#healthytip: cook once, eat twice
I find batch cooking veggies and other staples (grains, beans, sauces, etc) and repeating these foods once or twice in your week is actually key to keeping up with a healthy lifestyle, because worrying about having a totally different meal each day is stressful, a lot of work, and can take away from your health.
It’s become a “tool” that has made everyday healthy eating in my house become stress-free and basically the status-quo. There are always healthy leftovers in my fridge (especially roasted veggies, sauteed greens and some sort of hummus)!
But I get asked a lot, IS IT HEALTHY TO EAT LEFTOVERS?
Energetically and nutritionally, it’s best to consume fresh foods (ideally, straight from an organic farm and not more than 1-2 days in your fridge) and it’s best to eat them right after being cooked. Reheated food isn’t the same. BUT that’s just not realistic for most of us. I 100% believe in being flexible and finding what works best for you to be as healthy as possible without over-stressing. Choose your priorities. Remember...It’s about progress, not perfection!!
I try to eat things as fresh as possible and get things from local organic farms whenever possible. But I can’t do everything perfect. For me, the principle of cooking once and eating twice, combined with some basic meal-prep, is a MUST to stay healthy without over-working and going crazy about it. My dinner is usually some leftovers from lunch, maybe sans salad and with a little tweak, but essentially it’s mostly reheated... And it’s NO. BIG. DEAL..
Hearing that “it’s ok” to eat leftovers and to remove the guilt of not eating fresh every single time can be a gamechanger.
And …DID YOU KNOW? Eating similar foods for a few days straight can actually be great as it gives your digestion a bit of a break. In the Ayurveda culture, they do a detox (usually once a season) that consists of eating only a “mono-meal” for 3 to 21 days straight. They eat a one pot meal of soft yellow lentils, basmati rice, spices, veggies and ghee.. for all 3 meals, everyday, for the duration of the detox. Why? Because it’s easy to digest and allows your body to save energy otherwise used for digestion (leaving your body with more energy to detoxify). So repeating meals really isn’t that bad!
Where to start?
Try some basic meal prep. Once or twice a week, “batch-cook” a ton of veggies, one grain, one type of legume and/or 2-3 recipes for the week (that you can have as both lunch and dinner). Plus, keep a few ingredients on hand always for easy-to-assemble salads and breakfasts.
And if you want ideas for healthy, easy breakfasts, I got some great resources and recipes for you:
So choose a day or two in the week for batch-cooking and meal prep, try buying organic where possible, reheating on the stove vs. microwave when you can muster the energy, and keep implementing ACCESSIBLE ‘healthy hacks” to keep advancing towards your health goals. We’re all in this together!