Chilly weather calls for a delicious bowl of ancient grain oats topped with sweet fresh berries, nanas and peanut butter. Can’t believe it’s almost Friday again! The week has flown by!
Today I woke up with a sweet tooth and decided to make myself a bowl of beet berry #nicecream. I personally LOVE raw beets, but if you don’t enjoy the taste as much, steamed beets actually don’t really have much of a taste when blended with berries.
Beets are extremely nutritious and are so great for keeping the blood pressure in check, boosting the immune system, increasing athletic functionality, supporting brain health, improving the digestive system and fighting inflammation. Can’t go wrong with a good bowl of beets.
Simple lentil salad with brown lentils, carrot, tomato, red bell pepper, cucumber, spring onions, olive oil, lemon juice, salt, pepper and roasted pine nuts
Vegan burgers Cross and soft burger buns topped with avocado, lemon juice tomato quinoa spread, salad, tomato, grilled red bell pepper and a vegan seitan patty with a huge salad tossed in a mustard lemon dressing on the side
A super simple but super delicious meal: basmati rice mixed with salad, red bell pepper, carrot, spring onions, tomato, lemon juice, olive oil, salt and pepper and some vegan sausages on the side one of my favorites this summer!
Cut up the edges of each slice of toast. Then flatten using a rolling pin. Spread your favorite vegan chocolate spread, put a sliced banana on top and roll them up into a wrap. Slightly dip them in plantbased milk and roast them in a pan until they are golden brown. Then coat them with a sugar cinnamon mix.
I am in the northwestern Polish city Międzyzdroje and I am enjoying food so much… Comparing to Warsaw the serving sizes are huge! The food is incredibly tasty.
I tried falafel with fruit salad, vegan cutlets with crispy potatoes and the salad, zucchini spaghetti with mushrooms and avocado. I can’t choose what was the best
is my favorite pastry. I am always excited to try them at different places. I go to Starbucks ~2-3 timer per year so I cannot say when they started to sell vegan croissants. To me it’s a new thing it’s with orange jam although true croissants are empty. The Starbucks croissant was pretty good. It doesn’t outperform my favorite one from Warsaw local Gorąco Polecam but a decent one
Saturday morning has started well. I spent ~1h to clean the kitchen. It feels so good and satisfying after this I treated myself with a delicious smoothie bowl: 2/3 banana, spinach, maca powder, a splash of water and soy milk + the mix of musli and dried strawberries
My first onigarazu. The shape is far from perfect but I am satisfied with the result. Next time I will try with sushi rice which holds the shape better.
Oh it looks so good. There will be tłusty czwartek in Poland which means “fat Thursday”. On this day people eat tons of traditional Polish pączki - kind of donuts but without holes I’ve been skipping this tradition since being vegan My main mission of this year is to find vegan pączki in Warsaw. If anyone knows, please let me know
Hey Guys! Today I am going to share my approach for weekly meals. I do not cook everything I eat during a week (3x for each day). Last weekend I made 5 meals (some of them are just addition or side dishes to the main course) which helped to survive throughout the busy working week.
This post contains both recipes and my approach to the meal prep. I hope it will help you
First thing first, I am thinking of meals I want to cook. It should not take too much time and it should be versatile, i.e. I can eat different ways so it is not boring + it should not be very expensive. Ideally, the majority of ingredients are already in my fridge or cupboard.
I prepared the list of meals with ingredients and marked with “+” what I already had. It is not necessary that I will follow blindly my initial plan. For example, I did not have strawberries for baked oats but I had frozen cherries. I marked it as “tbd” (to be decided). I like the + combo but eventually I decided not to buy strawberries and used what I’d already had.
The third meal idea, the brown rice salad, was also changed. I had an open package of buckwheat groats which should be used up so I took this grain and made some changes for toppings.
As you see, my list is not the holy book which I follow precisely. I change it easily depending what I have. It’s my approach for almost all recipes.
OK, now moving on to the recipes I will cook baked oats, marinated tofu, baked potatoes, buckwheat salad, red lentil curry.
I cooked it last Saturday. As it’s the weekend, I do not want to spend too much time in the kitchen. I am cooking several meals at once. I recommend to do the same.
1. Firstly, start heating the oven for baked oats - 190C or 370F.
2. Before cooking, tofu should be marinated and red lentils should be soaked. For the tofu sauce, I am mixing 30 ml. soy sauce, 15 ml. maple syrup, 10 ml. sriracha. Cover the sliced tofu (120 g. tofu) with the sauce and leave it aside. Cover the red lentils (150 g.) with cold water. Now you can forget about tofu and lentils for 30 minutes and move on to the oats. If you have a wide container for the tofu like I do and the sauce spread out, set a timer/reminder to flip over the tofu slices in 15 minutes.
3. For baked oats:
200 g. oats
230 g. soy or any plant based milk (+4 tbsp of milk to pour it over the oats before the oven. it’s needed so your oats will not be so dry)
1 tsp cinnamon or more
30 g. chopped walnuts
1 banana
any frozen berries (cherries in my case)
for the date paste: 4 soft dates (I had medjool dates) + 3 tbsp hot water
Chop the dates and smash them with the fork. Add hot water.
Mix oats with cinnamon and walnuts in the baking dish. Pour the date paste and the milk. Stir well. Top it with the sliced banana and cherries. Pour several tablespoons of soy milk.
Bake it for around 50 minutes.
3. Time to prep the potatoes. You need three medium sized potatoes and the basic spices: salt, black pepper, paprika, cumin (if you have). Peel the potatoes and cut them into cubes.
As the slicing board is already on the table, chop 1 yellow onion and mince 2-3 garlic cloves. This is for the curry. Multitasking is the key in meal prep
4. Cover the potatoes with spices. Place them and tofu on the baking tray and put them into the oven. It should take ~30 minutes, a bit earlier than the baked oats. Don’t forget to flip them over in 15 minutes and continue to bake.
5. For curry:
150 g. red lentils
1 yellow onion
2-3 garlic cloves
1 bay leave
1 can of crashed tomatoes
70 g. frozen spinach (or fresh)
salt and pepper to taste
1 vegetable cube
300 ml. water
spices I used: curry, cumin, chilli, turmeric, and the mix of spices I bought in the local Indian store. Use what you have! I’d recommend to have curry, cumin, and turmeric as your staples for curry.
Sauté the onion and garlic in oil or water for 5 minutes over medium heat. Add your spices (2 tsp curry powder, 1 tsp turmeric, 1 tsp cumin, 1 tsp chilli) and cook for 1-2 more minutes. Add a splash of water to deglaze the pan.
Add rinsed red lentils, canned tomatoes, bay leave, the vegetable cube and water. Let it cook for 30 minutes.
6. Meanwhile let’s make the buckwheat salad. You can use brown rice, quinoa or couscous instead.
100 g. grains of your choice
1 tbsp soy sauce
1 tbsp balsamic vinegar
any vegetables you have! I am highlighting this: any! Whatever you have on hand. I am using all leftovers in my fridge:
3 celery stalks
some pickled red cabbage
some dill
you can add cucumbers, bell peppers, microgreens, corn… the choice is yours
Cook the grain according to the package instruction. It took 12 minutes to cook buckwheat. I mix it with vegetables, soy sauce, and balsamic vinegar.
7. By that time, almost everything should be ready: oats, tofu, potatoes. red lentils will soak almost all liquid. Add the frozen spinach and cook until it’s defrosted in the curry.
The meal prep is done!
I always have some pickled or fresh vegetables, different types of jams and frozen fruits so I matched and mixed what I cooked with the staples from the fridge and cupboard.
Meal idea #1. The curry can be served over rice or with naan. It was enough for 4 servings.
Meal idea #2. Tofu, baked potato and some vegetables on the side.
Meal idea #3. Tofu with the buckwheat salad
Meal idea #4. Baked oats with different toppings. One day I had it with flavoured yogurt, another day with vanilla pudding, third day with yogurt and cherry jam. I recommend to microwave it for 10-20 sec before serving if you eat it next day after cooking.
Reminder: Once again it’s not everything I ate during the last week. I always have nuts, dried and fresh fruits for snaked; I bought sandwiches twice in the bakery close to the office when I was hungry; once I was at my friend’s house so we ordered the food. However, this meal prep was really helpful. I can’t count how many times I patted my own head and gave a golden ⭐️ to myself that I spent time and made several meals on Saturday.
I hope it gave you some ideas and inspiration how you can approach your meal prep and actually proved it is not necessary expensive. I am not a fan to eat the same food for breakfast, lunch and dinner during the whole week so I do not cook tons of rice and the big bowl of stew which is enough for 5-10 main courses. I prefer to have some variety. Do not make your life boring especially in terms of food
Let me know what kind of food are staples at your home and if you cook on weekend for the next week
