I think I’ve finally cracked lunch!

Lunch: Ugh! I find it weirdly overwhelming and annoying to have to consider it every single goddamn day. I’m very happy to eat leftovers for lunch, but they often run out faster than I expect. And even if takeout didn’t cost a million dollars right now (see also: this perfect TikTok), I don’t live in an area with a ton of great options. And because my energy levels aren’t amazing, I’ve been avoiding buying a ton of ingredients for meal prep that I then don’t end up using—or, at the opposite end of the spectrum, getting way too ambitious, not being able to eat everything I make before it goes bad, and ultimately wasting time and money before falling off again. 

You know how it goes! 

But last week, frustrated yet again at lunchtime and craving a big bowl of healthy slop, I decided to dip a toe into meal prepping…with guardrails. I made a plan that prioritized conserving energy (and saving money) via lots of shortcuts, plus foods that wouldn’t go bad too quickly. 

This was my grocery list:

• One 5-lb. bag of dried brown rice 

• One 18-ounce container of peeled and cubed sweet potatoes

• One 10-ounce bag of pre-washed broccoli florets

• Two 12-ounce bags of frozen Brussels sprouts 

• Two cans of chickpeas

• 2 lbs. of chicken breast 

• All of the ingredients I needed for two different dressings (creamy mustard and tahini ranch) from What Goes With What by Julia Turshen 

I prepared everything over the course of a few hours one morning. First, I got three cups of brown rice going in the rice cooker. As the Zojirushi worked its magic, I…

1. Roasted the chickpeas using a recipe from The Joy of Cooking. (This one is very similar!)  

2. Roasted both the broccoli and sweet potato at the same time in a 425-degree oven (the recommended temp in The Joy of Cooking). I took the broccoli out after 30 minutes and let the sweet potatoes go for 40ish. (My plan was to save the frozen Brussels sprouts for when the broccoli ran out, but that happened after just two bowls, so I ended up roasting the Brussels sprouts the next day.) 

3. Prepared the perfect chicken.

4. Made the creamy mustard dressing recipe, which came together in like 5 minutes. (You can find instructions for making it in the chart here; the proportions work out equal parts mayo, olive oil, and white wine vinegar.)

All of the above, including the batch of Brussels sprouts, was enough to assemble 10 very generous bowls (and still have some chicken left over), an amount I’m very happy with! The bowls were really filling and delicious, and I loved not having to think about what to eat for lunch every day. And because so much of this was passive cooking time—meaning I was able to sit and chill between each step—I didn’t feel totally wiped by it. 

Better yet, I still had plenty of dressing ingredients and dried rice to work with. On Sunday, I bought two bags of frozen broccoli florets and a bag of dried chickpeas (since dried are cheaper/will go further). On Monday, I made new batches of rice and dressing and roasted more broccoli and chickpeas, and now I’m back in business! (The grocery store didn’t have cubed sweet potatoes so I skipped them for now, but I can always add them later this week if I’m feeling motivated. And I actually think replenishing the different components on a staggered/rolling basis sounds like an even easier way to do this going forward.) 

I’m really relieved that this turned out to be a lot easier and more pleasant than I was anticipating! Buying frozen/pre-cut vegetables and choosing prep methods that all basically amount to “dump this thing on a sheet pan with some olive oil, salt, and pepper” made a huge difference—I find washing, peeling, and cutting produce so tedious, and removing that barrier did a lot, both mentally and in practice. And even though I don’t mind eating the same exact thing day after day, I also think it’ll be easy to make small tweaks here and there to avoid any boredom that does arise. (See also: sauce theory!) 🥦