Fuel

I had someone email me recently and ask what I cook for breakfasts and lunches for the work week.  While this varies from week to week (or 2 weeks actually as that's usually how far ahead I do my bulk cooking and freezing ahead of time)...this is pretty standard right now.

Breakfast:  Breakfast tacos - consisting of egg whites, browned ground turkey, a sprinkling of shredded cheese, and tortillas.  I scramble up and cook an entire carton of egg whites plus usually 2 or 3 whole eggs for a little color and extra umph from the egg yolks, and a 1 lb chub of Jennie O ground turkey that I brown, drain and rinse of all grease.  throw all in the pan, mix it up, sprinkle some cheese over the top and using my cooking spoon...put one spoonful into a soft taco sized tortilla...roll each one up and wrap in wax paper, put those in a large ziploc....one bag full for the first week, freezer for the second bag full for the second week.  My last batch I managed to get 19 of them out of the batch...im gonna aim for 20 next batch.  :)

I then either eat one of those with a protein shake (1 scoop protein powder mixed with 8 oz almond milk)....or I will just eat 2 tacos.  Either way, my breakfast is between 400-500 calories and I am FUUUULLLLLLL and satisfied.  This is after I am back from gym trip #1, showered, ready to go...and yes will admit, sometimes gets eaten on the way to dropping James off at KinderCare. 

3 and a half hours later, I mix a cinnamon oatmeal packet with a half scoop of vanilla protein powder and water and eat that as my mid morning snack/pre-workout fuel before workout #2 on my break.

Lunch consists of steamed broccoli, steamed brown rice with maybe a half a teaspoon of reduced sodium soy sauce on it for flavor, and a 3 oz piece of chicken.....lately Ive been baking a 3 lb batch of chicken breasts or things in the oven, and topping them with a little BBQ sauce.......once I burn out on that, will change the seasonings or whatever.  Again, I steam enough broccoli for 5 lunches at a time, same with the rice and chicken.  Assemble into plastic containers, and its grab and go in the mornings when I pack my lunch - lunch container, medium sized apple, bottle of water for lunchtime gym session, and I have the oatmeal packets and protein powder already in my drawer at work.

Apple and sometimes a little natural peanut butter around 3:00 to stave off that afternoon slump...then home to figure out what healthy dinner we want to make that night.  That's my only variable to my day right now.

And as much as I love food, and all different kinds of food...I thought ok Im gonna get sick and tired of the same thing every day.....I can honestly say I havent......that I treat breakfast, lunch and snacks more as FUEL before and after the workouts etc.....and I enjoy dinner a lot as that is when we as a family decide what we feel like that night, still keeping it on the healthy side of things.

That's probably the hardest part for a lot of people is breaking that "love affair" with how YUMMY food is...especially the stuff that is really not good for you.  But once you start treating it as fuel, and you see how positively your body responds to eating healthy....it gets really easy, really quick.

Time to get thru the rest of my day......before I do, here's some stuff to ponder....

Im finding this is true more and more every day as I incorporate more and more healthy recipes and items into our daily life, and cutting out the junk....

My pantry and fridge are getting more and more towards this goal every time I do another big shopping trip...less and less boxed/processed stuff, even down to stuff like taco seasoning and what not......

And been successful so far at keeping to the good stuff 90% of the time, and allowing a little of the fast, cheap, easy and fake stuff about 10% of the time.....even then I find myself choosing better than I used to, and in much much smaller portions.

Happy Wednesday y'all!!!  Make it a great one, eat right and get up and MOVE today for a while....you will be glad you did!!  :)