Sunday Funday: Meal Prep Sunday

National Blog Posting Month

Blogging everyday in November

#NaBloPoMo Day 13 - Meal Prep Sunday

I love being in the kitchen but often I am too tired or find myself too hungry to enjoy cooking.  Sundays are different.  Some people call them Meal Preparation Sundays #mealprepsundays.  This is the one day when you meal plan, prepare and cook your meals or lunches for the week.  I love the idea and Sundays are lazy days for me so I was super happy that it was raining and I had time to try a Meal Prep Sunday.  

First I use my meal planner called Plan to Eat to plan the meals that I want to cook.  I have recipes from the web that I want to try and like to see how the meals will work for the upcoming days.  Plan to Eat has grocery lists for grocery shopping but since I am only cooking for two, I don't use that function very often.  I did in the beginning when I first started using Plan to Eat.  Feel free to visit my referral link to check it out:  https://www.plantoeat.com/ref/couponchef  Or you can keep it simple and write down the meals on a piece of paper.  There is nothing wrong with that!

So I wanted to get started with some baking.  I hadn't baked in a LONG time.  I decided to make Mini Pumpkin muffins using the following recipe:  http://www.myrecipes.com/recipe/pumpkin-mini-muffins because I had a can of pumpkin puree in the pantry.  After I put the first batch of muffins in the oven and was putting away the leftover pumpkin puree I licked the spoon of with the last scraps of the pumpkin purree in the can and YUCK!  It tasted awful!  Then I looked at the top of the can of pumpkin puree and saw the expiry date.  It read October 2015.  What a letdown to my first baking experience back in the kitchen!  Lesson learned, if you have pantry items that you want to use, check the expiry dates.  I learned the hard way.  

So I didn't let that stop me from Sunday Funday Meal Prep Sunday.  (Just stopped the baking).  Take a look at what recipes I prepared for my first Meal Prep Sunday.

1.  Easiest Eggplant - http://allrecipes.com/recipe/70142/easiest-eggplant/

I had a lonely eggplant in the fridge that needed cooking up so this is what I made.  I figured we could eat this as a snack or to accompany a main dish.

2.  Brocolli Apple Salad - http://paleoleap.com/broccoli-apple-salad-walnuts/

This will be a great starter to any meal or to bring as my brown bag lunch.

3.  Korean Glass Noodle Chap Chae - http://steamykitchen.com/180-korean-glass-noodles-jap-chae.html

We actually ate this all up for Sunday lunch.  Next time I would need to double it up if I wanted more for lunches.  Great vegetarian recipe!

3.  One Pot Chicken and Mushroom Tettrazini - http://www.jocooks.com/main-courses/poultry-main-courses/one-pot-chicken-and-mushroom-tetrazzini/

This was my Sunday favorite One Pot Chicken and Mushroom Tettrazini!  It was the first time that I made a one pot dish and guess what?  It worked!  We ate this for dinner and there was some leftover this time for our lunch tomorrow.  

What did I learn from my first Meal Prep Sunday? 

I learned to check the expiry date of canned foods, and also that I might not have actually done meal prep sunday since I do not have a week's worth of lunches in the fridge.  I have one lunch, eggplant snacks, and three small containers of salad.  I also have ingredients all ready for tomorrow's Chicken Stirfry dinner.  All in all, even though there's room for improvement for #MealPrepSunday, it was a successful #SundayFunday because I had fun in the kitchen!