Welcome to Week 1 of the 2020 Summer Tone Up! I’m so excited to share some tips and trips on how to make the Nutrition Plan work for you. If at any time you have questions that come up, please feel free to reach out.

Once again, I am not affiliated with TIU in any way but I standby their nutrition principles and so many of the recipes! They have truly changed my life and I’m confident that you can take the best parts of the program and apply it to yours as well.

Each week I’ll be breaking down my personal menu: this is to feed me and my fiancée who I am very lucky is into 90% of the foods that I like to eat! We also think it’s really important to share meals together so we make a point to cook together and eat together.

That said, even while WFH, Sunday Meal Prep is a staple. As I write this, I’m currently in the middle of the TIU 7DSD and chopping veggies, having hummus made, chia pudding and prepped salads were life savers. Just because I don’t have a commute, doesn’t mean my days won’t be crazy!

On to week one!

I am a firm Morning Cocktail drinker and black coffee only. Trust me - if you get some high quality stuff, you won’t want to add anything because it takes away from the taste!

M1/Breakfasts:

Cherry Chia Pudding: very excited to try this one - not going to bother with the ground cardamom and possibly will skip the fresh cherries too based on price

The rest of the breakfasts this week are a skip for me. Protein pancakes never turn out right and I don’t love them enough to try - I also don’t have the Vitamin C collagen although I have heard great things. Instead, I’ll swap either for an egg and veggie scramble or a green smoothie with Tone It Up Protein.

M2/Morning Snack:

Most of you who follow me probably know that there are very few protein muffins I actually like! I love the chocolate beet and chocolate donuts, as well as the blondie muffins and pumpkin muffins. Those last two don’t have protein in them which is probably why I love them! So I will be skipping the strawberry ones.

If I skip any of the 5 entirely meals, it’s usually this one but I always have on hand some fruit and yogurt as snack options. I base my fruit on what is in season and priced well at my grocery store! I love variety and full flavor while getting the best price.

M3/Lunch:

Summer Bounty Grain Bowl: I am SO excited for this recipe! However I can’t stand radicchio and it always goes to waste when I buy it so leaving it out. Otherwise pretty much making the recipe as is assuming I can now get peaches in store! If you prefer not to buy fresh berries because they are so pricey, invest in goji berries that last forever!

TIU Rolls: I have brown rice papers so I will definitely be making some rolls and peanut sauce! I like Minimalist Baker’s Peanut Sauce recipe and I usually use bake tofu or seared tempeh as my protein for these.

Dinner Leftovers: We are doing less batch cooking these days but I always try to have at least one dinner a week where I know we have leftovers so I can use them as lunch the next day!

Takeout from a local restaurant: love this! Great chance to make healthy choices while still getting to indulge a little and support a local spot.

M4/Afternoon Snack:

M4 has always been the hardest meal for me! Beating that “afternoon slump” without giving in to the sugar crash and burn and trying to turn to veggies more often than not has been a huge habit change. I also used to be a protein bar on-the-go kinda chick and unfortunately so many of them are just not the healthiest option and I was finding that many made me not feel great (any artificial sugar gives me headaches.)

I also have been eating hummus for years so I try to keep things interesting for M4! You’ll see that limits a lot of options.

Following this week’s schedule, I’ll be opting for the following choices:

Veggies Dipped: Probably going to do a quick guac because avocado just makes me feel so good and I basically never get sick of them. Go-to snack veggies are snap peas, mini peppers, and cucumbers. I really need to try and master the kale chip too because I love store-bought ones!

Pick Me Up Chia Pudding: My hack here is use full-fat coconut milk (the canned stuff), about 1/4 cup chia (more or less depending on how thick you like it) and lately I’ve been ditching the maple syrup in favor of a brown sugar monkfruit sweetener and it is divine.

Blondie Muffins: Yes I will prep these for week 2 because they are one of my fave muffin recipes!

M5/Dinner:

One of my meal prep tips that works for me and Martin is that every Sunday night we make a batch of some kind of soup, stew or curry. Given that we’ve been stocking up on so many canned beans with the C-19 situation, I am going to opt for one of the TIU chili recipes this Sunday. The Butternut Squash Lentil Chili is one of my FAVES! The simple Lean Chili is great too. I’ll see what inspiration strikes!

Because we make a large batch, that usually covers us for at least one extra night of dinners and when we were commuting to the office, would be Martin’s lunches. I love salads for lunch but he often wants something a little more substantial (and prefers to pack less Tupperware than me…) so this is how we compromise.

Since we’re both WFH for the foreseeable future, we have a lot more flexibility but it’s still really nice to free up a night or two from cooking so we can focus on other things to do!

Faux-Lafal Tray Bake: One of the other recipes I’m most excited to try in plan! I LOVE tray bakes and Martin will make them too. Buying an extra large baking sheet was a great investment this past fall. My only issue with them is that once the weather reaches a certain temp., we really try to limit oven use at which case they are clearly off the table.

Spicy Mango Black Bean Tacos: I just can’t mentally wrap my head around lettuce leaves for tacos that I eat with my hands so I will either turn this into a salad, or also buy some Siete tortillas for my option and Martin will have regular since they are a staple in our fridge.

Occasionally we make our own corn tortillas and I love them. It just depends on if we want to put the effort in and when trying to be a little more diligent with my nutrition, I need to watch how many I eat because they are that good.

New Recipe from the Plan: As you may know, I recently went back and completed the 8 Week 2015 Bikini Program and I still have never made the Coconut Crusted Mahi Mahi! So if I can get a hold of that fish (or I might choose to sub a different white fish) I think I’ll finally make this one!

Lean Protein Night: I am going to prep my favorite homemade veggie burgers this weekend so we’ll pull those out this night with the fixings and a side salad

Fun Night: Friday and Saturday night cooking tends to be our “fun” and “adventurous” cooking experiences together. I might let Martin make the call on this one and then have everyone on hand for the Buddha Bowls too because they are possibly my single favorite TIU recipe of all time. Seriously, I can’t get enough of the simple sauce and the spiced sweet potatoes!

Sunday Stew: Probably will do either Martin’s Oxtail stew (actually it’s a Jamie Oliver recipe) or a homemade curry. Both are great representations of how I “enhance” the TIU plan for us. Jamie’s recipe is a little heartier than a lot of TIU fare but the ingredients themselves are all super clean, still vegetable forward and man oh man so good! Those are the kind of recipes I work into our rotation to keep things flavorful.

And that’s all for week 1! As we get closer to the start of week 2, I’ll walk through my prep. For this week I’ll definitely meal prep:

• The Cherry Chia Pudding
• Pick Me Up Chia Pudding
• Chop veggies for snacks
• Sunday stew
• The Summer Bounty Grain Bowl
• Veggie Burgers from Oh She Glows
• Tofu Spring Rolls

Let me know if you have any questions!

Considering starting a small group for nutrition coaching at around week 3 of the challenge to keep up accountability. HMU if you are interested!