Guidance for single males

piobhan

Advice required please for a single man with basic cooking skills, who isn't massively unfit but about 2 stone overweight and lazy.


- is there any books or plans available for such a person with a busy lifestyle and limited cooking skills - buying meal plans or regular meals from someone like clean cut meals isn't an option

- motivation is low but I know I need to change my diet pretty drastically as the weight will creep up and up

What do you all suggest? There has to be thousands in a similiar position. Thanks

jaykhunter

A lot of people have great success with using a slow cooker - whack in meat and veggies in the am, have a hearty, healthy, tasty meal when you get back. It's witchcraft! I do Slimming World (74 lbs in 7m!) and they've just brought out a Slow Cooker recipe booklet. Their recipes don't require much cooking skills (thankfully!)

Also since it's so cold out I've been batch cooking soups. This one (Italian chicken and tomato) is delicious and keeps you going. I'd add baby potatoes and it'd be a dinner.
http://www.slimmingworld.ie/recipes/italian-chicken-and-tomato-soup.aspx

- lastly I've got some amazing news: weight loss is 80% diet. That means you don't have to stop being lazy. Just shop 'better'! Fitness is great for clearing your mind and toning, but it doesn't stand a chance against a pint or some biscuits or a bag of Skittles! So give that 80% your 100%!

Penn

Agree with the post above, a slow cooker is incredibly simple to use and more importantly, you can batch cook meals so you can make a few lunches/dinners in one go and freeze them for later.

Cooking can seem daunting, but unless you're aiming for Gordon Ramsey standards, it's quite forgiving if you overcook something slightly or don't get the seasoning completely right. It'll still be enjoyable and edible, and after a few tries you'll be nailing it every time and it'll seem like such little effort.

Even just on pans, there are loads of simple recipes you can make, like thai green curry, or beef stir fry. I also posted up two recipes I use recently, a Prawn Korma and a Chilli Con Carne.

As jayk said, weight loss isn't about not being lazy, it's more about being smart. Track your calories on MyFitnessPal. Go for healthier options of the things you do like. If you find a recipe you want to try but it seems like there are too many calories in it, google low calorie alternatives. The BBC GoodFood website I linked to above is fantastic as you can narrow down recipes to easy to cook and low calorie, or one-pot dishes that require very little effort. And plan ahead. Find recipes you can cook in batches and reheat later so you don't end up taking the lazy option and buying bad food (and when you think about it, cooking batches and reheating them later is kinda the real lazy option ). Planning ahead also means if you've already bought all or most of your ingredients already, you'll have to use them before they go off otherwise you'll have wasted your money.

I was in a very similar position to you months ago. I could cook some basic dishes for myself, but I was just lazy and found cooking most things to be daunting. But it's really not. Recently I've made a beef stroganoff, risotto, the dishes I posted above and more. A little bit of confidence after a few attempts and you'll be flying. Think of meals you enjoy, then find simple and healthy versions of those recipes, or even just reduce the portion sizes enough. At the end of the day, if you're tracking calories and burning more than you eat, you'll lose weight.

silverharp

even just old fashioned batch cooking , big pots of soup , various kinds of stews that you can break up into portions and keep in the fridge or freeze. I use Youtube a lot, just throw in a few terms and you will get loads of suggestions. Try to avoid having snack foods in the house, bring your lunch with you instead of buying lunch, don't eat after dinner.
Maybe keep a food diary for a week before you start to turn the ship and some obvious stuff will jump off the page. Write down some measurements like weight and waist size so you can see if you are making progress to your target. You can use a BMI calculator to set a target or personally I prefer waist to height being 50% or under.

Macy0161

Slow cooker is definitely an easy way to batch cook.

I did a chilli beef in the slow cooker last week which the most cooking skills required was slicing a couple of red onions - it was 800kg of diced beef, two red onions, half a bag of frozen sliced peppers, two tins of chopped tomatoes, tin of sweetcorn, tin of kidney beans and two fajita seasoning packs. Just threw it all in and a stir before work, cooked when I got home. I prepped the onions the night before, and cooked up 4 portions of (brown) rice the night before which I stirred into the pot for the last half hour when I got home. That gave 8 portions - I buy the takeaway foil trays to freeze them (in dealz, 10 for 1.50), as you can write on the top what's in them and date them!

As for other recipes - foodforfitness.co.uk has some free recipes, and I've brought the ebooks. The "one pot" rice dishes are generally very easy (a couple of them are free I think), and work well for batching up. I've no connection to the site at all, bar I found it via the recipes (and brought the ebooks and haven't had a dud yet following them). But I would generally agree with his line of thinking/ advice regarding diet.