Thwarted by the Bat Cave

[A Grue]

Hey folks.  I'm having a hell of a time coming up with Bat Cave changes, and the improvements in particular.  I keep my derby gear in my car, I have what are probably good snacks at my desk.  (I'm meeting with a dietician soon to go over that stuff and will remove any bad choices accordingly.)  I make sure to pack a change of clothes and bring it with me to work if I need to go from work to the gym/practice.  I get my weekday breakfast and lunch foods on the way to work once a week so there's no risk of forgetting them at home.  After that, I'm not really sure where to go from here.  Those are all things I've been doing for years.  My spouse picks up snacks for himself sometimes, but I'm good at avoiding them as long as it's not chips.  I asked that there be no more surprise chips, and he's agreed to that.  Once I have an idea of what snacks I can actually eat, I'll make sure those are around at home as well as at work.

 

What changes have you folks made for the Bat Cave missions?  I'm sure you all have some brilliant ideas that I'm just missing right now.  Thank you!

[Elastigirl]

One thing I did this challenge was to have my challenge goals (which I made into a game) on a sheet of paper sitting on the dining room table. Makes it much easier to remember my goals

[A Grue]

Ooh.  That is really good idea.  Thank you!

[PshawRaven]

Following. ;D

I'm in a bit of the same predicament with the Batcave. I stopped keeping a lot of the junk foods that tempt me, set my running clothes out the night before, and moved my yoga stuff into the living room. I even got a couple of water bottles that I keep filled and sitting around the house, including one for the truck so I'm never out of water. I was stuck for ideas but now I'm thinking weekly meal prep is probably my next step. I hadn't bothered since I don't work outside the home but it's probably a smart idea.

[Phoenix - AKA "TinkerBot"]

On 20/11/2016 at 11:19 AM, PshawRaven said:

Following. ;D

I was stuck for ideas but now I'm thinking weekly meal prep is probably my next step. I hadn't bothered since I don't work outside the home but it's probably a smart idea.

 

Meal prep is absolutely worth it even if you work from home. I've started prepping 3-6 lunches in advance (depends on how much fridge space is open) and it's SO much easier to just grab a container and kick back for a break now. Before I'd end up wandering around the kitchen for twenty minutes going "what am I going to eat? Where's the food? Too many ingredients and nothing is edible aaaaaaagh".

 

It's also useful for days when we have to leave the house early for meet-ups/classes/appointments. Just grab a couple containers, stick 'em in a bag with an ice brick, and head off.

[Guzzi]

On 15/11/2016 at 5:08 PM, Elastigirl said:

One thing I did this challenge was to have my challenge goals (which I made into a game) on a sheet of paper sitting on the dining room table. Makes it much easier to remember my goals

 

I take this a little further and make myself a chart when I'm doing a challenge. I try to mark things off as I do them, that way there's less chance of me sitting at the end of a week thinking "how many times did I do X this week....?"

 

On 11/12/2016 at 4:35 AM, Phoenix_ said:

I'd end up wandering around the kitchen for twenty minutes going "what am I going to eat? Where's the food? Too many ingredients and nothing is edible aaaaaaagh".

 

Haha! That is soooo me! 

 

I used to batch cook chicken for work lunches. I would chop up a MOUND of chicken (it's far cheaper if you bulk buy and then portion it out) marinade it then whack it in the oven.  I'd have 3 or 4 different marinades to give me different styles so I didn't get bored. 

 

My favourites were: Piri Puri, lemon and herb, barbecue, honey and mustard, garlic and herb... the list goes on. I'd simply grab one of those microwave steam bags of frozen veg, some cherry tomatoes, some dressing and my chicken of choice (hot smoked salmon is also bloody good but sadly it's also bloody expensive) and... BOOM!... instant healthy lunch.

 

If you need some more carbs in there then some sweet potato chunks (again just microwaved) is a tasty addition or a microwave pouch of (brown?) rice, quinoa or some couscous all work well. 

 

We literally had a kettle and a microwave in our break room at work and no cafés or restaurants nearby so you had to be inventive and plan ahead if you wanted a decent hot meal.  

 

 

If you want to make life easy for yourself and prevent that "there's nothing to eat/ I can't be bothered" situation then consider batch cooking some basics on your days off. It's amazing how easy it is to cook a taster, healthy meal if you have things in standby to throw together.

 

I always have a bag of ready frozen mince (ground beef) in the freezer but it tends to be fairly fatty (not really a problem as I just pour the excess fat off) and it's made from cheap-ass cuts of meat. If you want better quality stuff then buy good quality mince, brown it either on it's own or with onion/ peppers/ mushrooms/ garlic and freeze it once it's cooled down. 

 

It's soooo easy to take out a tub of cooked mince (I also portion mine out so there's no waste), defrost in the microwave and throw in the remaining ingredients for - bolognaise, chilli, tacos, burritos... The same goes with chicken. If you cook and freeze it then you can just take out how much you need and throw together a casserole, a curry, a stir fry  etc. 

[The Legendary Zoltan]

I'm on the bat cave one as well. I go to the gym at night and don't have a car, so I can't do anything with gym clothing placement. I gave up eating breakfast because I'm tired of making it. I don't have to cook lunch because I work at public school, so I just skip the rice and milk and it's very healthy. I think I'm going to do the making frozen mexican food thing that Guzzi does. I LOVE Mexican food.