How do you all devise your meal prep planning with macros/calories?!

Cubrean
Cubrean Posts: 1 Member
edited November 2024 in Food and Nutrition
Howdy community! Long story short, I went from 240 lbs to 180 a few years ago, gained some weight back then dropped to my lowest since middle school at 168 last February. I quit soda, lifted weights without following a program (doh!) and ate what I deemed "healthy". I didn't count the foods, but apparently I was eating at a huge cut. I got super skinny. Anywho, after some holiday eating I'm around 179 now. I'm back in the gym doing splits just to get my body ready then I plan on doing a program like ICF 5x5. I plan on eating at a 1900-2000 calorie cut.

I start with a big breakfast, same boring lunch - sweet potato, asparagus or broccoli, and 6oz cooked chicken breast. Two snacks throughout the day, one scoop of whey + banana after workout then dinner is just sauteed spinach, mushrooms and 4 oz chicken or one cod fish. It hits my numbers for protein for body weight x 0.8 and fats x 0.4.

Anyways, sorry for the long text. But how do you all come up with your meal plan? Just randomly punching in foods and get foods closest to your macro goals? My lunch usually doesn't taste the best after the third day so I will look around for different recipes that last 4-5 days. Any recommendations? I'm browsing around for slow-cooker/instant pot recipes however many don't show calorie/macro info.

Thanks mfp community!

Replies

  • cwolfman13
    cwolfman13 Posts: 41,865 Member
    I don't really meal plan, and I'm only vaguely aware of my macros to the extent that I know I'm getting enough protein and enough fat without drilling down to any kind of exactness. I focus namely on having a diet that is rich in whole food nutrition...I'm also big on variety and the idea of eating the same thing day in and day out sounds miserable to me. My breakfast is usually the same, but I need variety elsewhere.

    My meal prep is basically me getting home in the evening and getting my breakfast and lunch and snacks ready...lunch is often whatever is leftover from that evenings meal.

    For recipes, I just look around on Pinterest for things that look tasty and include a lot of good nutrition...
  • janejellyroll
    janejellyroll Posts: 25,763 Member
    I plan my dinners for the week and pre-log them. Once those macros are set, I plug in breakfasts and lunches that get me approximately to where I want to be for calories. I don't focus on hitting specific macro goals within a day, just a range. If I'm far from what I want, then I'll make adjustments for breakfast and lunch until it's in a good spot.

    It's not what I would call random because I focus on the foods that I enjoy and I've gotten pretty good at making adjustments to keep me in the range where I feel best.

    Once I got used to logging consistently, recipes not having macros and calories wasn't as big of a deal because I'm pretty good at looking at a recipe and having a ballpark estimate of where it is going to fall nutritionally.
  • ahoy_m8
    ahoy_m8 Posts: 3,053 Member
    edited December 2017
    I started with what I normally like eating and observed what the macros were & how I felt. Then I tried small adjustments from there.

    E.g. I noticed my meals tend to be low fat, so I tried adding high fat snacks (nuts & cheese) or fat bombs. And I felt great and loved eating that stuff. Another e.g., after prelogging if my fat is high and fiber low, I might change the nut& cheese snack to airpopped popcorn. Small adjustments like that starting from current eating pattern.
  • toxikon
    toxikon Posts: 2,383 Member
    edited December 2017
    I just pay attention to my protein macro, not the other 2. I try to reach a certain protein minimum, adding a protein bar or shake if I fall short.

    I do meal prep once or twice a week. I just visit my favourite recipe websites, find a recipe that reheats well, and off I go. I double or triple the serving size to make enough to last my fiance and I at least a few days.
  • Momepro
    Momepro Posts: 1,509 Member
    I eat simlar meals for breakfast and lunch that I know are under 300 each. Dinner I just measure whatever we are having and keep it under whatever amount I have left. Snacks aren't usually planned, but I will usually look it up before I eat it to decide how much I'm willing to "spend" on it.
  • estherdragonbat
    estherdragonbat Posts: 5,283 Member
    6 days out of seven, I have the same breakfast: 1 cup of red seedless grapes (sometimes will switch out for green grapes or blueberries); weight out it's usually 155-185 grams, 1 6oz container double-protein fat-free Greek yogurt, and one granola bar crumbled on top.

    Lunch is usually a burrito or veggie burger. Sometimes it's a corn, veggie-dog, and vegetable salad, with pickle, pickled jalapeno, salsa, relish, and sour cream.

    Supper... I'm trying to work my way through a cookbook (1,000 Vegan Recipes; I'm ovo-lacto vegetarian, but I tend to not cook a lot of dairy). So, once a week, I make whatever is "next". Tonight I finish the barley risotto with mushroom and asparagus. Thursday, I'll be making a winter vegetable stew with barley. Between now and then, I'll likely have stirfry or fritatta.

    In general, I just try to hit my protein and iron within my calories and let the rest fall where it falls. I make room to snack on veggie dogs (protein and iron), string cheese (protein), Quaker Corn Squares Cereal (iron), Simple Protein chips and/or clusters (protein and iron) to bring up the totals if the meals fall short. Sometimes I'm over on carbs. I'm usually under on fats. I wouldn't say I'm eating low fat; more like moderate.
  • sllm1
    sllm1 Posts: 2,130 Member
    I also just pay attention to the protein...

    Lots of chicken and veggies and sometimes rice. Not terribly exciting, but it works.
  • kommodevaran
    kommodevaran Posts: 17,890 Member
    I build my meals from components, according to which meal it is - dinner is usually protein+starch+veg - and then I just alternate the components of the meals. The components are generally interchangeable; for me, nutrition is about consistency and not accuracy. There are so many different options in each category, that I'm never going to get bored. To make it easier and more structured, I have one dinner "theme" for each day - red meat, white meat, fish, etc; for variety, I make sure I don't have the same sides two days in a row, and pick different things each week. On Mondays I make enough for two days, so that I have planned leftovers for one dinner per week. Most meals are simple and easy to make, but I must have different foods through the day and from day to day - I will eat up a pack of something day by day until it's gone, but then I need something else.

    I considered meal prep, but landed on meal planning and component prep. You can enter any recipe into the recipe builder here, and get the nutrition info, just make sure each ingredient is correct. I don't think you'll find any recipes that taste fresh for more than 2-3 days, but people have varying sensitivity to both freshness and variety, so you have to figure it out through a bit of trial and error.
  • sgt1372
    sgt1372 Posts: 3,997 Member
    I just decide what I want to eat and wing it from there. I keep track of my cals & macros as I eat each meal and adjust the cals & macros as needed.

    I mostly watch my protein and eat high protein food or supplements to bring it up and try to keep fat intake under control by avoid fat heavy foods or eating more protein and/or carbs later in the day instead. The carbs just take care of themselves and end up where they may.

    Doing this I've been able to remain in maintenance at 158# +/-3 over the past 12 months and have kept my macros at a fairly balanced ratio of 34%P/38%C/28%F.

    Couldn't have done it w/o MFP.
  • rivergoat37
    rivergoat37 Posts: 2 Member
    I've been tracking macros and hitting my targets precisely for 9 months, losing about a pound per week. I've not tracked only 5 or 6 days in that time. For meal planning, it took some trial and error (crap, I have zero fat and 70 grams of protein left to eat!), but now I eat basically the same thing for breakfast each day, which I prep and log on sundays for the whole week. For lunches, I either make a big pot of something and portion it out or put together containers with steamed veggies, meat, and a whole grain, for the whole week at a time. You can enter recipes into MFP using the "recipes" feature, to be sure you're accurate. For example, I entered in everything I put in my chili, weighed the final product, and entered the serving size as one gram, which made it easy to log any amount of chili. (Most of my lunches were 350 grams of chili.) I also freeze extra portions and just grab one in the mornings. Dinner is whatever I need to fill in the remaining macros, so I keep lean lunch meat, cooked chicken breasts, eggs, veggies, fruit, applesauce, bread, and oils on hand and put together whatever I need. Last night it was a zucchini sauteed in butter with some diced up turkey. It really helps to log ahead of time if you're tracking macros.
  • Sharon_C
    Sharon_C Posts: 2,132 Member
    It's interesting to see how people manage their macros. I'm glad I'm not the only one that's not super strict. I was strict when I first started, but I tend to eat the same breakfast and lunch so that just leaves dinner I have to worry about. I used to worry about hitting every macro exactly but now I focus on protein first, carbs second, and usually I don't worry about fats because when I was strictly counting, fats were never an issue.
  • CJOttawa
    CJOttawa Posts: 3 Member
    edited December 2017
    I work backwards using MyFitnessPal's saved meal tool, prepping 6-days+ of meals at a time.

    Example: I'll enter, say, 2lbs of sweet potato, 6 eggs, half-a-pound of sausage (or vegetarian alternative), some cooking oil, cabbage etc.

    Then I save it, divide the totals by how much I'm splitting the meal up (0.167 is 1/6th) giving me the macros for a single meal and adjust the recipe as needed.

    I shop for groceries based on what's needed to prep that meal.

    I may be an outlier but I don't mind eating the same lunch day-in, day-out, and I'll vac-seal and freeze a bunch of them to get ahead. Once I get tired of eating a particular meal, I'll rotate a different recipe in.

    This is one I've been experimenting with, and can be made vegetarian subbing something like tempeh for the chorizo: http://www.seriouseats.com/recipes/2014/04/crispy-potato-and-chorizo-hash-recipe.html
  • lorrpb
    lorrpb Posts: 11,463 Member
    I build my meals around protein. Add fruit at breakfast or veggies other meals. At all snacks and meals have a little protein and a little carbs. Make sure I get enough protein and the other macros tend to fall in line.
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