrots too. Almost everyday, I bring the same snacks to work. I keep protien powder in my office, so I make protien shakes with unsweetened vanilla almond milk, a scoop of chocolate/vanilla protein, and 4-6 oz of coffee (Protein Mocha or vanilla latte) . I bring an apple and banana to work almost everyday. I sometime bring an addition protein bar, but more often I bring 1/2 cup of almonds as part of my snack. Between the shake and almonds , this gives me and additional 36 grams of protien.
For breakfast this week I decided to skip the man scramble, and go for making 4 eggs every morning with steak. I have 1.5# London broil I will broil. I will broil this Sunday, and slice very thin to re-warm in the pan with my eggs. Since I will be re-warming it up I will broil it rare. I will then eat 4 eggs and 3-4 oz of steak every morning. Since there are no veggies with this meal. I will definitely be having my green juice with my breakfast everyday. I buy 2.5# bags of spinach at Costco and freeze it, I think we have three bags in our freezer, which should last me to the end of the month. Spinach is an excellent source of potassium. Then I will blend 2 hand fulls (2 Cups) of spinach with 50% less sugar Orange juice. Some days I will add a 100% cranberry juice to make is a little more tart. You can see the macro break down in the table- this is a total of 640 calories.
For my lunch this week, I am making something I have made once before. I mentioned last week I modify most recipes, but only slightly on this one. I basically added a few extra carrots, potatoes, and meat balls to get more protien. This recipe can also be found on pinterest. It is called Bavarian Meatball Stew. One thing I like about this stew is that it has sauerkraut in it. Sauerkraut is an excellent for our gut health because it is a fermented food. Most people do not get enough fermented foods in their diets.
This recipe is a little more complicated than some of my meal prep recipes, but it is still very easy. The thing is you have to prepare the meat balls. If you are OK using pre-made meat ball it would be a lot easier. I normally do not use frozen or pre-made because they use bread crumbs with soy. I try my best to not eat any soy. Read Estrogeneration by Anthony Jay if you would like to know more about soy and the issue with eating it. Ingredients list
- 2.5# grass fed ground beef
- 2 Bay leaf
- 5 Carrots, medium
- 3 tbsp Parsley flakes, dried
- 5 Yukon Gold Potatoes
- 2 cans diced Tomatoes
- 2 Eggs
- 4 cups homemade beef bone broth
- 1 can Bavarian sauerkraut
- 1 envelope Onion soup mix
- 1/4 tsp Allspice, ground
- 1/4 tsp Nutmeg, ground
- 3/4 tsp Pepper
- 1 tbsp Splenda
- 1/2 cup Soy Free Bread Crumbs
Meat balls: throw the meat, eggs, bread crumbs and spices in the big mixing bowl, mix everything together and make 1 inch meatballs and place on baking sheet. Bake on 400 for 15 mins. While this is cooking you can peel and chop the carrots and potatoes. Throw all the other ingredients in the big soup pot. Make sure you rinse the sauerkraut before adding it. Bring it all to a boil, then simmer for 30-35 min. Once the the meatballs are finished, mix them in with the rest of the stew. This is supposed to make 8 servings in the original recipe but I have added more to it and made it into 5 servings.
From my standard snack, the above breakfast and lunch I should be at 153 grams of protien on my day before dinner. I don't premake dinner during the week. My wife and I plan meals around what the entire family will eat, but we try to have meat, veggie and most meals have a starch of some kind as well.
I hope you are enjoying the blog- leave comments or questions below.
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