This is the eighth article in the Get Started Eating Every Three Hours series that outlines how to start eating every three hours and the benefits of such a diet.

Now that you have your meals planned and your food already precooked, it comes time to actually assemble your meals. Typically, this is done in advance so that you don’t have to worry about it when meal time arrives.

Meal assembly is simply the process of grabbing the precooked portions of carbs, protein and fats that you have on your meal plan and preparing them for either eating immediately or taking with you to eat later. Here is how it is done:

Assemble enough meals to last until you get home 

The number of meals that you need to prepare is going to depend on your situation. For me, I cook my first breakfast fresh and then I’ll assemble three meals to take to work. This would be my second breakfast, first and second lunches. If I suspect I’ll be working late at the office for some reason, I’ll assemble a fourth meal to take with me. At home I will assemble my first and second dinners as needed, I may even cook one of them fresh.

On the weekends I typically assemble the meals as needed. If I’m leaving the house for more than a few hours, I’ll assemble a meal and take it with me. I personally find it easier to assemble a few meals in Tupperware dishes in advance, then I only have to pop open the container and eat, thus saving the assembly time. 

If you work in a place that has a dedicated kitchen, you may be able to get away with assembling your meals as needed. The only prerequisite would be to keep your cooked and/or vacuum sealed food in your work fridge.

Assemble meals that can be easily reheated or eaten cold

When taking meals to work, you probably don’t have access to much more than a microwave at the office. As such, those midday meals should not include anything that must be cooked on a stove-top or baked. For example, eggs might not be a good protein choice for work as you would have not way to cook them (unless you already hard boiled them). The meals you are taking with you should comprise of food that you cooked during your bulk cooking session. 

Show as little or as much creativity as you like

There are many ways to assemble a meal. For example, if a meal calls for 4oz of chicken, 3oz of red potato and 1.5 cups of steamed mixed veggies, you have a couple of options for assembly:

You can dice the chicken and potato then toss into a Tupperware bowl  and mix it up with the veggies. That would be the quick and easy bachelor-style method of doing things; which is how I like meals on the run.

Another option is to get one of those Tupperware containers that are like cafeteria plates with compartments for each portion of food, but with a sealable lid. You can have your chicken breast, some potato, and a batch of veggies all laid out like a nice home cooked meal.

What I don’t like about the second option is the larger container that must be packed around. You also will need a knife in addition to your fork to cut up the food when you eat it. This option is better when assembling the meal for immediate eating at home since it makes me feel like I’m having a real, i.e. traditional, dinner.

Some meals may need to be assembled when you eat

While assembling your meals, you will discover that there are some obvious combinations that should not be made until you are ready to eat. Your breakfast may include Grape Nuts and milk. Keep these in separate containers until feeding time. Just be sure your milk goes into a plastic container with locking lid that has a rubber gasket to prevent leaks.

I found that high quality lean turkey is very moist. If your meal calls for a turkey sandwich, keep the turkey away from the bread until you are ready to eat. Bread has a tendency to soak large quantities of turkey-juice. Yuk.

Due to the extra separating, you may have seven Tupperware containers for only three meals. This is perfectly fine.

Double check before leaving the house

What I find frustrating is spending time planning the meals, cooking, preparing and assembling, only to forget a critical portion of food such as a serving of veggies or protien.

So, once I think I’m done assembling my meals I will peek into each Tupperware dish and make sure I added what is on the meal plan. There are always a couple times in the month where I catch a mistake. These errors are more common when dealing with vastly different meal plans from day-to-day.

If your meal plans are stored on the computer, it may be worth while to print out the spreadsheet so you can have it in the kitchen. This helps ensure you get the right foods with the correct portions without having to memorize anything. Once you get the hang of assembling meals, you can skip printing it every day.

Don’t assemble meals more than a day in advance

If you have ample portable plastic containers to do so, you may be tempted to assemble two or three days of meals at once. If your meals are the basic mixed bowls of food as described above, I discourage mixing food to early. Flavors have a tendency to mix together over time, firm veggies become soggy, soft veggies become mush, and chicken becomes rubbery. This is not very appetizing. From my experience, I found these “mixed bowls” tend to do okay for a day; don’t assemble your meals too far in advance!

Enjoy a fresh meal every once in a while

There is not much fun in eating reheated food with every meal. As I mentioned before, I always cook a fresh breakfast that includes oatmeal and an egg-white omelette (among other things). Sometimes I cook one of my dinners fresh so that I can enjoy a nice home cooked three-course meal. 

Once you get into the routine of eating every three hours, you may will  become sick of being in the kitchen and just settle on reheated food. This often happens to me. However, I’m a bachelor and can get away with such things. For those of you that have family at home that is not on the same diet plan, they will very much appreciate when you eat the same dinner as everyone else. Hopefully you won’t me making them eat reheated food every day. ;)

What are your thoughts on assembling your meals in advance? Do you have any tips or advice to simplify the process?

This is the second article in the Get Started Eating Every Three Hours series that outlines how to start eating every three hours and the benefits of such a diet.

In the previous article, I talked about the benefits of eating healthy food every three hours. Now we’ll take a look at some of the handy kitchen items needed to ease your passage into a healthy lifestyle. Many of you will already have most of these items, while others with a sparse kitchen may not.

To eat every three hours effectively you must store prepared foods, quickly create meals, and easily transport your meals; all while minimizing your kitchen chores such as dishes. The following are the items I have personally found useful.

Vacuum Sealer

The vacuum sealer is quite possibly the best kitchen invention since the refrigerator. Not only is this product good for storing raw foods, it is great for storing cooked foods; which is how I recommend using the product.

When preparing yourself five or six meals a day, you must cook food in advance. This is especially true during the work-week. The vacuum sealer provides the means to cook your food in advance (more on that in another article) and safely store the meals for the coming week. 

Vacuum sealers come in a variety of models. I personally have experience with the FoodSaver V2040, and highly recommend it since it has put up with months of abuse in my busy kitchen. There are many other vacuum sealers on the market and some are less expensive than the FoodSaver. There are models from Rival, Oliso, Toastess, and Kenmore®. I cannot personally recommend those products because I have not used them, but they may work fine. Keep in mind that you get what you pay for!

Kitchen Scale

In order to eat healthy, you must face the fact that you will be counting calories, among other things. With some foods, calories will only be given for a specific weight regardless of how much food is provided in the package. This is where a good kitchen scale is essential.

When shopping for a kitchen scale, make sure you get something that is digital. Avoid products that use spring-loading to determine weight as they are always inaccurate. For me, the most useful kitchen scales offer display read-outs in either ounces or grams. Some nutrition labels offer portions in grams, and others in ounces. Having a kitchen scale that can display both saves some conversion headaches.

In my opinion, a kitchen scale is not an optional appliance when you are regulating your diet. Buy one right away!

Plastic Containers

Unless you like to return home every three hours when it comes time to eat again, you will need some method of taking a meal or two with you while out on the go. Plastic containers are the obvious choice when transporting food.

There are many brands of plastic containers available. The best bang-for-your-buck will be a container set that will include different sizes. If there is a specific plastic container not included in the larger set, you can often purchase them separately.

When shopping around, I encourage you to play with the containers in the store. Do the lids seal on properly to the container without easily popping off? Can you squeeze the container a little and have the lid not come off? Can you hold it upside down? It really is a buzz-kill to have a meal container pop open in the car or in your bag.

Some brands have locking lids. These are great, but they are also more expensive. Having one or two of these is good for the times when you need to take a liquid with you, such as milk or soft items like applesauce. The locking containers with a rubber seal are required to keep liquids in their container. Put fluids in any non-locking type container and there will be leaks.

Make sure your containers are microwave and dishwasher safe. Not all of my meals need to be heated up, but it is very nice to toss the container in a microwave and eat directly from the plastic dish. Classy!

Feed Bag

When going to work or running errands around town, you may have to take up to three meals with you. Depending on how you separate food in your plastic containers, you may have eight or nine containers coming along for the ride.

Find or buy a “feed bag” dedicated to the job of transporting your food containers. I use a cheap backpack, but any type of bag with handles will work fine. Some people like to use leftover plastic sacks from the grocery store. However, a bag with multiple pockets is nice because you can carry extra stuff like plastic utensils, napkins, toothbrush, and mints. Always having these extras with your containers avoids you eating like a dog from your plastic dish in public places.

Miscellaneous 

There are several miscellaneous items necessary to eat every three hours that are useful.

You should be stocked up on plastic forks, spoons, and paper plates. Eating five or six times a day will leave you constantly washing dishes. Make use of the disposable alternatives. Save the pretty plates for guests.

I find that most food will not spoil during the day if sealed in a plastic container. If you are paranoid about such things or carrying something that you must keep cold, cold-packs may be necessary. Simply keep a couple of these in your freezer and toss one into your feed bag on your way out the door to keep your food cool. Good for the summer months!

I will discuss bulk cooking in a later article, but having more than one frying pan allows you to cook large quantities of food at once when preparing for the coming week. Not a requirement, but having an extra large pan does save cooking time.

I’m sure there are items I left out, but this list comprehensive enough to get anyone started eating healthy food. What else do you think would be handy for the Eat Every Three diet?