Cooking for One: Part Three: A Well-Stocked Kitchen – For One

Getting in Your Proteins and Other Essentials

Protein is the foundation of your weight loss surgery diet. Some sources, such as canned salmon and tuna, tofu, canned beans, and beef jerky are non-perishable. You can stock up on them just like you would if your entire family were eating them. But what about other sources?

• Buy pre-portioned frozen packs of grilled or baked fish and chicken breast, or veggie and turkey burgers.
  
• Don’t be intimidated by eggs. They don’t have an unlimited shelf life, but you can go through them pretty quickly. Each white has 3-4 gram of protein, and if you have just two whites a day, you’ll go through the entire dozen in less than a week.
  
• Buy family packs of chicken breasts, fish fillets, and lean ground turkey to save money. Just open the package, separate them into single servings, and freeze them. Or, cook the meat first so it’s ready to be eaten or used in a quick recipe later.
  
• Store enough yogurt, cottage cheese, and cheese for at least a week.
  

Fruits and vegetables are the other big contributor to your diet. You don’t need to watch huge packages rot or go grocery shopping every day just to get in your fruits and vegetables. If you can go even twice a week, you can have fresh produce every day.

• Eat or cook mushrooms, greens, lettuces, berries, and sprouts first because they have the shortest shelf life.
  
• Carrots, apples, oranges, onions, spaghetti squash, and bell peppers are just a few examples of vegetables and fruits that last a little longer.
  
• You can cook any vegetable as soon as you buy it, and store it in the fridge or freezer. You can also freeze bananas and have a half for a healthy treat instead of ice cream.
  

If you’re can only get to the store once a week and you’re not able to cook all of your vegetables on weekends, you may want to depend on some frozen or canned veggies and fruits, Check the label to make sure they don’t contain salt or added sugars.

Pantry Staples for One or a Crowd

The beautiful thing about staples is that they last a long time. You can stock your kitchen with essentials even if you’re not planning to go through a lot of food. Having the right foods on hand can keep you inspired and enable you to make delicious food at any time. Keep these in your kitchen, and you should be just an ingredient or two away from making any recipe.

• Spices, including cinnamon, cloves, nutmeg, dill, basil, oregano, thyme.
  
• Salt and pepper.
  
• Milk or almond milk.
  
• Baking powder, baking soda.
  
• Sweetener.
  
• Broth or bouillon for cooking and flavoring.
  
• Olive oil.
  
• Spaghetti sauce.
  
• Condiments: mustard, low-sodium soy sauce, balsamic vinegar, red wine and white wine vinegar, fat-free salad dressings or dry mixes, fat-free mayo.
  
• Garlic.
  
• Protein powder.
  

Learn to Love Leftovers

Remember when dinner used to mean making a box of macaroni and cheese or ordering a pizza, and finishing it? Even if you had something healthy, there weren’t always leftovers. When there were, they went quickly enough by the next day.

If you’ve ever had a teenaged boy in the house or the guys have come over to watch sports on TV, you also know what it is like to watch food disappear. It seems any food you buy will disappear within hours, so you never have to worry about it going off.

That’s no longer the case when you’re cooking for yourself after weight loss surgery. Your portions are tiny, so you’re not plowing through mounds of food anymore. You need to either cook one serving at a time – that’s a drag! – or learn to love your leftovers. You can eat them straight, such as taking your leftover spaghetti squash and turkey meatballs for lunch the next day.

You can also transform them each time you see them. For example, enjoy a grilled chicken breast on day one. On day two, slice up leftover grilled chicken to put on your green salad at lunch, and make chicken skewers with grilled eggplant and zucchini for dinner. As you’re eating dinner, stew the rest of the chicken with canned tomatoes and a can of beans for a high-protein dinner for day three.

One of the barriers to cooking for one is having a variety of healthy ingredients on hand, but it’s not impossible. Stock up your kitchen with non-perishables, and plan your menus and shopping trips ahead of time so you can pick up what you need. Also, be prepared to cook and store extra food that you will come back to later. Next up in our series on cooking for one: handy kitchen tools that’ll help you make and store your food.