Cooking for One: Tips

The Power 90 Challenge has a very nice meal plan associated with it. Some dishes are simple, others require a little more preparation and additional ingredients. Problem is how to you use all the ingredients cooking for one. So here are some tricks I've learned to reduce the amount of food I waste.

1. When possible buy frozen or freeze


• This works especially well for Meats. Buy the 2.5 lb bag of chicken and the 8 pack of frozen low fat Bubba Burgers (Yup they do exist).


• Repackage in Ziplock vacuum bags. These work just like those infomercial vacuseal systems except they use a hand pump which costs $10 instead of $90. They're great at preventing that funky freezer taste in chicken. When I buy the 2.5 bag of frozen chicken I immediately transfer them the vacuum bags (2 breasts each). Every couple of days, in the evening, I transfer a vacuum bag of 2 breasts from the freezer to the fridge. Next evening they're ready to cook fresh as the day they were frozen. Also since they're in the vacuum bag they'll last longer in the fridge as well.
  


• Also freezing bread makes it last much longer with little affect. Ziploc says that bread will last 3 months in the freezer. Bread out in the open lasts me about a week. I used to only get 2 Burger buns out of an 8 pack before figuring this trick out.
  



2. Buy you're veggies at the salad bar
   


• Buying whole vegetables is really problematic. Are you really going to be able to use that whole head of broccoli before it goes brown? The salad bar is great because you can just get the portion you need for the next meal or two.


• Get multiple containers for multiple meals. You can organize right there with individual containers for individual meals.
  


• Salad bar veggies are already washed and cut.
  


3. Stock up on ingredients with a long shelf life
   


• Cereals, Canned goods, pantry stuff... You're going to be at the super market a lot getting ingredients but you might as well lighten you're weekday shopping by stocking up on stuff that will last on the weekends. Nothing annoys me more than being hungry for breakfast and realizing I'm out of Cheerios.


4. Weigh it don't measure it


• I bought a Salter Digital Scale for about $30, you can see the exact model here.


• Keep your measuring cups clean. You can all your weighing by putting your plate/pan on the scale and using the Tear feature. Put 4oz of chicken on then hit tare now add the 56g of Marinara Sauce (56g = 1/4 cup) etc...


5. Use Snack bags and Sandwich bags to pre-portion food in the fridge.


• Instead of dirtying a plate I use Snack/Sandwich bags to portion cubed chicken or sliced veggies.
  


6. Always have cubed chicken ready to go


• Many of the recipes call for chicken. I keep a bunch of cooked pre-cubed chicken in snack bags in the fridge. It really cuts down on prep time during the week. Just add cubes until you get the portion you want. Heat and eat.
  

Fed For a Day

So here's what I ate today:

For breakfast I had 2 cups of Cheerios with fat-free milk.

For snacks and lunch I brought the following to work:

Snacks:
Green peppers sliced (Eaten with Peanut Butter that's already at work)
Sunflower seeds
Clif Bar (Chocolate Chip Peanut Crunch)

Lunch:
Makings for a Ruben (corned beef/sauerkraut/whole grain rye bread/mustard)
Yogurt
A large Fuji apple (not pictured)


For dinner I had whole wheat spaghetti with chicken and marinara sauce and a yogurt for desert (not pictured). This was a larger dinner than I normally have but I'm preparing for a long bicycle ride tomorrow evening.

All said and done a pretty well balanced meal plan. Most of what I ate came out of the P90 Nutrition Guide (which you can see in the 2nd picture). I've had to augment it slightly with some additional snacks and upping the portion size. The plan is designed to drastically cut your caloric intake (1500 calories). I'm assuming this is because it's designed with someone who is sedintary and wants to loose a lot of weight fast. Even so 1500 calories seems a little low for weight loss unless you were a 110 pound girl. The dinner is my own creation to attempt to carbo load before long or intensive bicycle training.

One month mark on P90

This is how I look today

• Body Fat: 16.0%
• Weight: 148 pounds
• Chest: 37 3/4"
• Waist:32"
• Hips: 33 3/4"
• Right Mid-Thigh: 20 5/16"
• Left Mid-Thigh: 20 1/2"
• Right Upper Arm: 12 1/4"
• Left Upper Arm: 12 5/16"
• Blood Pressure: ??
• Resting Heart Rate: ?? beats per minute.

My body fat is a little up but that may just be because of my hydration level when I weighed my self. I'm pleased to see that my arms are starting to get a little bigger. It's not visible in the pictures but the measurements show that it's the truth. Also my waist is a tiny bit smaller.

I'm finally done with all the long distance bike riding which was reeking havoc on my diet and exercise schedule. This means that I can now concentrate on P90 and achieving my ultimate goal of a 6 pack.

Till next time.

Jeans for fat Americans

So today I went shopping with my friend Megatron for Jeans. It's a long standing tradition. I bring a girl with good fashion sense with me to check out my ass in the Jeans before I buy them. This little trick has worked wonders for my wardrobe and fashion sense (Really I'm not gay!!).

Ok so I know that I have a 32" waist. I measured it with a tape and it says 32". Well in Jean's 30 is apperently the max I can wear now. I was pulling at the fly's of half of the ones I tried on and there was 1 1/2" gap. So that's like a 3" fudge factor. Come on America, retailers are now having to fudge 10% so you don't feel fat.

Also this really complicates things for me buying Jeans that fit. The department stores minimum size these days is FA 30" (FA = Fat American = + 3"). Hopefully my salvation will come in the form of international chains like H & M that carry Jeans for Europeans. I guess they got frustrated at not being able to find Jeans that fit too.

Little Dividends

I was hanging out in the city with some out-of-town friends and stepped back to take a picture of the group. As I framed the picture a car full of girls go driving by and in chorus yell "Cute!" I looked around to see who they were cat calling and one of my friends said "They mean you." I was flattered, in a random drive by flattering kind of way. It's funny when you start improving your body and you're the last to realize that your image will improve also. You have a mental picture of yourself and what you look like and even though you realize on some cerebral level that you're getting fitter you don't consider the social change until someone mentions it. Several of my friends have commented that they notice my arms are a little more cut. I don't see much of a difference but if they're noticing that's a great sign. The P90 Challenge highly recommends blogging and sharing you're stats with as many people as possible. I now understand that this is becuse their comments and feedback are part of the reward.

So make sure to comment ;-).

Diet woes

I'm still really struggling with the diet. I'm slightly annoyed that the caloric intake for the diet is so low. It's been a constant battle to increase things to a reasonable number of calories. My plan for tomorrow is to work on a meal plan for the rest of the week and prepare food accordingly. Having to prep food during the week is a serious time sink and can be pretty challenging after a workout. I'm also thinking of investigating the P90X meal plan as it is designed for someone trying to gain muscle rather than loose fat.