On being healthy and taking good care of myself.
There is a lot of work that is required when you want to achieve that healthy lifestyle. In my situation, I am grateful that it’s just difficult to do, I just have to make time and put in some effort, and of course, it’s going to take a toll on my finances…but still, it’s possible.
I have made Sundays as my dedicated day of the week to prep my meals. If I could just pre-make half of my meals for the week, then it’s already a lighter load for me (especially, now that I live alone). For this week, I decided to make burger patties! That’s also one of the things I consider when I plan my meals, it should be flexible. My trick to meal planning is that I never consume the same kind of meal for the entire week, even if it’s just my lunch. I still incorporate a variety of what I eat.
Burger patties can be eaten as is, with mushroom gravy to make it more savory. It can be eaten as a burger, just add lettuce, tomato, onion, and sauce to make it healthy and delicious. I used it with taco wraps for an easy prep dinner. And, as an alternative, I used it for chili for my lunch meals for the week.
First, we make the burger patties! I’ve looked into different recipes on how to make the patties, I just kept it simple by using five ingredients: ground beef, egg, white onion, pepper, and salt. I mixed everything together in a bowl and formed the patties for storage. Bread crumbs can be used to serve as extenders, but I actually want a protein-loaded burger patty so I wanted it to be as meaty as possible. I was able to make a lot for just 250g of ground beef, enough for a week’s worth of meals.
I cooked the chili the next day, I am not sure if I should call it chili since it just resembles the real thing, hehe. For the vegetables, I chopped carrot, bell pepper, potatoes, and leeks. The aroma I used are garlic, onion, pepper, and cajun seasoning. This is one lazy chili since I only used tomato sauce and skipped the diced tomatoes and tomato paste.
I first cooked the burger patties on a medium heat to extract some of the fat, then I set aside the patties to start with the chili. I sautéed the aroma and vegetables in a saucepan to give it some crisp and color.
Then, I poured chicken stock (as it’s the only one I have at that moment haha) and waited a few minutes to make it boil. I added the tomato sauce and stirred everything on low heat. I added back the burger patties and topped it with chopped onion leeks.
Voila! It’s all good and ready to be put in the food container. I added steamed french beans for additional veggies, as it's a good source of protein and other vitamins. I'm all set for the week! I hope this helps especially to those with limited time but still want to eat healthy. :)
