With just a little forethought and planning, you can have a weekly supply of ready-to-go snacks and meals that are both healthy and meet your macronutrient goals. It also means you don't reach for junk food when you're too busy to get anything ready.
So get ready and get organised...
Weekly Meal Plan #4
Meals
- Breakfast – Chocolate overnight oats
- Morning snack – Homemade hummus and carrot sticks
- Lunch – Mexican pulled chicken with corn and coriander brown rice
- Afternoon snack – Greek yoghurt with seed mix
Additional Supplements
Macronutrients
We try to base our meal preps on the following macronutrients: Male, 70kg body weight, heavy exercise (5-7 times a week), with a goal of putting on less than half a kg per week.
Daily target:
- 2937 calories
- 220 grams protein
- 367 grams carbs
- 65 grams fat
This meal prep achieves (keeping in mind it doesn’t include dinner or supplementation):
- 1844 calories
- 114 grams protein
- 170 grams carbs
- 74 grams fat
You can tailor the amount of macronutrients to suit your body weight and goals. A handy calculator for finding out your daily macronutrient requirements is found here: www.macronutrientcalculator.com
To work out food quantities I use the Easy Diet Diary app.
Weekly Shopping List
**I try to buy organic wherever possible**
2 ½ cups oats
2 ½ cups coconut milk
1 x 400g can chickpeas
2 x 400g cans diced tomatoes
1 x 310g can corn
1 x 40g fajita spice mix
2 cups brown rice (dry quantity)
5 tablespoons shredded coconut
5 tablespoons honey
2 tablespoons hulled tahini
5 tablespoons True Protein organic cocoa powder
2 ½ teaspoons True Protein organic vanilla powder
2 ½ teaspoons True Protein organic cinnamon powder
5 tablespoons mixed seeds
1.5kg chicken thigh
1kg Greek yoghurt
5 large carrots
3 bananas
1 lemon
2 garlic cloves
1 bunch coriander
Items you should have in your fridge / pantry:
Olive Oil
Chilli flakes (optional)
Flavor God Spices
How to prepare & cook
- Cook the chicken thighs in a pan until sealed on all sides (do not cook through).
- Place the chicken thighs, fajita spice mix and 2 cans of tomatoes into a slow cooker and cook for 4 hours.
- After 4 hours, shred the thighs with a fork and continue cooking in the slow cooker for half an hour. If you do not have a slow cooker you can cook in a saucepan over a very low heat.
- Prepare the chocolate overnight oats using the following recipe.
- Divide the overnight oats between 5 jars and store in the fridge.
- Cook the brown rice as per packet instructions. I use the absorption method which takes 25 minutes.
- Once the rice has cooled, drain the can of corn and stir in the corn and approximately ½ cup of chopped coriander leaves (or to taste)
- Make the hummus. Place the following ingredients in a food processor and blend until smooth: 1 can chickpeas, juice of 1 lemon, 1 teaspoon of lemon zest, 2 garlic cloves, 2 tablespoons hulled tahini and 2 tablespoons olive oil.
- Peel and cut the carrots into sticks. Store the carrot sticks in water to last longer.
- Place approximately 100g yoghurt into 5 containers and sprinkle with 1 tablespoon of seed mix.
- Once prepared and cooled place the rest of your meals into your containers for the week!
Tips & Tricks to make it happen
Post any questions in the comments below and I will include in future tips & tricks
- Be organised! It pays to plan ahead. I put an online click and collect Woolworths order in earlier in the week for collection on Sunday morning
- Put aside one or two times to prep each week – I prefer to do it all at once on Sunday afternoon/evenings
- Purchase good containers with really good seals, a few different sizes for different meals helps. It’s a good idea to buy a few spares in case they go missing! I use Ikea containers, Sistema containers and glass jars (All BPA free)
- Try to multi-task while you are prepping – cook your meat while vegies are baking etc. The more you prep the more efficient you will get. A first time prep can take 4-5 hours but I can now usually have it all done in less than 2 hours.
- I don’t normally freeze the meals and just keep them in the refrigerator. This is a personal choice though and many meals can be frozen. You may just like to freeze Thursday/Friday for example.