This was my table pretty much Friday – Sunday, and sometimes it was worse. That is just the nature of being a student: balancing teaching, research endeavors, having a life, classes, oh, and then there is the studying……. for those who care I was knee deep in Vitamins this weekend. Good times.
So, if I’m going to take care of myself I’ve got to find ways to maximize cooking time. We do really simple meals when life gets busy: quinoa/rice blends in the rice cooker, frozen turkey burger patties, hardboiled eggs, spinach salads, etc.
For those of you who think you don’t have time to cook healthy, I want to challenge that belief. You may not have time right now, but somewhere in the week you have a few minutes to devote to your wellness, if you are willing to get creative and try something.
Batch cooking is your tool of insuring healthy food is around when you need it. Basically I figure out what foods needed to be cooked soon to avoid spoilining and I whipped up enough foods to last a few meals. My approach is that if I’m turning on the oven, I’m going to make it worth my while, so on Saturday I baked sweet potatoes, roasted garlic and green peppers, and cooked some phyllo encrusted tilapia for dinner that night. The whole process took me about 30 minutes (including making a big green salad to last that night and the next day), and I had meal components for 3 days.
Check it out: a view of the oven (you can’t see the fish) I cooked it all @ 350 for various lengths of time. I was willing to sacrifice precision for diversity in options:
The sweet potatoes lasted 3 meals, and one was used to make some tasty oatmeal for B-fast one day. The fish served as the basis for dinner, and the roasted veggies were nice additions to a salad for 2 lunches. Easy, peasy…..
Happy off white eating!
