Nope, I didn’t sneak in an April Fools post like last year. ;) My first post of April is all about food prepping and portion control! We skipped the gym yet again in favor of an outdoor workout because the weather was just too good to ignore. Yesterday we opted for a backyard HIIT circuit, and today we jogged along the bike path by our house for an hour. It’s doing our winter-white skin some good too!

Most of the pictures on Instagram or strength training athlete’s pages make “Meal Prepping” look it’s all about containers of chicken, rice and broccoli. There’s nothing wrong with the lean and green bulk food prep, but for variety-lovers like me, there are so many more options for food prepping! If you are not a physique competitor, then meal prepping is really just about portioning out proper serving sizes and pre-planning meals and snacks.

A lot of our food prep for the week includes portioning out fruit. We LOVE fruit and it’s pretty easy for us to get our daily recommended servings since we add it to oatmeal, yogurt, afternoon snacks and sometimes dessert. Some diets (particularly those that are low-carb) warn of the high sugar content in fruit. It’s important to know that the natural sugars in fruit are paired with fiber and vitamins that slow the digestion and prevent spike in blood sugar like processed sugary snacks. Carbohydrates are also the body’s primary source of energy for every activity, and it is recommended to allocate 45-65% of your daily calories from a variety of carbohydrates. Do not fear the fruit! Ever!

For my birthday, I asked for this food scale which uses electronic codes for each ingredient to calculate not only the weight, but the calories and macronutrients as well!

Every food item has a 4 digit code that is found in the handbook. Put your food on the scale, punch in the code and it will automatically populate the nutritional information based on the grams of the food item. I’ve been really happy with it, and it definitely helps with understanding true serving sizes of meats, fruits, nuts, cheese, and other items that list their serving sizes in “grams” or “ounces.” This scale and similar ones can be found on Amazon.

In addition to produce, we like to cook up our meat and sauces for that week’s dinners. This week, “Chicken Enchilada Zucchini Boats” are on the menu. My dad helped pre-cook the chicken and enchilada sauce. I’ll also make a batch of protein bites if we’re all out for the week, as well as package up any snack items like pretzels, nuts, dried fruit, rice crisps, dry cereal, or my guilty pleasure – cinnamon goldfish grahams. :)

After a full day of grocery shopping, running, meal prepping, and blogging, we made some healthified mini pizzas for dinner. Mine were inspired by Taralynn over at the blog Simply Taralynn. I sliced zucchinis into long flat strips for my crust, topped with pizza sauce, cheese, pineapple, and cashews. We also found these perfectly-sized naan breads at Costco – I have never had naan before. But as a carb and bread LOVER, I was pretty excited to try them. These were a perfect personal pizza crust for my dad. I wanted too try mine plain, so I ate it on the side of my “pizzas” and salad.

And even though is may seem like a lot of food and work for one day, meal prepping absolutely makes the rest of the week so much easier for packing healthy convenient lunches and staying on track with our fitness and nutrition goals. Plus I just love seeing all of the bright & beautiful colors!

What do you meal prep on the weekends?