Eat. Tri. Venture.

For most of my life growing up my parents worked opposite shifts.  My mom worked the traditional business day and my dad worked nights.  Between sports and other after school activities, this meant a crazy juggling of the schedules with one parent often picking my brother and/or I up one place and the other parent picking us up an hour or two later.  With all of this hustle and bustle, I do not recall much time for traditional family dinners most days of the week.  What I do recall is my mom spending a few hours in the kitchen on Sunday’s, preparing meals for the upcoming week, making sure there was real food in the fridge for us to eat.

Today, the pace of my life is much the same, as it is for many people.  Work obligations, self-imposed training obligations, family and social events and well, life, keep us busy all throughout the week.  However, this does not mean that in our haste our diets have to suffer, that we have to rely on industrial science experiments for nourishment. 

As I mentioned in a previous post, I was rolling into a recovery week.  I took full advantage of the extra time on my hands on Sunday to make food for the upcoming week and for weeks when I will not have adequate time to cook. 

On Saturday, I took a few minutes to flip through my cookbooks for some inspiration.  I decided to go veggie and settled on Appetite for Reduction

 for my meals.  I then made a grocery list and did my shopping.  On Sunday, in approximately four hours, I made the following:

• Two loaves paleo bread http://www.elanaspantry.com/paleo-bread/ .  This is an excellent recipe, whether you are low carb, gluten free (GF) or not.  I doubled the recipe.  After cooling, I wrapped one and a half loaves in plastic wrap and then foil and froze them.  I kept the remaining half loaf out to be consumed the first few days of the week.  (And it was).  To defrost the frozen loaf, just take it out of the freezer in the morning and leave it on the counter (away from the dog) and by evening, it will be good to go.*
• One pan GF cornbread for JMac, which was inadvertently left out on the counter (not away from the dog) and later consumed by the dog (again).  Doh!
• Veggie Pot Pie Stew (6 servings) http://www.tastebook.com/recipes/3478411-Veggie-Potpie-Stew .**  After cooling, I separated the stew, 2/3 going in a large plastic container and being frozen for dinner/lunch later in the week.  The remaining 1/3 was put in a smaller container and also frozen with the intention of being emergency lunch some day in the future. 
• Lentil and Eggplant Chili Mole (6 servings) http://www.seriouseats.com/recipes/2011/01/lentil-and-eggplant-chili-mole-recipe.html .**  This was separated the same as above except that I left the large container in the refrigerator for dinner/lunch Monday/Tuesday.***
• Red Thai Tofu (4 servings) http://reductionproject.blogspot.com/2011/06/red-thai-tofu.html .  We ate about half for dinner on Sunday.  JMac had his over rice.  I had mine over half of a baked sweet potato.  The rest became lunch on Monday.^

So, in four hours I made sixteen meals^^ and enough “bread” to last more than two weeks.  If my math is correct, that’s a mere fifteen minutes per serving.  Add a salad trough and voila, dinner is served!  Real food in real time is really doable.  And your body will thank you for it.  Have a great week.

*Tip:  I substitute Trader Joe's gluten free flour for the coconut flour and the bread comes out fine.

**Tip:  Stews, soups and chilies are generally better the second day, after having a chance for the flavors to meld together.  Just a thought for meal planning.

***Yet Another Tip:  I passed on the agave and did not miss it in the final product.

^Last tip:  The author of this blog thought her sauce came out too thin.  I'm not sure what she did differently because my sauce came out both a good consistency and very tasty.  Also, to add more "Thai" flavor, I cooked the tofu in coconut oil as opposed to olive oil.

^^Ok, one more comment:  Any of these recipes could be doubled or tripled so that there would be more freezable leftovers for a larger family.  In particular, I like the recipes in this book because the serving size works out well for two people.