Protein bars (made with protein powder)

Hi there!

I currently like to eat protein bars as a snack, because they’re easy to take with you, they’re tasty and the ones I’m eating (clean protein bars from http://www.bodyenfitshop.nl) are also quite filling. But also very expensive! So I was looking to see if I could make them myself using protein powder, which is less expensive. I combined some ideas I saw online and came up with these tasty, easy to make and no-bake bars:

Recipe is for 8 bars:  
1 bar is 2 sp for you ww people out there

1 bar contains 106 kcal, 6.4 gr carbs, 2.8 gr fat and 12.6 gr protein.

Ingredients:

• 1 banana
• 100 ml (1/2 cup) of unsweetened almond milk
• A splash of liquid sweetener (to taste)
• A few drops of vanilla and rum essence (or whatever tastes good to you)
• 50 gr coconut flour
• 20 gr unsweetened peanutbutterpowder
• 100 gr of coconut flavour whey protein powder (I use whey perfection)
• 15 gr raw cacao nibs
• 20 gr psyllium fiber

Mix the liquid ingredients with the smashed banana, set aside. Use a sieve for the flour, peanutbutter powder and protein powder, and mix with the cacao nibs and fiber. Throw like a teaspoon of this mix in your pan/mould to ease removal afterwards! Now pour the liquid mix on top of the ‘dry’ mix, and mix until it becomes like a dough. If it’s too dry, add a bit of extra almond milk. It shouldn’t be too wet, because it will not really dry up anymore. Press the dough into a pan, a mould or whatever has a shape that suits you. Put in the fridge for a couple of hours, remove, cut into 8 pieces and use a bit of baking paper to wrap them, because they’re still a bit sticky! Store in the fridge, enjoy!

Veggie lasagna

My mom gave me the Jamie Oliver’s superfood cookbook for Christmas and I’ve been using it to get some new ideas. Of course I’m not going to completely copy somebody else’s recipe, but I like to use it as inspiration to come up with something that fits my lifestyle, so here is the veggie lasagna recipe everybody’s waiting for 🙂

It contains 291 kcal per portion, 26 gr carbs, 11 gr fat and 24 gr of protein. It’s 6 sp on weightwatchers!

Ingredients for 2 portions:

• 1 squash/pumpkin (the long type)
• 1 zucchini
• 1 onion
• 2 tomatoes
• 2 hands of fresh spinach
• 20 gr sunflowerseeds
• 200 gr cottage cheese
• 20 gr parmesan grated
• salt, pepper and italian herbs

Preheat your oven to 340 degrees F or 170 degrees C. I use a silicone cake-shape baking mold to get it in the shape I want. Use a cheese slicer or any other tool to make very thin slices of zucchini and squash. When you reach the middle of the vegetable, it won’t give you nice slices, so cut those piece up and use it in the sauce. Lay the nice slices out on some plates (you’ll also get some bad slices, use them in the sauce!) Sprinkle some salt on the slices. It’ll draw out some of the water which you can remove with some kitchen towell. Repeat once. In the mean time, cut the onion, tomatoes, zucchini and pumpkin pieces and fry it in a nonstick pan. Add the spinach and let it shrink. Make sure it get’s thick and most of the moisture is gone! Add the salt, pepper and herbs.

Start layering your ingredients, start with pumpkin slices and use your imagination to make the rest of the layers. Be aware that normally the pasta plates absorb a lot of moisture. Making lasagna without the pasta will create a lot of moisture, so make sure you drain the cottage cheese before you use is and make the sauce as thick as possible. End with the pumpkin slices again and sprinkle with the parmesan cheese.

Put it in the oven and bake it for about 30-45 minutes, check it regularly for getting too brown. After this, remove from the oven, cut it in half and remove. Let it drain a bit on a plate to remove some of the excess moisture and enjoy!

Mealprep week 22

This week’s mealprep was really something…. I wanted to prep different type of meals this week, not eating the same every day like I usually do. Don’t get me wrong, I never have a problem with eating the same. I just wanted to spice it up a bit AND show people it can be done if you really want to! Of course it took more planning and more time prepping (aprox. 3,5 hours), but I’m really pleased with it. I’m writing this on Friday, so I’ve almost eaten all of the meals and it was really great! Especially the new recipes I tried. Here’s the pic, I’ll break it down for you so you know what everything is and what I made. Day 1 starts on the left, first meal on the top, last meal on the bottom. I’m doing leangains intermittent fasting now, so this means I eat all my meals between noon and 8 pm, the rest of the time I fast. The first two days (Monday and Wednesday) are high carb as I’ll workout on those days, the last two days (Thursday and Friday) are high fat as those are restdays from weightlifting. All days are high protein (130gr a day or higher) and about 1700-1900 kcal a day. All days have veggies as snack.

Day one (high carb workout day):

Meal 1: Oats with protein powder, unsweetened almond milk, seeds and topped with pb, a banana and an apple.

Meal 2: Egg muffins with smoked salmon, roasted sweet potato and carrots

Meal 3: Veggies and burritos with chicken, avocado, bell pepper and cilantro

Day two (high carb workout day):

Meal one: Oats with protein powder, unsweetened almond milk, seeds and topped with pb and blueberries

Meal two: Beanburgers (I’ll try to upload the recipe soon because they are delish), cilantro and green asparagus

Meal three: Meatloaf, broccoli, yellow brown rice and a grapefruit

Day three (high fat rest day):

Meal one: mini burgers, raw cauliflower, lightly steamed broccoli, almonds and an orange

Meal two: zucchini spiralized and lightly steamed with blue cheese and garlic shrimps

Meal three: salad with lettuce, egg, tomatoes, goat cheese and avocado and almonds

Day four (high fat rest day):

Meal one: veggies, chicken, blue cheese, almonds and an apple

Meal two: frittata with green asparagus, broccoli, smoked salmon, egg and goat cheese

Meal three: stuffed bell peppers with minced meat and blue cheese

How to make an awesome and quick smoothie

Smoothies are really popular nowadays and there are so many ways to make a tasty one. My way is definitely not the best or superior. I just want to share with you how I do it and what I think makes it taste great.  I love to add a lot of ingredients, to make it a real ‘meal’.

This is a stash of kale (not something else that’s popular in my country)

First of all, a lot of people don’t like to cut fruits or don’t have anything to use in a smoothie and don’t feel like shopping for it. I really love the idea of smoothie prepping. I buy some fruits when they’re cheap and freeze them to use for a smoothie. Some fruits, like berries, are usually cheaper to buy frozen (at least in my country). I always have frozen fruits and kale in my freezer to make an awesome smoothie from scratch! You can also prep a smoothie bag, so put a bit of every fruit in it, 1 bag = 1 smoothie. Easy as that! I usually also add a green to my smoothie, like kale or spinach. These really freeze well, buy them in bulk when they’re cheap and freeze them the same day for fresh greens in your smoothie.

Smoothie bag

I usually eat a smoothie as breakfast on Saturdays. This is why I add more than just fruits and liquids, because I want it to contain more nutrients to last me till lunch. It usually doesn’t fit in 1 glass, which is fine by me 🙂

 

 

Blender

Super fluffy smoothie

I now use a very expensive high end blender with high wattage (a very nice birthday present lol!). Before this, I used a normal ‘cheap’ one, the type you can buy at normal appliance stores. It worked well for a year or so, but finally broke down, I think because I used too much frozen stuff which it really couldn’t handle that well. I really like this website, because it gives good advise about buying a blender. They conclude that if you want to crush ice/make smooth smoothies, go for a blender with 2hp/800 watt or higher.

Ingredients

For a typical smoothie, this is what I use:

• 1 frozen banana
• 1/2 cup of frozen berries/mango pieces
• 1 cup frozen kale
• 1 scoop of protein powder (preferably the one with peanutbutter flavor)
• 10 gr peanutpowder (natural type without added sugar/preservatives)
• 1 cup unsweetened almond milk
• 10 gr flax seeds
• 10 gr chia seeds
• 10 gr goji berries
• 5 gr raw cacao nibs
• teaspoon of maca powder

Sometimes I have to add a bit of water to make it more liquid. Mixing it long enough usually makes it more fluffy. Sometimes it needs some help when you use a lot of frozen stuff. Preferably mix liquid with powders and seeds first, then gradually add the frozen stuff (switch off, add frozen stuff, put lid back on and switch on to prevent having to redo your kitchen). Enjoy!

How do you make your smoothies?

Mealprep week 11

Many people tell me that eating the same thing for a couple of days is boring to them. I can imagine that, personally, I don’t find it boring, but that’s just me. This week, I want to show you that by just some minor adjustments, you can make it less boring. Let’s start with an overview of this weeks food:

• Breakfast: superseed oats with pb and fruit
• Snack: 4x protein-bananabread, 2x bellpepper and cucumber, 2x radish and carrots
• Lunch: 4x sweet potato, 2x chicken, 2x sausage, 2x broccoli, 2x cauliflower
• Snack: 2x apple, 1x pear, 1x orange
• Dinner: 4x yellow brown rice, 2x chicken curry, 2x Indonesian chicken liver, 2x sweet/sour salad, 2x veg stir fry.

Breakfast: Many people eat the same breakfast day after day. A way to make oats a bit different is adding different types of fruit. Personally, I always add a banana with some berries, but you can mix and match different types of fruit and add cinnamon/vanilla or other flavors to spice it up a bit. A great thing about this is, that you can prep a basic oatmeal breakfast and still safe time, but have different toppings every day. (Recipe for this oatmeal breakfast is over here)

Snacks: Making different types of bananabread could be possible with using small trays and adding different ingredients. Personally that’s too much work for me, so I stick with the same (yum) bananabread every day (recipe is over here). I tried to have some variation with the veggies and fruits, which doesn’t cost extra time at all. (It does cost extra money, because buying 1 orange and 1 pear etc. is relatively more expensive than buying it in bulk and eating the same fruit every day).

Lunch: I chose to keep my carb source the same, but to mix up the meat and veggies. I chose the meats that are easy to prepare, I always pop the chicken in the steamer and the sausages are fried with some turning over from time to time. I eat cauliflower raw and I lightly steamed the broccoli in the steamer at the same time together with the sweet potato and chicken (I love that machine!).

Dinner: Again, kept the rice the same for all the meals, but chose different meats and veggies. My mom has Indonesian ancestors and has the best Indonesian chicken liver recipe (yum!). It goes well with sweet and sour cucumber/orange pepper/tomato salad which I’ll make when I’m going to eat it (cut tomatoes don’t stay well, I didn’t show the cucumber in the picture, because it messes the beautiful balance, lol!). The other dish is chicken curry with vegetable stir fry. I fried the chicken with some onion and garlic and added a bit of red curry paste and 3 tablespoons of coconut cream. I fried the veggies with onion and garlic, spices and mustard seeds. I love my non-stick Stonehenge pans, because you really need almost no oil!

I prepped everything in about 1 hour and 45 minutes! I went like a tornado through the kitchen, but what really helps is planning ahead. So for example; start with making the bananabread, because it needs some time in the oven and also needs cooling down before the cutting. I always start with that, then I’ll pop my stuff in the steam cooker and move on to the next thing. If you think about your planning before you start, you can safe so much time!!

Mealprep week 8

If you want to start mealprepping/mealplanning yourself, I uploaded a printable mealprep planner on my mealprep page for you to use, have fun!

Another week, another mealprep! I´ll write something about my experiences with the raw vegan week soon. To be short about it: I loved the meals I made, but totally binged in the weekend. I find that restricting myself too much leads to the opposite! 

So now about this week: I wanted a simple, but nutritious mealprep with a bit more vegetables and fruits (one of the things I learned from my raw vegan week). I always eat extra food on the days I go to the gym! If you want to calculate your exact needs, go to http://www.iifym.com.

• Breakfast: Superseed oats with raspberries, blueberries and a banana
• Snack: Questbar, carrots and cucumber
• Lunch: steamed sweet potato, steamed chicken breast and steamed broccoli
• Snack: walnuts, 1/2 bell pepper, apple
• Dinner: yellow spicy quinoa, minced lean beef with mushrooms, onion and kale, sugar snaps and grape tomatoes
• Snack: a pear

I took it super easy, not making bananabread and chosing meals that are cooked quickly. This way it is possible to make it really fast. This is how I did it:

I started in the morning making the breakfast oats, for the recipe look here. I always make it for 5 days and eat one right away. I divided the berries so I won’t be left with only a few on friday 😉 I shopped for my groceries which were super cheap this time! I started with putting the chicken, sweet potato and broccoli in the steamcooker. I cook the chicken for 60 minutes, but remove the layer of broccoli after 15 minutes and the layer of sweet potato after 20 minutes (I really adore this machine). In the meantime I cook the quinoa with maggi, curry powder and tumeric powder. I fried the onion in a nonstick pan together with the mushrooms. After this, I added the minced meat and only in the end 2-3 hands full of kale. When everything is cooling down I cut the veggies and put them in the tubs. Divided the rest of the meals in the tubs and of course made pictures!

I’m so looking forward to spring/summer! I’m going to have a vegetable and herb patch on my balcony, I will keep you people updated! Here is a picture of my broccoli seeds getting ready to sprout! 🙂 Have a nice day everybody!

Mealprep week 6 breakdown

I always start with the fact that I don’t think everybody should mealprep, I’m writing this because I want to show people a way that most think is impossible or very hard. It can be done and it’s not even that hard! For more tips go and check out this mealprep 101 post. I kept it relatively easy during this weeks mealprep. So what did I make:

Breakfast: superseed oats with pb and a banana (and I add blueberries and goji berries): With pb:7 pp, 275 kcal, 23 gr carbs, 13 gr fat, 16 gr protein. Without pb: 5pp, 224 kcal, 22 gr carbs, 9 gr fat, 14 gr protein. Check out this post for the exact recipe.

Snack 1: carrots and 1/2 bell pepper. 0pp, 64 kcal, 1 gr fat, 12 gr carbs and 2 gr protein.

Snack 2: banana-protein bread, The whole bread contains 1441 kcal, 30 gr fat, 179 gr carbs and 101 gr protein. A 1/6 slice (which is BIG) contains 5pp, 240 kcal, 5 gr fat, 30 gr carbs and 17 gr protein. Check out this post for the exact recipe.

Lunch: sweet potato, chicken, tomatoes and sugar snaps. My serving is 8pp, 408 kcal, 6 gr fat, 37 gr carbs and 47 gr protein.

Snack 3: 2 clementines. 0pp, 54 kcal, 0.4 gr fat, 11.2 gr carbs and 0.8 gr protein.

Dinner: yellow brown rice, cauliflower and a pork sausage (100% clean). 7pp, 348 kcal, 11 gr fat, 30 gr carbs, 28 gr protein.

Nutritional information of 1 day: 27pp, 1389 kcal, 36 gr fat, 143 gr carbs, 110 gr protein.

IMPORTANT: this is a VERY basic mealprep. I will add at least 1 questbar to get to my daily allowance, but will add more food on the days I workout. This is meant for an average women to lose weight when already close to goal. This will NOT be enough for an average male or female who doesn’t need to lose weight or for a very obese person! Calculate your specific needs on www.iifym.com.

Instructions:

I’m not going to write a complete shoppinglist anymore, because the chance somebody wants to do this exact prep is very small and it’s a huge time investment on my part. So generally, I do my preps like this:

I wake up Monday morning and start with the breakfast prep (recipe over here). Sometimes I already put everything in the pan on Sunday evening for easy and fast cooking. I eat 1 of the breakfast, then I’ll go shopping for the rest of the ingredients. When I come home, I pop the chicken (4 200gr pieces of boneless chicken) in the steam cooker, while I peel and cut the sweet potato (4×125 gr). I add those in the top layer of the steam cooker. Total steam cooker time is 60 minutes. Meanwhile, I preheat the oven and make the dough for the banana-protein bread (recipe over here). When the bread is in the oven, I wash the brown rice (4×30 gr) and boil it with tumeric, salt and hot curry spices for about 30 minutes. I also throw the sausages in a pan and fry them slowly for about 30 minutes (turning them from time to time). Usually around this time I have some waiting to do, I’ll use this for cutting/cleaning my veggies and put them in the tubs. Now some of the things are finished, I’ll let it cool down before I put them in the tub. I let the bread cool down partially and slice it into 6 pieces (eat 1 right away, nom nom). Let everything cool down properly before you put the lids on! Divide your portions using the weighing method I describe in my mealprep 101 post!

Enjoy!

Mealprep 101

I always get a lot of questions about and comments on my mealpreps when I post them on Instagram. Let met start by saying: you don’t have to mealprep! I do it because it really helps me to stay on track and lose weight, but if it’s not for you, then that is totally fine!

If you scroll down on my instagram page, you can kind of see how my mealprepping started. I started with making 3 dinners on a plate, for easy and healthy eating when I come home tired. I progressed to adding breakfast and later on I also started prepping my lunches. Nowadays I prep for 4 days on Monday (breakfast, lunch, dinner and snacks). I usually add some extra snacks (usually protein) on the days I workout.

2 Most frequently asked questions:

1. Doesn’t it spoil? Do you freeze them?

The answer is no and no. I use airtight containers for the lunch and dinner. The breakfast goes in a bowl without a cover in the fridge. I don’t freeze them, because it alters the taste, makes is more dry and it’s not necessary. We are always so afraid of food going bad, but really, if you work hygienic, use the proper containers and have a proper working fridge, there is no problem. I even don’t cool my lunch during the morning, I just put it in my bag and eat it at noon. And everything tastes very nice 🙂

2. Isn’t it boring to eat the same every day?

This is very personal. For me it’s not boring. But I can imagine you wouldn’t like it. And that’s ok! I’ve prepped different meals for every day, but it just wasn’t worth the time for me. I only do this 4 days a week, so the other days I eat something completely different. Personally, eating the same for 4 days really works well for me. It takes out the guessing and the emotional eating. I see food as a nice way to fuel your body, it’s not something to control your emotions with!

How to start:

Ok, so you want to start prepping, here are some tips and questions you need to ask yourself before you start.

1. My first tip is don’t go overboard the first time. You’ll get overwhelmed by everything and might quit soon! Try to prep 1 course, so maybe only lunches or only dinners.
2. Plan before prep! Think of the following:

• Where am I going to eat my prepped meal?
• Am I going to eat it cold or hot?
• Do I have the possibility to heat if I want to eat it hot?
• How many meals/which days are busy for you?
• Do you have enough tubs?
• Where are you going to keep them, how are you going to transport them?

3. Every ‘boring’ meal can be made nice by herbs/spices/garlic/onion/pepper/salt/ginger etc.
4. What does your meal has to contain? (weightwatchers: how many pp? Slimming world people: what day and how many syns? Calorie counters: how many calories? Macro counters: how many macro’s?) iifym.com is a great site to find out how many calories and how many macro’s your body needs. www.myfitnesspal.com is also a great way to track what you eat and it also has an app!
5. When you choose your food: don’t choose food that has to stay partially raw, like rare steak. I choose food that can be heated thoroughly so germs die and don’t spoil it after a few days.
6. When are you going to prep and what are you prepping exactly?
7. When are you going to do the shopping? For how many days will you shop?
8. Create a shoppinglist and a prep-plan
9. Clean your kitchen, empty the dishwasher/sink, get the stuff you need out on the counter/table.
10. Get started!

Hiccups:

So everybody has hiccups on their path. For me, I’ve realized I have to change my meals weekly, because prepping the same week after week will leave me nauseated and not feeling like eating it anymore. I learned from this. I’ve also learned that I don’t like the taste of reheated fish (I’ve tried tilapia and salmon). If I want to prep with fish again, I’ll leave it for dinner and just fry it when I want to eat, because the frying of fish doesn’t take that long. You’ll find out yourself what works for you and what doesn’t. Write it down, make a plan and change it if necessary. I’ve learned to write down the exact cooking plan. Why? Well, I had a plan in my head of what to do first and what can cook at the same time, but forgot I only had 1 big pan and 2 dishes needed the big pan lol.

What stuff do you need?

Well, this is different for everybody, the only thing I know is the stuff I use, some things are just handy and not really necessary:

• Proper tubs (BPA free!) that can stand cooling, microwaving and the dishwasher.
• Cooking utensils (pans, spoons etc.)
• I use the oven frequently, but not 100% necessary
• I use a steamcooker frequently, but again, not necessary (Mine is Tefal, Jamie Oliver edition)
• SCALE (if you want to know how much you eat, you can’t do without!)

Portion control:

So you’re cooking in bulk, how do you calculate your exact portion? Not too difficult I must say, but I’ve got some tricks that make it very easy. If you have separate ingredients, like steamed sweet potato, steamed chicken and broccoli, it’s not really difficult to weigh the portions out in your tubs. But, I cook dishes with multiple ingredients frequently and that got me doing this method:

1. You weigh your pan before you start cooking
2. You write down everything you put in the pan (100 gr. Rice, 100 gr. Chicken etc.)
3. You calculate the total amount of points/syns/calories/macro’s and devide it by how many meals you are making (so 40 pp for the whole pan, 4 meals, 10pp per meal).
4. You weigh your pan again, but now with the finished product in it.
5. You subtract the original pan weight from this finished product weight.
6. Now divide this weight by how many portions you are making.
7. Now put your tubs on the scale and weigh out your separate portions.

You could also just start scooping things in the tubs and than weigh every tub and redivide, but that is a pain in the behind, so I prefer this method (also good for oatmeal breakfast prep!).

When you have any mealprep questions, just ask!! I’m trying to upload my mealprep weekly with a shoppinglist and a plan which takes you through the process.

Mealprep breakdown (+ shoppinglist)

So, I’m going to do a try-out: I’m writing a breakdown of this weeks mealprep, including calorie and macro breakdown, pp amounts, a shoppinglist and a guide on how to make it without wasting time. Let me know what you think!

This mealprep is for 4 days (except for the breakfast which is for 5 days, because I eat it too on the morning I mealprep). I mealprep for 4 days, because I work 4 days a week (basically more, but those on calls are usually all over the place). You can adjust it to your likings. I don’t freeze my preps, they stay good in the fridge until the last day! Really, just try it yourself, I’ve been doing it for months and never had any problem with food getting spoiled. My tips are: use good and clean airtight containers (you can see in my picture that I don’t always use them, I misplaced some during my move), set your fridge to a low temperature and make sure you don’t leave it open too much. That’s it, easy right? With my cooking, I use a normal stove, an oven and a steam cooker. You can also just boil or use a steam basket in a normal pan if you don’t have a steam cooker.

Ok, so there’s one thing I didn’t prep: my questbars. I’m in love with them and really wish I wasn’t because they are so damn expensive. Anyway… I’ll post a recipe for a nice protein cupcake soon!

Meal 1: Breakfast oats with or without the peanut butter. I usually top it with a banana, goji berries and some blueberries. With pb:7 pp, 275 kcal, 23 gr carbs, 13 gr fat, 16 gr protein. Without pb: 5pp, 224 kcal, 22 gr carbs, 9 gr fat, 14 gr protein.

Snacks: An apple, a tangerine, some carrots and cucumber. I eat some of them between breakfast and lunch and some between lunch and dinner: 0 pp, 139 kcal, 34 gr carbs, 0 gr fat, 1 gr protein

Questbar: Depending on which one you take, it’s 4 or 5 pp, for example Cookies&cream: 5pp, 180 kcal, 5 gr carbs (17 gr fiber), 7 gr fat and 21 gr protein.

Meal 2: Steamed chicken, steamed sweet potato and raw/fresh cherry tomatoes: 9pp, 358 kcal, 32 gr carbs, 2 gr fat, 49 gr protein.

Meal 3: Quinoa with Moroccan pumpkin stew (this time with beef, but can also be made vegetarian): 9pp, 466 kcal, 55 gr carbs, 15 gr fat, 25 gr protein.

This makes for one whole day: 1418 kcal, 149 gr carbs, 37 gr fat, 112 gr protein, or 30 pp. Personally, this would be a low day for me, I usually add at least 1 protein shake on the days I workout, sometimes another Questbar and/or a handful of almonds. This mealprep is really not enough for a regular/obese man or a woman who is obese! Make sure you know what your body needs, eat the pp that Weightwatchers gives you, check www.myfitnesspal.com or www.iifym.com for a kcal and macro breakdown that fits your body and your activity level. I’m a firm believer in feeding your body the right way, crash diets will only make you suffer and will leave you with less muscle and a higher chance of gaining everything back and more!

So now to the mealprep:

There are a couple of things I have in my storage that don’t spoil and I don’t shop for weekly. If you don’t have it, add it to the shopping list:

• Raw cacao nibs
• Flax, broken
• Hemp seeds
• Chia seeds
• Protein powder (choose your own flavor, I have peanut butter, coconut and cookies&cream)
• Cinnamon
• Ground cloves
• Peanut butter (natural type without additives)
• Oats
• Goji berries
• Liquid organic vanilla flavor
• Curry powder
• Vegetable stock blocks (maggi type)
• Cardamom
• Turmeric
• Nutmeg
• Coriander (ground seeds)
• Salt and pepper
• Dried ground ginger
• Olive oil

Shopping list:

• 400 ml of Oatmilk. I use Alpro ‘oats’. You can also use unsweetened almond milk, unsweetened soy milk or any other milk you want. Adjust your pp accordingly!
• 5 medium sized bananas
• 1 packet of blueberries, fresh (roughly 150 grams)
• 2 big carrots
• 1 cucumber
• 4 apples
• 4 tangerines
• 4 protein bars/questbars or any other protein rich snack you want
• 4 chicken breasts, I buy them 200 grams each
• 700 grams of sweet potato (you need 600 grams peeled ones)
• 1-2 packets of cherry tomatoes (about 200 grams)
• 1 orange pumpkin, size of a spread hand
• 50 grams of green olives
• 50 grams of dark raisins
• 1 can of chickpeas (265 grams of peas without the water)
• 250 grams of lean beef
• 3 cm/1 inch of fresh ginger
• 2 garlic cloves
• 1 red bell pepper
• 1 red chilli pepper
• 3 medium white onions
• 2 big or 4 small tomatoes
• 1 can of diced tomatoes (no additives)
• 2 blocks of vegetable stock (maggi)
• 80 grams of quinoa

Directions:

For the exact oatmeal recipe, I refer to this post. For the exact pumpkin stew recipe, I refer to this post.

So I wake up on Monday morning, and I start with the oatmeal immediately. I make it for 5 days, divide it into the appropriate portions and eat 1 right away. A tip: weigh your empty pan. When you finish, weigh it again, and subtract the original pan weight. Now divide it by 5 and you know the exact weight of 1 portion when you divide it into tubs/bowls.

After this, I take my shopping list and do the shoppings. Ideally, I could also shop on Sunday, but I’m usually busy with other things on Sundays.

I start with preheating the oven for the pumpkin and setting up the steam cooker. Mine has 3 layers, I put the 4 chicken breasts in the 2 lowest layers, then peel the sweet potato and cut them into 1 inch pieces and throw them in the upper layer of the steam cooker. I set it to 60 minutes and take out the potatoes after 40 minutes (check them regularly) Here is a picture of the steam cooker, cooking a 1 person dish, so only using 2 layers. If you don’t have one, you can choose to boil/steam the sweet potato and chicken in a pan. As you can see I don’t use seasoning on both, because I really like the pure taste. If you want, you can add some spices or something like Mrs. Dash or Flavorgod.

So now this is set up, I clean the pumpkin, remove the seeds and cut it into pieces. I don’t remove the skin! Lay the pieces on a tray and put it in the oven for about 40 minutes. Use a baking sheet to make cleaning up easier! I continue with the pumpkin stew recipe. I also start cooking the quinoa, I used 20 grams per portion for this prep, because I added meat and wanted to come to 9pp. Just add about 200 ml of water, a bit of salt and pepper or a veg stock block and some turmeric and boil until the water is finished.

I add the diced meat to the stew when I also add the can of tomatoes (the original recipe is without meat). When there is some waiting time, I peel and cut the carrots and cut the cucumber and divide them into the tubs. I add a splash of water to prevent drying out and store them in the fridge. In the meantime, the pumpkin should be finished, I add them to the stew and let it boil for some time. I bring out the tubs, let the already finished chicken and potato cool down. Put a chicken breast in each container, 1/4 of the sweet potato and 1/4 of the tomatoes. When it’s cooled down enough, put the lid on it and store it in the fridge. The stew and the quinoa should be finished now. Divide them into 4 portions and let the tubs cool down before you put the lid on them and store them in the fridge.

After this, I clean the kitchen, stove, oven and put all my utensils in the dishwasher. I also continue with vacuum cleaning and mopping the floor of my place, because yeah, I like to start my week clean 😉 lol!

To keep on track, I mealprep! (Mealprep recipe for oatmeal breakfast)

To keep on track I mealprep!

I have a busy job and with all the ‘on calls’, evenings at the gym and social events, I lack time and energy to cook daily. With mealprepping I eat exactly what I plan and that way I stay on track! Usually, I cook my meals every Monday, so I make healthy breakfast, lunch, dinner and snacks for the next 4 days. Today I’ll share with you my recipe for this yum breakfast. This recipe is for 5 servings as I will eat one right away!

Nutritional information: With pb: 275 kcal, 23 gr carbs, 13 gr fat, 16 gr protein. Without pb: 224 kcal, 22 gr carbs, 9 gr fat, 14 gr protein.

Ingredients:
50 grams of oats
30 grams of broken flax
15 grams of hemp seeds
15 grams of raw cacao nibs
15 grams of chia seeds
56 grams (2 scoops) of protein powder (I use coconut and/or peanutbutter flavor)
dash of cinnamon
few drops of vanilla flavor
dash of ground cloves
4x 10 grams of natural peanutbutter
400 ml oatmilk (or unsweetened almond milk or any other type of milk)
400 ml water

Put all the dry ingredients in a pan, mix it together and then pour in the milk and water. Mix and then heat until it’s boiling for about 5 minutes. Keep stirring because it can stick to your pan! Turn off the heat and let it stand for about 5 minutes, stir and add a bit of extra water if it gets too thick. I usually end up adding about a cup of extra water. Devide it into 5 tubs or bowls and add the peanutbutter. Store it in the fridge and heat in microwave when you want to eat it. Top with your favorite fruits, I usually use banana, goji berries and blueberries. Enjoy!