Any single people eating healthy?

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  • swimmchick87
    swimmchick87 Posts: 458 Member
    edited July 2020
    yirara wrote: »
    swimmchick87 wrote: »
    I never cook anymore. I get all of my groceries from Trader Joe's, where I can buy a huge variety of things I just need to pop in the oven or maybe just throw a few things together. Discovering that store was a huge lifesaver for me. Honestly I don't know that I would have stuck to my weight loss goals this long without it.

    I know how to cook and I'm decent at it, but I always felt it was a waste of time as a single person- often spending an hour plus, and then cleanup, only to be done eating in 10-15 minutes. I often really liked what I made the first night I had it, but I hate leftovers. Nothing ever tastes the same the next day, and since it's just me if I made a "regular sized" recipe, it wasn't uncommon to end up with 6 servings of something. I definitely don't want to eat something 6 meals in a row! Freezing didn't work too well for me either. My food seemed to get freezer burn quickly and even if didn't, again the food just didn't taste the same reheated.

    With my Trader Joe's stuff I rarely end up with more than 2 servings of something. I enjoy everything I eat, I easily find things to fit into my calorie day, and I don't waste my time cooking and cleaning up cooking messes. It's also helped me cut way down on take out, since I know I can have something ready to eat pretty quickly after getting home from work, and I can't make excuses about getting take out because I'm too tired to cook.

    With the whole pandemic thing I wondered if I should try cooking again just for something to do, but I've found even with tons of extra time available I still don't want to spend my time on cooking :smile: . And I really like what I'm eating now and doing a good job of sticking to my calorie goal, so why mess with it?

    Isn't this massively expensive? Just curious as my dinners hardly ever cost more than 1.50 Euro. Cooking... today it took I don't even know how long. Peeled a big potato, cut into pieces, cooked, put half French smoked sausage into another pan, and did something else in the meantime. When nearly done I drained the water, smashed potatoes and added milk, sauerkraut and raisins. Put sausage on plate, mash into pan for a short moment, served. So I guess effective cooking was not even 10 minutes. Dishes go into dishwasher, which I'll put on when full.

    It's not expensive at all. Trader Joe's is a very cheap store and I actually spend far less money than I used to. Most of the time back when I was making recipes and going to a regular store like Kroger, I spent tons of money on varied ingredients needed to make something. Then often some of the leftovers would go bad because I just couldn't bring myself to eat the same thing so many days in a row. Tonight I ate some orange chicken in vegetable rice. It comes out to $1.88 per serving if you want to get technical. It would be significantly more expensive for me to buy all of the ingredients to make a meal like that myself, god knows how much time and mess, and probably wouldn't taste nearly as good either.
  • HoneyBadger302
    HoneyBadger302 Posts: 2,084 Member
    edited July 2020
    Overall my meals are fairly healthy, definitely single, and I cook a fair bit (can't afford to eat out all the time).

    I hate a lot of clean up, so most of my meals are going to be one or two pan dishes. I make good use of sauces, herbs, curries, pesto, etc and just build it into my calories. I avoid carb specific foods (breads, rice, potatoes, etc), and opt for things like riced cauliflower instead.

    Lunches are the hardest for me - salads or snacks, or I end up with those frozen meals (which, for a decent one, aren't particularly cheap).

    I am NOT a fan of leftovers, so while I try to keep a couple leftover meals frozen for those days I simply do not want to cook but can't eat out, most of my meals are 1-2 servings.

    When my groceries arrive, I weigh and portion my meats accordingly, put them in baggies, and freeze. That way I thaw something "fresh" each day, without the rest of it going bad.

    Veggies I have to buy most weeks or go frozen.

    Eating out and my waist line do not agree....neither does my wallet. It gets really expensive really fast.

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