Work 8 hours, come home tired, don't feel like cooking, eat fast food. Help?

Do you have a crockpot? I use mine all the time during the week. Most of my favorite recipes are only a few ingredients. Try searching some websites for different recipes. Right now I have a hamburger potato soup cooking for dinner tonight. Last week we had beef stew. I think tomorrow I will do a pork tenderlion with some mexican seasonings, a can of rotel and make pork soft tacos.
There is nothing better than coming home after a busy day and dinner is pretty much ready.
HTH!

Spending the time to prepare your meals would be best but you can do way better than fast food in a pinch - you'll still need to make that trip to the grocery store. When I lived alone I stocked up on single-serve items like Chobani yogurts, granola, pieces of fruit, bags of frozen veggies, rice, and chicken breasts (you can divide these yourself to save $). One benefit to this is all of these items are easy to find on MFP so portioning and logging is a breeze. The most time I would spend is cooking meats - sometimes I'd spend about 20-30 minutes to prepare 4 or 5 chicken breasts for the week. Keep hot sauce, mustard, balsamic vinegar around to dress up any meals that turn out bland.

Second the idea of a slow cooker or even just preparing food that you begin the night before - like marinating chicken or something. Tonight all I'll do is throw a chicken breast on the George Foreman and bake some frozen french fries.

I agree with the crock pot recipe, now that it's getting colder I plan to make chili in it soon & found an apple pork recipe online. I also dislike eating the same thing all week, so I prep the regular portion meal, but only put half in the crock pot and freeze the other half to have in a couple of weeks. I have a really small crockpot so this helps with that too! I feel the recipe's in a crockpot tend to be pretty forgiving too. The other suggestion is host a freezer meal session - where you pick out meals with friends & buy the items in bulk. You then create freezer meals with your friends. I'm not a great cook, but am friends with someone who is so they usually have great suggestions for meals/ techniques.

I never feel like cooking. Here is what I often do. Buy bags of frozen vegs. Buy a variety of sauces like orange, ginger, teriyaki, sweat/sour etc. Buy large amounts of chicken (ham slices work also, for variety, and they are pre-cooked). On the weekends, cook the chicken (I boil mine), divide into 1-meal-size portions, freeze them.

After work, throw a whole bag of vegs into microwave. Thaw 1 portion of chicken (I boil again, just until thawed but can also microzap.) Add sauce to chicken (or mix and add to all). Log. Eat.

Takes 8 minutes total -- faster than driving to fast food and waiting in line.

A whole 8 hours?

I bought a crock pot with a timer on it. It was money well spent. I can throw in frozen chicken, frozen veggies, some broth(I use Rachel Ray's boxed broth) and set it and come home to a hot and ready meal.

If you want to eat fast food during maintenance too......it can be done. There are thin people who eat fast food regularly. But, your choices are going to be more limited than before you lost the weight. You will have to cut back on something or the weight will come back.

Lifestyle changes......you need to decide what's right for you. Learn to cook ...... or limited choices (forever).

I like stir fries. Lean meat, veggies (even frozen bags work).....sauce & rice. Sauce is broth, thickener (corn starch) and seasonings.

Crock pot soups & stews are great. Crock pot chicken (TinCanonaString).....so easy. Seasoned meat for so many things.....burritos, tacos, taco salads.

Even buying ready made pizza crust....then do it yourself toppings. Turkey pepperoni is flavorful & lower fat.

Agree with all that everyone else is saying. We also sometimes do prepped stuff from the store rather than fast food. (We have a large grocery line item and a much smaller restaurant line item in our budget, haha.)

Generally we do a big meal on Sunday (enchiladas, lasagna, chili, whatever) since we work during the week. And then we usually do quicker meals during the week. We love leftovers and if we cook, we try to get at least 2-3 meals each out of it. We are a 2 person household (2 adults).

If we don't want to cook or have time to cook:
We will buy a bagged salad and a Newmans Own frozen pizza. That makes a meal.

Or...we have a great Italian specialty store around the corner. We will buy freshly made pasta and sauce and all you have to do is boil the noodles and heat the sauce. Add a bagged salad again for some veggies.

Or...a quick meal we can fall back on is a can of vegetarian refried beans, spread on a tortilla. (Use pinto or black if you prefer.) Sauté onion and bell pepper together, add a dash of spices, and top on the tortilla. Bam, fajitas. Dice up some avocado for some healthy fat if you wish. They are not restaurant quality but it gets the job done.

It really can be a pain to make meals, but it's so important to carve that time out. We also usually designate one weekday evening to be tv/media-free and it's amazing how much we can get done when we are not parked on the couch.

I use Soylent, which is a meal replacement powder, for the times when I'm just too tired or lazy to procure "real" food. Its definitely not as enjoyable as real food, but it's nutritious and healthier than fast food, and gets the job done.

jemhh wrote: »

tatjanak87 wrote: »

I use Soylent, which is a meal replacement powder, for the times when I'm just too tired or lazy to procure "real" food. Its definitely not as enjoyable as real food, but it's nutritious and healthier than fast food, and gets the job done.

I cannot get over the name of this product. Every time I see it mentioned I think of Soylent Green.

Well, one is called Soylent and the other is called Soylent so I can see how that might happen.

I am struggling with the same. I buy a ton of Amy's cheese and been burritos are Target for $2 and eat them for lunch, they are 310 calories. Frozen bags of veggies are quite frequent in my house. Sometimes I get a 7 layer burrito at Taco Bell and they are 470 calories...Eating out I usually pick a salad and always get the dressing on the side. I get a lot of Costco salads and use only half the dressing. Frozen chicken breast strips at costco are easy to heat up in the oven or microwave - then I add them to a salad. Every time you do make dinner, make extra for your lunch at least the next day if not meals for the next 2-3 days. Good luck!

The hubs cooks on the grill several items and we use the vacuum sealer and portion meats out and freeze them. Same thing with crock pot meal. I always have chicken, lean burgers, soups, stew, chilli, spaghetti sauce in the freezer. To me with my meat done and just needing heating is half the battle and can get supper on the table quick and healthy.

JanineAytekin wrote: »

.................................., if you must do fastfood, try kookooroo chicken or el pollo loco. But steer clear from the regulars.

Chipotle (my daughter calls is Chi-poodle, lol) is a good one to. The food is near organic, definitely high grade, and tastes really fresh and light. Just had it for lunch and total calories were 545 (mostly because of the brown rice, but I need some type of grain for my colon.) I could eat this every day of the week.

I make a home made version on Sundays when I have time. Beans and rice a very good quick meal, add grilled/baked chicken, add red onions, salsa, and that is some serious good eating that you will get full on.