Blog Seven: Meal Prep & Favorite Recipies

Like I mentioned in my last blog, meal planning has really helped me on this journey. I feel like when I plan ahead, I eat a well-balanced diet more often. Not only that, but I can get all my groceries in one go once a week. This saves me time and money because I can plan to use similar ingredients for the week so no food goes to waste! In this blog, I want to share my top 2 go-to meals that I have made recently.

Sushi Bowls:

Ingredients: 

• 1 Avocado, large
• 1 1/2 cups English cucumber
• 3/4 cup carrots
• Nori (seaweed packet) 
• 1/4 cup Mayonnaise, light
• 1/2 cup edamame 
• 1/4 cup Soy sauce, low-sodium
• 1 1/2 tbsp Sriracha
• 2 cups Sushi rice 
• 10 oz Imitation crab
•  Sesame seeds

Instructions: Cook rice and edamame in separate pots. While rice is cooking prep carrots and cucumbers by cutting them up into small bite-sized pieces (can do matchstick carrots). Combine siracha and mayonnaise in a small bowl. Once rice is done, prepare a bowl with rice topped with carrots, cucumber, edamame, immitation crab, and avaocado. Drizzle with spicy mayo, soy sauce, and sesame seeds.

Luscious Lentil Loaf

Serving size: 3 people

Ingredients:

• ¾ cup lentils
• ¾ cup cooked rice
• 2 cups vegetable broth
• 1 onion finely chopped
• 1 red pepper finely chopped
• 1 cup chopped mushrooms
• 1 cup shredded carrots
• 2 cloves minced garlic
• 2 cups grated cheddar cheese
• ¼ cup water
• ¼ tsp cayenne 
• ½ tsp coriander
• ½ tsp cumin
• ½ tsp curry
• ½ tsp basil 
• 1 tsp seasoning salt
• 2 tsp cornstarch

Directions:

Cook lentils in broth for ½ hour or until soft

Put small amount of oil in a large pan and saute onions, garlic, carrots, peppers, mushrooms, then add seasoning and saute until soft. (remember for rice use ¾ cup cooked rice so you may have extra cooked rice since it is hard to get that proportion! Luckily you can make a easy fried rice or stir fry with extra veggies)

Add remaining ingredients, rice, and lentils. Stir well. Put in loaf pan and bake @ 350 for 20-30 min!

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Last year I took a nutrition course and I found it so interesting!! Not only did I learn tons of information that help me make healthy choices every day, but now I’m learning how to take that information and turn it into lessons I can one day teach! Right now I’m working on a physical education unit on nutrition and I find that it’s really cool to start integrating what I know with what I want to teach!