Over 60, Eat fresh and lose weight

jonmcardle

I was checking out some of the topics on MFP and saw so many people wanting information about meal plans. Those people must have way more money than I have to afford to have someone mail them food in a box with recipes inside. Stop wasting your money! Eat fresh and lose weight.

Michelin Star Chef Gordon Ramsey is famous for telling restaurateurs good food in NEVER frozen and frozen food is never very good. I would add, pre-packaged prepared foods are not good for you either.

I make two trips to the grocery store on my way home from work each week. This way I always have fresh ingredients to cook with. How do I know what I'm going to need to make meals? Well, I make my meal plans ahead of time. Breakfast, lunch and dinner are planned for every day of the week on Fridays. I make my weekly meal plans for the upcoming 8 days every Friday. Then I shop for those meals on my way home from work so I don't make any extra trips.

I'll tell you this, my family and I eat really well! We have restaurant quality food at home for a week and spend less than 25% of what it costs me to take the family to a steakhouse for one meal. We eat swordfish, yellow fin tuna, Turkey, chicken, soup(s), salad(s), omelets, frittatas, Poke, just about anything we want. The trick, I meal plan ahead, make it at home and save hundreds of dollars each month.

Try it. You'll eat better, feel better, lose weight with portion control, and save money. What more could you ask for.

sollyn23l2

While I do all my own cooking, and I agree it's a great thing to do, it's a tall order for a lot of people. Especially for people who aren't used to it. I spend more time on it than I'd like to. I just refuse to pay the outlandish price for eating out, take away, or ready made meals.

Corina1143

😃

claireychn074

Just got to disagree with one part of your post: frozen veg can actually have more nutrients than fresh. Frozen veg - like peas - is picked and frozen quickly, which locks in the vitamins. Fresh peas can be air freighted or hang around in shops for a week before being bought. Frozen veg is also often cheaper and is a great quick way to bulk out meals at home - if people are short on time, then frozen veg is quick to cook (no preparation needed).

I live in a rural area. I don’t have time to do a round trip to get fresh veg twice a week, and besides, I grow a lot of my own fruit and veg and then freeze it.

StepNup27

I do alot of "fresh" cooking. I'm having trouble finding where do you search foods? Where do you search recipes in general? I found all the recipes listed by category, but I have not been basing my menu on that yet.

AnnPT77

StepNup27 wrote: »

I do alot of "fresh" cooking. I'm having trouble finding where do you search foods? Where do you search recipes in general? I found all the recipes listed by category, but I have not been basing my menu on that yet.

You can use any search term at all in the MFP blog. For example, if you do that in the recipe section with an ingredient, recipes using that ingredient will be among the search results.

That would be here: https://blog.myfitnesspal.com/category/meal-planning-recipes/

Here's an arbitrary example, where I searched for "beans":



Web search on ingredients works fine, too, e.g. "recipes for beans" or even "low calorie recipes for beans". Pinterest may also be helpful.

paperpudding

Those people must have way more money than I have to afford to have someone mail them food in a box with recipes inside.

You must have a different interpretation of the term "meal plans"

When I read that someone wants a meal plan, I interpret that as they want a set eating plan

ie Mon breakfast; eat x quantity of xyz, lunch abc, Dinner xyz etc
Tues eat blah blah
and so on for a week or fortnight

and then they buy the food/ingredients and do it themself - so no more money required than anything else, just a plan to follow rather than decide yourself and have to calculate calories yourself.

If people want to do this - make sure the calorie total is right for you ie pick a meal plan for ,say 1500 calories per day or add or remove something from the plan to get it to your calorie level

and IMO, pick one that is not too proscriptive - ie a flexible one that suggests various options at meals - eg choose 1 of each of these options at each dinner - rather than eat exactly X at exactly this meal on exactly this day

I'm sure you were trying to be helpful but your post did come across a bit 'holier than thou' to me

I disagree that frozen food is never good - I see no issue with things like frozen vegetables, frozen pastry sheets - and I often buy foods non frozen and then freeze them myself - , grated cheese, bacon, bread, meat - they don't suddenly then become not good for me.

Whilst I think it is good to eat fresh food I don't see processed food as a NEVER thing nor do I see going out for meals as a NEVER thing.Sure, it is more expensive than cooking at home - but it is also enjoyable, sociable etc
It isn't a false dichotomy of pick one only.

I think for most people finding the right balance is the key, rather than seeing things in black and whites of always and never.