Meal Plans

Find recipes: Quarantine with Protein

Plan your meals

Track your portions

Chow & meet your goals

What is this?

I believe that a healthy lifestyle doesn't mean banishing foods you love. However, it does take work and thoughtful planning. You can stare at a healthy cookbook all day but
 1) if the food doesn't taste good, you won't eat it
 2) If you don't eat the right amount and proportions, you won't achieve results no matter how "healthy" the food is.
For those starting out in their health journey, this can be very misleading and discouraging. You're doing everything the book says, so what's going wrong? That's because there's more to that.

Having a plan allows you to indulge in your favorite foods. Restrictive diets suck and drain the enjoyment from your day. I've been there- the ping pong battle of eating horrible meals and then rebounding with cheat days that throw off any progress. By planning everyday, even your indulgent days won't set you back. I no longer look forward to "cheat days" because I eat things I enjoy every day.

Sounds amazing? The catch is that it involves careful planning, which takes a lot of time. Well, that's where these plans help you! They're here so you don't have to.  All you have to do is track your portions (see below). You can enjoy the recipes from Quarantine with Protein with how they were designed in mind: balance.     

How do I use these?

We are all unique individuals with different nutritional needs. 

Because I can't customize one meal plan that fits everyone, the best thing to do is for you to track
1) food portions and nutrition information
2) the foods you are eating outside of this. Then adjust your portion sizes accordingly.

Just track the ingredients from the recipes (such as through MyFitnessPal or other app) and how much you ate (whether you ate half or only a quarter of the recipe, etc.). Be sure to include your other meals. The meal plans tell you what to eat, this tells you how much to eat in relation to your daily calorie/macro goals. I knowwww, it does take work. If you don't have a problem with eyeballing how much to eat, then great, no need! But doing this will help those that are interested in understanding what's in your food, and sometimes, you get to see that you have some room to eat a little something extra! How fun is that.

Please note these plans are examples. If you have health conditions or unique dietary needs, please account for those.

Why did you make these?

When I came home for the holidays, I watched my parents eat completely unbalanced meals and confused why they have diabetes, hypertension, and high cholesterol. It was horrifying!!! They thought that by eating anything with a label that said it's good for them, that was all they need. Balance means you don't have to cut this or that, but it means being mindful of what everything adds up to in a day.

Yes, I aimed to create delicious recipes in Quarantine with Protein that taste like a splurge yet can be used for balanced eating. However, I don't want someone to think that it's productive to eat everything in the cookbook in any which way they want and be able to lose weight (pasta for breakfast lunch and dinner?!). You definitely can eat everything in the cookbook each day, and that's what I did and that's how the book was born. However, it takes thought into making sure you're balancing your meals for the day.

It's already hard enough to meal plan just to feed yourself. I understand that adding nutrition considerations is just too much effort than what many of us have time for. That's why I hope that by creating these meal plans, it will help others jump on the bandwagon of healthy, yummy, and balanced eating.

Will these plans be updated?

That's up to you! If you find this helpful, let me know! I'll continue based on interest. Also let me know your preferences! Do you like to meal prep and eat the same meals 2x a week? 4x? Email me.

Otherwise, you can see what I eat in a day, everyday by following me @hangryvore!

 © Katherine Tran