Preparing For a Week of Clean Eating

The best thing that you can do for yourself in your fitness journey is to be prepared with clean food.  If you have healthy choices on hand you will reach for those instead of something quick and unhealthy.  Take time either on Sunday night or Monday night to get ready for a successful week.  I will make sure that I have food for two snacks, one can be a protein shake or green smoothie, two meals.  Breakfast is always easy for me, I eat (pretty much) the same thing every day, eggs, sprouted grain Ezekiel nuts and seeds bread and some berries.  I have one cup of coffee with a little coconut milk creamer.  Here are some meal and snacks you can prepare ahead of time, and some ideas of what you can grab if you are out and in a pinch!

Meals
Lunch or Dinner:
Grilled chicken breast, quinoa, mixed veggies (broccoli, zucchini, tomatoes, spinach)
 -Make 4 or 5 grilled chicken breasts (approx 4 ounce servings) for the week
-Cook enough vegetables to eat at 3 or 4 meals
-Make quinoa to have 4 or 5 1/2 cup servings
Baked Salmon, sweet potato, salad
-Make enough salmon for 3 or 4 5-6 ounce servings
-Bake 2 or 3 sweet potatoes
-Make one large salad to eat during the week, load it up with carrots, cucumbers, tomatoes, add in lots of mixed leafy greens and spinach.  Choose your dressing wisely: red wine or balsamic vinegar and evoo, or an organic vinaigrette (I prefer the Organicville brand)
* The key here is to prepare enough meals to have 5 days of lunch and dinner.  You can make 2 or 3 different meals, depending on how much variety you need.  When I am in goal mode I can eat a lot of the same meals throughout the week. 

Snacks:
-1/4 cup raw almonds
-Cut up veggies (carrots, celery, snow or snap peas) and 2 tbsp hummus
-1 tbsp organic peanut butter with Sprouted Grain Ezekiel cinnamon raisin bread
-Apples, pears, peaches, plums, etc
-Mixed berries, 1/2 cup organic full fat yogurt, 1 scoop vanilla protein powder (I use Sun Warrior Vegan blend, or for those of you who prefer whey, J Robb Whey is a good choice)
-1 organic mozzarella cheese stick
-Green Smoothie- you can make this in the morning to take with you, make sure to keep refrigerated (will keep up to 24 hours)
-Protein Shake- again make in the morning to take with you.  You can also purchase a blender bottle to keep with you, add water and your protein shake and drink.  It's easy and will keep you from grabbing something bad.

On the go or in a pinch:
If you are able to make it to a grocery store pick up any of these:
-Kind Protein bar
-Apple
-Banana
-Portioned out unsalted nuts
-Frozen Amy's meal (if you can get to a microwave)
-Premade salad- skip the dressing and stick with red wine vinegar and evoo

Make sure you are drinking plenty of water (half your body weight in ounces per day) as sometimes you will mistake hunger for thirst.
If you need more ideas check out my approved foods list here.

 Please share any healthy meals or snacks that you eat to stay lean and clean!
As always, thanks for stopping by! 

My Successful Week in Review!

I want to take a minute and share my week in review with you.  Since I shared my plan with you I think that it is only fair that I tell you how I am doing with that plan.  I am at the end of two weeks in and I am feeling really motivated.  The first week I was only able to get 4 days in and didn't make it to yoga, but on the plus side I was sore after my workouts, which makes me more conscious of my eating, I don't want to ruin all that hard work with poor food choices.  This week was very successful!  I worked out 5 days and plan to do yoga tomorrow.  Here is my week in review:
Monday- Legs and cardio in the morning, logged my food in my fitness pal app
Tuesday-Chest circuits, logged my food
Wednesday- Day of rest.  I also had some Bowen work done on my shoulder so I wanted to give my body a rest before I had my session.  If you are not familiar with Bowen work, it is a type of trigger point therapy that works to correct muscle imbalances.  I have to say after just one session I was feeling much better.  I plan to go back weekly until my shoulder (a chronic injury that is aggravated from carrying my daughter around) is fixed.
Thursday-Interval Cardio on the treadmill in the morning
Friday- Back circuits
Saturday- Leg circuits from a fellow blogger at Peanut Butter Fingers and Jillian Michaels Kickboxing cardio workout
Sunday- Asthanga Yoga
*I wasn't as good about logging my food toward the end of the week, but I was eating clean.  Also, my days aren't exactly as in my plan, but I got all my workouts in and that's what matters!  Flexibility is important in your fitness journey, just because you don't get a workout in on a planned day does not mean you have to wait another week to start.  Start today with where you are and with what you can fit into your day, you will be happy that you did!

Today after my workout I made a yummy post-workout/meal replacement shake.  Since my hubby and I are getting a night out, thanks to my wonderful mom, I made this shake to be more of a meal replacement as well as post-workout, double duty is always good!  I will be more full at dinner and will make good meal choices because it is important for me to stay on track.  If you are heading out this weekend make sure to plan your meals out so you can stay on track too!  

Here is the recipe for my shake:  I hope you enjoy it!
2 scoops Sun Warrior Vegan Blend Protein (I'm not vegan, I just can't process whey protein)
2 tbsp. organic ground flax
1 tbsp. Trader Joe's Cocoa Powder
1 tbsp homemade peanut butter (this one is from our local specialty grocery store)
1 tbsp organic coconut oil
1 frozen banana
1 & 1/2 cup water and some ice
Blend well and enjoy!

I would love to hear from you on your week in review or if you have any awesome, yummy protein shake recipes!

Thanks for stopping by!

My peanut butter pancakes I made for breakfast! Yum!

After all the talk of Peanut Butter Pancakes yesterday I had to make them today for breakfast!  I made a few changes, because I needed enough for 3 of us.  I will say that my 19 month old gobbled these up!  My wonderful hubby (who worked out with me), made the blueberry topping.  It is simple and adds another layer of flavor to the delicious pancakes.
Here is how I made them this morning, it made 8 total pancakes:
1 cup old fashioned oats
3 tablespoons peanut butter (organic if possible)
6 egg whites
1 tablespoon coconut milk
1 teaspoon vanilla
1 teaspoon cinnamon
Pour 1/4 cup for each pancake into a preheated pan on medium heat.  Cook evenly on both sides, Enjoy!

Blueberry topping
1/2 c blueberries
water
dash of organic cane sugar to balance out the tartness (optional)
Heat blueberries and just enough water to cover the bottom of a small pan, once blueberries are warm mash with for and simmer until desired consistency is reached.  Spread on pancakes.

If you made these pancakes, please let me know what you thought and if you made any changes to yours.

Thanks for stopping by!

Peanut Butter Pancakes Recipe

Clean eating Peanut Butter Pancakes...YUM!

Breakfast is my favorite meal of the day and with a yummy clean eating meal like these Peanut Butter pancakes, how can it not be?!?

1/2 cup old fashioned oat meal
6 egg whites
2 tbsp. organic peanut butter
1 tsp vanilla
1 tsp cinnamon
*splash or 2 of coconut or almond milk if needed
(optional, top with a few banana slices)
Mix all ingredients in a bowl until well incorporated.  Add coconut or almond milk if mixture is too thick.  You want a little bit of a runny consistency so the batter pours into the pan.  Heat pan on medium heat and coat with organic cooking spray.  Pour batter into pan and cook until pancake is firm and flip, cooking the other side.  Enjoy!
Makes 2 servings-Nutrition information (from myfitnesspal.com) Calories: 220, Fat 9.4g, Carbs 17.2g, fiber 3g, Sugar 1g, Protein 17.5g

Please come back after you make this recipe and let me know what you think!  Feel free to share your own quick and clean eating breakfast recipe!

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