Flexi food prep
Reduce the barriers and eat healthful, vibrant food more often than not.
I greatly admire those who batch cook large volumes of meals and food on a set day yet I am not one of those people. There’s a significant Type B element to the way I operate that likes to leave much to the moment, and this characteristic can leave me grabbing at whatever food comes my way.
So, this is what I do when I want to eat in a way that makes me feel energised and well, but still leave plenty of room for spontaneity and flex. I compose over make. Immediately, this word change lowers the barrier to preparing something. Especially when we typically may not have as much time to prepare, like at lunch.
So, when you compose, you’re simply stealing in between moments to prepare components of future meals, without having a crystal clear idea of what those meals will be, exactly. You are pulling elements, typically unprocessed whole foods, together in a way so that they front up and perform when needed, contributing to a delicious meal with little effort.
It’s still mindful, it still requires prior thought, but it doesn’t involve setting aside a full afternoon or day to cook and prepare.
These twists can make all the difference when we’re moving through barriers to eating differently than we currently do and when we aspire to mostly eat in a way that makes us feel energised and well.
And now, some compositional tips I use weekly:
Buy or cook up a large lot of veggie/chicken/beef broth and freeze it into one cup portions. Reheat and drink as is with slices of ginger, wakame or spring onion added, or add to soup. The one cup portion is convenient because you can defrost without wastage, have it in a mug, or add the right amount to a recipe.
Pre cook white basmati rice in the morning. For lunch, if I was using the rice as the base of a quick veggie bowl, I would then add ghee to a saucepan and gently heat the rice with the ghee to access both a warm meal and a digestible, resistant starch. When cooked rice cools down, it develops into a resistant starch, which is beneficial for supporting a healthy gut microbiome. FYI reheating it doesn’t cancel out the resistant starch.
Cook quinoa in advance. I love quinoa because I’ve learned to cook it before I really need it. I’ve also learned how I like to eat it - lots of citrus, herbs, very light and zingy. I’ll usually cook it while making coffee in the morning, then leave it lid on until we go to make dinner. It usually becomes a quinoa salad with the above in it plus loads of olive oil and crunchy veg like radish, cucumber, tomato. If it doesn’t make the dinner menu, it becomes quinoa porridge the following morning.
Hard boil eggs, keep in the fridge.
I always have a salted, preserved or fermented item that I can pull out and add in 10 seconds to create a dish from nothing: anchovies, kimchi, olives, capers, pickles, jars of roasted capsicums. Little pops of flavour are everything. We want our palette to get excited about healthy food, not bored by it.
Bake a whole kumara! See this ‘to eat’ Tom and I did for reference.
Make components, like sauce, that pull everything (starch+vege+protein) together. Regardless of what produce or protein you have on hand, you have something fresh to drizzle with or coat grains with. I have a capsicum red sauce that we make in large quantities in the Vitamix. It goes well as a dip, pasta sauce, or with a protein.
Things to sprinkle with. When composing and short on time, you want to build the umami quickly without resorting to processed sauces that have extra, unhelpful ingredients. Toasting seeds in a pan on low heat (3-5min), adding salt and spices and then jarring it up is all it takes. When I think sprinkles I think: gomasio (a heavenly toasted sesame seed+seaweed+salt mix), other toasted seed mixes, Za’atar.
FYI! Next week, Tom and I are back for another kitchen edition video. If there’s anything you’re particularly keen for me to cover in these, just reply to this email.
As always, we’re aiming for joy, ease and curiosity. These are my own personal baselines for health on a daily basis. Keep establishing, practising and noticing and I’ll see you back here next week.
A few bits and pieces I’m loving right now, maybe you will too.
Fluff Bronzing Powder and Kabuki Brush. I love the intentional product development that Australian beauty brand Fluff is committed to. They make really great staple makeup products, and encase them in refillable packaging that looks like a polished metal river stone. I’ve always loved makeup that encourages natural features to shine through, and to be honest, for better or worse I just prefer to wear as little makeup as possible. This brand seems to build products with that exact mood in mind. The bronzer in particular is ideal for anyone transitioning away from foundation.
Heating pad. For my cold hands and feet humans who need a little extra help through Autumn and Winter, I’m suggesting a plug in heating pad. Not cute, definitely not sexy but gosh when you lay them across your lap they can help tremendously with stomach pain, feelings of airiness and building up the core warmth.