Visual Weekly Menus

One week into enjoying prepped dinners along with my other meal preps. Now that my mind is re-organized for menus, it makes it easier for me to refocus on what I am really putting in my body again. So I started logging, just to see how over I was on calorie consumption (WAY OVER!) and start monitoring my baseline numbers for my macros. I have made some tweaks and adjustments throughout the week to make it more attainable to move back toward weight loss. Now that I'm paying attention, I'm seeing how these small bad habits make a huge difference!

So, I made some adjustments to my visual menu. I am gradually working on inputting the calories and macros for each meal so there are still some blanks. Here is next week!

Visual Menu for March and April

Time to prep!

Here is my visual menu. Since there are two weeks left in March, I will do half of March and prep for April. 

*Here is another tip: You will see some ingredients on you monthly shopping list that may say "buy cook day only". This will typically be on the perishable items like produce that goes into the recipe but would go bad if you won't utilize it until cook day. To remind me to buy it in the right week, I am going to start adding those to the visual menu since that's what I refer to weekly to add my sides to the list. 

Here is my visual menu

April Food Prep

                                         

There is a lot of seafood in this month!

April Pinterest board for original Recipes

April Recipe Cards

April Shopping List 

March Meal Plan

                                               

March 

I have two more tips for you to consider: 

- When looking at the shopping list, shop your cabinets first, especially for the seasoning. Shopping was a lot at the beginning because I didn't have a huge choice in seasonings. Now that I cook all of the time, the majority of the items on my list that are perishable, I usually already have. It can save you a ton of money to shop your cabinets before going to the grocery store. 

- Olive oil: You will see that MANY of the recipes call for olive oil. On the recipe cards, I multiply the quantity as it corresponds with the rest  of the ingredients. That results in a MASSIVE amount of olive oil. I almost NEVER use olive oil in my cooking. When you cook and freeze, it's rarely necessary. I almost always grill or use the crock pot, so it isn't necessary. I will use a tiny amount if I am skillet cooking. You will notice that a lot of the recipes call for you to cover the chicken in olive oil before placing in the bag. I save on the calories an do not do that. The chicken will be marinating in the other ingredients and, for flavor sake, it does not need olive oil. You will see the recipe cards and shopping lists always lists large quantities of olive oil but use at your own discretion. I probably buy new olive oil once every 6 months or so (if that). 

- Lastly, there is a lot of cheese in this month. I am dairy free. I either modify to not include cheese at all or I will use Daiya cheese. Just a thought for those who have restrictions. I try to make these recipes work for my families sake. Avocado is another fun substitute for cheese. 

March Pinterest Board with original recipes

March Recipe Cards

March Shopping List 

February Meal Plan

February Recipes and List

Here is another tip that occurred to me as I was making this list. Beware of produce and breads. DO NOT buy for the month if it is an ingredient used only for cook day. For example, this month features a yummy flatbread meal. I will need to buy 12-16 flat breads for the month but if I buy them all at one time, they will go bad by the time I use them since I don't actually assemble the flatbread until cook day. That particular recipe calls for freezing the meat only and the remainder of the prep is on cook day. I like to do these recipes on weekends/days I am not working since there is more work on cook day. 

All lessons I have learned as I grew through this process. 

                                            

Original Recipes found on my Pinterest Board 

February Recipe Cards

February Shopping List (It's a big one) 

January Recipe Cards and Shopping List

January Meal Prep 

As I create these documents, I am trying to think of a way to best explain how to adjust the ingredients. Again, the original recipes are on my Pinterest board, so start there, don't start from my prepped documents. It takes time to learn how to adjust. I create for 12 servings per month, so you have to see how many servings the original recipe is laid out for and then go from there. Every recipe is different. You would prepare for chicken breast different than you would a pot of spaghetti. The easiest advice I have for you is to do the math from the original recipe. So if it called for 4 servings and you are prepping for 16, multiply every quantity by 4. That is how you adjust for your family. You will learn as you go and make mistakes. Trust me, I know. I usually overbuy which I would rather have instead of under buy. My husband has had to make a run or two. 

Pinterest Board for Jan with Original Recipes

January Recipe Cards

January Shopping List for 12 servings

Phase 2: Photos of dinners and directions on how to make visual menus

Visual Deliciousness 

January Dinners

February Dinners 

March Dinners

April Dinners

May Dinners

June Dinners

August Dinners

September Dinners

October Dinners

November Dinners

December Dinners

Visual Menus

This is the part where people start to wonder if they can do what I do. For some people repeated meals is an issue and they worry about getting bored with their foods. I do not have that issue and since the meals change monthly I don't see variety as an issue. So you may ask, how does six meal options get you through the entire month? Well, I quadruple each recipe, eating it FOUR TIMES throughout the month. I prepare the meals in two different freezer bags, having one cook day per back, with the following day always being a left over day. So essentially, I cook the same recipe twice in a month, two weeks apart. 

To give you a visual of what I mean, I have included a sample visual menu to illustrate my process. 
Below is an old February visual menu, featured in an earlier post. You will see the following dinners: 

1) Crockpot Chicken Cacciatore 
2) Man-Pleasing Chicken
3) Slow Cooker Chiken Teriyaki 
4) Chicken Carnitas Burrito Bowl with Cilantro Lime Cauliflower Rice 
5) Chicken Fajitas
6) One-Pot Chicken, Quinoa, Mushrooms & Spinach Recipe

How I created it: 
- I place, the dinners on the calendar, always skipping a day and always skipping Sunday. The empty day is always leftovers and I always write in what sides I need for that dinner. This helps tremendously with my weekly shopping. 
- Once I have placed all of the dinners. I repeat. 
- Always take into consideration late evenings you won't be home to cook or vacations you are going to take so you don't end up with a tremendous amount of food at the end of the month. I like to pad in some days because there are a lot of evenings we are not home. I only like to allow us to eat out on Sundays so I don't cook on that day. This is also my weekly food prep day. 

For now, I won't make the visual menus for the year, but if I do, I will post them. 

Phase 1: Monthly Plan

Yearly Plan for dinners

                                            

Click the link for the plan. I have Pinterest boards that correlate with with the linked yearly plan. All of the boards start with Dinner Plans::(Month) 

January

February

March

April

May 

June

July: I don't work most of July so I want to do Hello Fresh this month

August

September 

October 

November: Not many recipes due to Thanksgiving

December : Less recipes due to Christmas Break/Vacations/Dinners

Enjoy exploring Phase 1!

Fail Proof Dinner Prep!

As I was sitting down to prep dinners after about two months on not being consistent I got annoyed with myself because deciding on meals, making lists, shopping and cooking takes multiple hours. I'm always looking for ways to save time. Since I am off of work for Spring Break, this is the time to invest the up front time to save time during the hectic work weeks. Who needs monthly planning when you can plan for the year!?!? Sounds crazy? Well, that is what I am investing my time in right now.

I tend to grab recipes I have cooked before and decide to vary my choices only slightly. So I decided to take the plans I have already created and lay them out for the year so the planning portion is complete and I just need to shop and cook.

The next several posts will highlight my steps as I create this intense planning. Feel free to use what you'd like.

Stages you'll see released:

1) Yearlong Planning 2 pager (Monthly list of the names of the dinners)
2) Photos of dinners and directions on how to make visual menus
3) Shopping list and how to adjust to your family size
4) Recipe Cards

All to build consistency!

Who I am and why I am

Hello Strangers!

It's been a long time. I have a had a lot of life changes that have distracted me from focusing on my health completely and being able to have the time to share the good news about how you can take control over her overall physical health.

A refresher: 

Me weeks before my surgery

I am an Elementary Educator. I currently serve as a campus Principal at a Primary School in the Austin area in Texas. In 2013, I was an instructional coach on another campus. My husband and I were trying to conceive and we were having no luck. In addition, I was having strange, unexplained pains. In my many appointments with my OB about these concern, there was a a suspicion based on my complaints, inability to conceive and blood work that I had something going on inside me that had not yet been diagnosed. At that time, the worry was that it could be cancer. I had to immediately go into surgery to diagnose what was going on. Thankfully, cancer was not the issue. Instead, I was diagnosed with severe Endometriosis. I had several stages of figuring out life after this diagnosis but eventually decided, after appointments and research that I needed to take my health back into my own hands and I can control this. Endometriosis is not something you can cure, but certainly can be managed. I feel blessed that it was not worse than that. I decided to thank God for my 1st (and only) child since she was more of a blessing and miracle than I even realized. From then, I let go of the idea of having a second child and I decided that building a healthy lifestyle would not only benefit myself but would benefit my daughter, who watches my every move.

4 years after my diagnosis and trying to Sustain a Healthy Lifestyle 

The Changes I made:

When I set out to change my habits, weight loss was not my preliminary reason. I had been to the doctor after my diagnosis and the doctor said to me, "Can I be candid? You can do a lot more if you would lose some weight." This appointment was us consulting about pain management and conception through IVF. That phrase just totally changed my perspective. As I researched endometriosis, I began learning that foods I introduce into my body could very well have been the reason I'm dealing with this at the severity that I was and that if I didn't change fast, it would not be good. So I studied foods to restrict: Dairy, Sugar, Caffeine. Then I decided to figure out what foods were best to introduce: Whole, natural foods, fruits, vegetables. Then my simple mind put two and two together... You introduce this into your body and you've been poisoning yourself. Fix it. So I did. Well...I should say I am. It's a process. 

Major changes: 

- 6 meals per day (I used timers until I got used to it)

- Reduction of sugar

- No more Dr. Peppers

- Don't drink calories

- More fruits/veggies

- Increase exercise/weightlifting

I focused hard for 9 months and dropped 75 pounds and felt great. I was managing my pain well, but still had some hard months. I did gain back about 10-15 pounds and I'm struggling to get it back off. 

Some of the habits I let go of that caused the gain: 

- I don't track calories anymore

- I work out a little less than I did then

- I am not as strict about my dairy consumption. I will periodically consume dairy even though I always regret it, since I've built an intolerance to it now. 

- I used to stick  to my meal plan 100 percent with a Sunday cheat day, and I cheat more frequently now. 

With that said, it's clear that I'm not getting any younger so I need to kick it back into high gear and pick some of these habits up to ensure success. 

In my next post, I will work on my food plans so that I have reusable plans and shopping list that will repeat yearly. I have all of the work, it's just not organized in a way that I can make sense of it. 

Stay tuned. We are all in this together....It's in our hands.