Meal Prepping A Birthday Gift – THIS IS REAL LIFE

Because you guys have presented me with the challenge of cooking for myself more often…I decided that I would meal prep a few healthy meal options on today’s Real Life Friday Video. And because I am not one to be selfish…I am going to meal prep a Birthday Gift for my son. I think this is a great idea! And I also think this would be a great idea for you guys to do for a loved one as well. It’s a win/win…you get some healthy meal options and your loved one gets an amazing gift. Watch and see how I put all of this together and receive the award for Best Mom Ever on the Planet!

If you are interested in any of the recipes I made during this meal prep, visit: https://www.eatingwell.com

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hello everyone and welcome back to this
is real life I’m your host Sherry and on
today’s real life Friday video I’m going
to take some of your guys’ advice from
the plank challenge video and I am going
to challenge myself to meal prep however
I’m not really doing this for me as you
can see by the title I am meal prepping
for a birthday gift I know it sounds
crazy but I think it’s a good idea and I
I think you guys might like it too let
me tell you why I came up with
this so you guys know Davis my son Davis
we love him he’s a darling boy well his
birthday is coming up and you know I
just know he’s not eating that great he
loves to cook but I don’t think that he
is actually cooking meals for himself he
might argue this fact if he was standing
right here today he might say none of
this is true this is just what I am
assuming and what I am Gathering From
what I am seeing I don’t think he’s
cooked that much for himself therefore I
don’t think he’s eating that healthy I
know you guys might look at me and say
um hi pot calling the kettle black yes I
get it I know I don’t eat that healthy
either but Davis is too young to not be
eating right I don’t want him to have
health issues later in life if he’s not
being healthy right now I hope that he
will soon be picking up on all of the
harping that I’ve been doing to him and
at him and think to himself yeah maybe I
should start being a little bit more
healthy in what I am eating so knowing
that his birthday is coming I thought
might be a good idea if I actually made
him some healthy food options I perused
the internet and I got a lot of recipes
from eating well and I printed them out
we’ve got like a spinach and artichoke
dip pasta white turkey chili eggs in
tomato sauce with chickpeas and spinach
now while these titles don’t sound very
good the pictures of the finished meal
looked Divine Divine spaghetti squash
and chicken with avocado pesto a no
cooked black bean salad crispy oven
fried fish tacos muffin tin kiches with
smoked cheddar and potato taco spaghetti
squash boats zucchini noodles with pesto
and chicken Citrus po salmon with
asparagus and slow cooker vegetable soup
while I might not make every single one
of these recipes my plan is to make a a
bunch of them and I printed out the
recipe because my thought is that if I
make these recipes and I get you know
nice Tupper wees to put them all in I
want to label them with what they are
and then basically if you liked that
here’s the recipe so then you Davis can
make it yourself so I am going to meal
prep all of this I’ll obviously keep
some for me and then give two servings
to Davis in a nice little Tupperware
with the recipe attached that way he can
put them in the refrigerator he can eat
them for lunch dinner what have you for
probably like the next week or so and
then if he likes any of them I think
that sounds like a great birthday gift
now this is not his only birthday gift
this is just part of his birthday gift
this is the uh Healthy Living portion of
the birthday gift so tomorrow at after
work I’m going to run over to the
grocery store I’m going to get all of
the ingredients that I need because his
birthday is in like 5 days so I didn’t
want to make things too far ahead so
there’s going to be a lot of kitchen
Havoc a lot of meal prepping going on
but we’re going to make however many of
these recipes we can knock out in 2 to 3
days I’m going to put them all together
in wonderful Tupper wees and give it to
Davis as a gift and while you guys may
think this is a crazy crazy birthday
gift I have a feeling maybe some of you
might be in my same boat or know
somebody that has a child or a
grandchild or even just a loved one an
older loved one that you think might not
necessarily be eating that healthy this
could be a good gift for them especially
if it’s someone that you know enjoys
cooking but just hasn’t been cooking for
themselves because of time let’s be real
laziness convenience of the door Dash
things like that I think Davis will like
this gift maybe I’m wrong but we’ll find
out tomorrow after work I’m going to the
grocery store then after that we’re
going to get cracking on making some
food okay so I went to the grocery store
and I can tell you that I have never had
so much fresh produce in my refrigerator
at one time I know that’s very sad to
say but I can admit it I have a ton
of fresh produce in that refrigerator I
have some of it here now because what I
went ahead and did is I prepped all of
the vegetables like for every recipe I
plan on making it said cut the green
beans into 1 in pieces did it already
chop up an onion did it already cut up
two carrots did it already cut up two
celeries basically for every recipe I
have pretty much everything prepped so
that I can just dump and go so for our
first thing I’m going to do the thing
that takes the longest and that is the
slow cooker vegetable soup now again
these are recipes that I got off of the
eating well website now it does say in
this recipe that I am supposed to have a
six quart or larger slow cooker well I
have two slow cookers neither one our
six quarts are larger this one is like 2
and 1/2 quarts and this one is Tiny I
have no idea so since I have two I’m
just going to divide everything in half
and then run both slow cookers at the
same time that’s the only thing I could
think of you know it’s Tim gun moment
you got two small slow cookers and you
need one big one just use your too small
it’ll be fine so let’s get to dumping
it’s really easy all we do is combine
the onions carrots celery green beans
kale zucchini Tomatoes garlic white
beans broth parmesan rind which I didn’t
get it does say that is optional and I
wasn’t going to buy a whole nice piece
of Parmesan just for the Rind salt and
pepper in your 64 or two smaller slow
cookers cook on high for 4 hours or on
low for 6 hours so that’s pretty easy so
we have all of our stuff here like I
said I’m just going to divide it in half
maybe a little more in this one than in
this one I don’t really know one medium
onion I’m going to estimate and try to
dump in half that seems like good to me
the rest will go in there great two
medium carrots right here half and half
see when you prep stuff it just goes so
much quicker um celery right here half
and half boom green
beans I don’t think this one’s going to
hold that much guys I don’t think so
kale I even prepped my tail right here
it says four
cups oh no I’m worried about that guy uh
2 medium zucchini right here great four
Roma tomatoes right here two cloves of
garlic obviously I didn’t mince my
garlic ahead of time okay there’s one
these ones are a little small so I’m
going to put two in great two 15 oz cans
of white beans right here put one in
each rinsed okay
I’m really worried about this guy right
here I don’t think it’s going to fit you
guys oh my God we still have to put
liquid in this could be real bad then I
need four cups low sodium chicken broth
it’s like just under two cups we’re
calling it two cups guys okay good now
we need 2 teaspoons of salt it’s kind of
funny that they had me buy low sodium
chicken broth but now they’re having me
add salt okay a half a teaspoon of
ground pepper all right I mean I guess
I’ll just do like like a little bit and
a little bit 2 tpoon of red wine vinegar
and don’t worry in the end I’ll mix both
of these pots together no one will be
the wiser and then lastly we need 8
teaspoon of prepared pesto yeah I bought
it I didn’t make the pesto myself eight
teaspoons so we’ll do four and four okay
well upon a closer inspection I was not
supposed to put the pesto in the soup I
was supposed to actually top the soup
when ready to serve with the pesto but
I’m sure it’ll be fine in here so now
all we need to do is Stir this together
it just doesn’t seem like there’s a lot
of liquid but maybe this will all break
down and also I don’t understand I think
this could fit in here don’t you guys
think should we give it a try I’m going
to do
it yeah that’s fun oh yeah this is going
to be fine this doesn’t seem very
liquidy to me but okay all right now we
put it in our slow cooker on low for 6
hours can’t say I’ve ever used this slow
cooker before this one I have but not
this one close it up low there it is 6
hours all right recipe one done that’s
cooking it little hard out all right
next on our list from eating well I’m
going to make some white bean chili but
I got to do a lot of the prep workk over
at the stove Brown the ground turkey the
onions the garlic
all of that good stuff so let’s go over
to the stove and it says Dutch oven but
I don’t have one so I’m going to do it
in this put it on medium high heat 3
tbspoon of extra virgin olive oil and
let this get all hot and good then we’re
going to add our turkey onion and garlic
I need to bust open my other one so we
get our 1 lb of 93% lean ground turkey
we plop that in
oh it’s hot all
right it’s oil hot oil battering
everywhere it’s fine okay I got to turn
that
down hold on I’m washing my hands one
large onion dice four cloves of garlic
minced and I know this technically isn’t
minced garlic I’m smashing it but I just
didn’t feel like mincing it so this will
be fun all right now we’re supposed to
stir this breaking up the turkey and
cooking for about 3 to 5 minutes until
the turkey is
browned here’s what it’s looking like
turkeyy is nice and brown so now what do
we do we add the zucchini and cook
stirring occasionally until the zucchini
starts to soften about 5 to 7 minutes
and we need two medium zucchinis
diced okay it’s been 5 minutes and our
zucchin looking relatively soft I knew
you going soft so now I just need to add
add in all of our spices so 2 tbspoon of
dried oregano 4 tpoon of ground cumin
ooh it’s already starting to smell like
chili a half a teaspoon of pepper and a
half a te no 1/4 teaspoon of salt o and
I need to add the bulgar which I had to
Google what that was the only thing I
could find was this bulgar and red
quinoa mix bulgar is like a dried GR
so we need a/4 cup of this and it’s
getting quinoa because it’s the only
thing I could
find now we stir until
aromatic M I wish you guys could smell
it smells good here’s what we’re looking
like so far now we get to add in our two
cans of rinsed white
beans and 8 oz of chilies this was a 7
oz can but what’s 1 oz we stir that all
in and then we get to add our 4 cups of
low
sodium chicken
broth stir that all together and now we
redu oh am I supposed to bring it to oh
I got to bring it to a boil first bring
it to a boil then reduce heat and simmer
and let it cook for an hour and a half
okay our chili has come to a boil so
I’ve reduced the heat to let it simmer
it says that we’re supposed to partially
cover and I lied we don’t cook it for an
hour and a half we cook it for 50
minutes so partially cover and it says
we have to Stir It occasionally the
liquid should thicken up over the course
of 50 minutes so okay Chili’s a
simmering vegetable soups a slow cooking
and I was going to try to knock out the
spinach and Arch choke dip pasta but
it’s getting kind of late and I feel
like this has 35 more minutes so I think
I’m going to use my time wisely clean up
my disaster area of a kitchen and hit it
hard tomorrow I’ll be back oh my gosh I
am done and my refrigerator has never
been so full of good
food oh my gosh you guys it seems like I
have been cooking for 80 million years
straight I hit it really hard yesterday
and today and I finally finished with 27
minutes to spare before I have to leave
to go meet Davis for his birthday dinner
I know I know so I made eight dishes in
total I actually split the dishes
between Davis and me so don’t worry I
have healthy food in my refrigerator for
my own self and actually I already ate
the white turkey chili
amazing very very good I also ate the
spinach and artichoke dip pop pasta
again an eating well recipe not
sponsored by eating well I just printed
out a bunch of their recipes based on
the pictures of the food and that’s what
I made this spinach and artichoke dip
pasta so good those are the two things
I’ve eaten myself everything else I just
haven’t had time to eat but I did make
which looks really good the taco
spaghetti squash boat and look at this
now I got a boat and Davis got a boat
and you basically take make a spaghetti
squash and then cut it in half and cook
it now it’s probably not going to look
as pleasing right now because it’s cold
it’s been in my refrigerator but it’s a
taco boat inside of the shell of a
spaghetti squash because I didn’t want
to top it I have Pico Deo in a separate
Tupperware and then the lettuce to go on
top of that for Davis I think that one
looks really good and I think it’s going
to tast really good too and the meat is
uh turkey ground turkey so I also bought
these new lockable lid Tupperware I got
them at the grocery outlet for Davis so
obviously I’m not going to ask for any
of these Tupperware back these are for
him I used remember this guy our PRT
little mini label printer to put all of
the labels on all of the Tupper Wares so
Davis knows this is the slow cooker
vegetable soup this is the Taco boat
this is a zucchini noodles with pesto
and chicken oh guys look at it I mean
can we be any healthier I don’t think so
you know my thought process behind
giving Davis’s gift is that hopefully
he’ll like these Foods it will inspire
him to start cooking better for himself
and if anything if he doesn’t want to
cook anything ever if he just eats these
at least he’s got some healthy options
for all this week so yeah and speaking
of Davis being able to make these
recipes I made him like a little generic
cookbook I printed out all of the
recipes here and I put them into this
green manila folder I actually stapled
them so they’d stay like a book so if he
likes the white turkey chili he can
remake it it is right here I got all
eight recipes printed out here and then
cuz I’m a dork I took screenshots of all
of the pictures because the recipes
don’t have the picture of the food so I
screenshotted and made a food collage
and then I put eating Well’s logo on it
cuz obviously these are all recipes from
eating well so this is going to go in
his little bag that I’m putting together
right now so I have this um you know
when we tested all the like uh hello
freshes and whatever this was one of the
bags that came in the box and I saved it
and I thought perfect to put all of
these in because we are going to a
restaurant I’m not going to bring all
this into a restaurant so I’m going to
keep these as cold as possible I’ll put
some ice packs in here as well and then
I’ll you know put a bow on it put my
little cookbook inside and then this
will be Davis’s one of Davis’s birthday
presents okay I am back from Davis’s
birthday dinner I gave him his meal prep
birthday gift now he didn’t appear to be
very excited about it but I know deep
down he was excited about it again what
I meal prepped all of those eight eight
meals that was not Davis’s main birthday
present he got an actual birthday
present so don’t think I’m a bad mom or
anything like that and actually quite
the opposite because I took the time to
make Davis eight healthy meals and print
him out the recipes I’m going to go out
on a limb here and say I’m the best mom
ever I mean I’m just saying each one of
them made enough I’m going to guess like
maybe four servings each to where I
could split the meal completely in half
so I actually have good food in my
refrigerator so now I’m not just eating
you know Cheez itss and cheese for
dinner so that’s good too Davis got a
birthday present and I got some good
food in my fridge now what I did like
about these recipes from eating well is
they do tell you how much time you’re
expected to be active and then how much
time it takes to cook so how much time
in total will it take for you to make
any specific recipe they also include
the nutrition facts based on a serving
so you’ve got all the details in this
recipe like I said I personally have
only eaten the white bean turkey chili
and the spinach and artichoke heart dip
pasta both of those were great the chili
out of both of them the chili is my
favorite I don’t think you should be
worried about making any of the recipes
from eating well I mean I just went off
the pictures so if you want to try
making any of the recipes from eating
well just go to their website it’s
eatingwell.com look up all their
pictures print yourself out a recipe go
to the grocery store and make it you’ll
be eating healthy in case you’re not
already eating healthy now while you
might not necessarily want to meal prep
and give it as a gift I’m hoping because
you guys inspired me to actually cook
some food so now I hope that this video
inspired you because I did it I made
eight recipes over the course of the
weekend and now I have good food in my
refrigerator and because I gave it as a
gift to someone that I love very dearly
they now have good food in their
refrigerator as well so yeah let me know
what you think about giving meal prep to
someone for their birthday would you do
it let me know in the comments below and
if you would wouldn’t give it as a
birthday gift would you do it for
yourself let me know in the comments
below and with all that said if you like
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as always thanks for hanging out
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