Prep For Day 1-4

The meal prep sessions ensure that you have quick and easy snacks, simple morning meals and lay the foundation for your afternoon and evening meals. This step is essential in order to guarantee a stress-free and rawtastic week. We don’t want to shake your routine up too much. Having everything ready makes it easy to stick to your healthy plans even after a long work day or when hanger strikes.

Creating new habits takes time. Implementing a meal prep session into your week is an important part of the program.  Many Refresh participants rave about how the weekly meal prep session has helped them to maintain their healthy habits long after the program ended.

There are two preparation sessions a week: the evening before the Refresh starts and on Day 4.  If you follow a normal work week, if would be Sunday and Thursday evenings.

These are great guidelines if you follow an average work week, but you’re welcome to change the prep sessions to work with your schedule. Sunday evening prep is scheduled to ensure you have an easy start of your work week, for instance, if you’d rather switch it to Monday morning, that’s perfectly fine.

The only thing we strongly suggest is doing both prep sessions instead of making the entire meal each day. This is also a great lifelong habit to create beyond the Refresh; such routines make it easier to eat healthy with intention.

1. Soaking Nuts & Pre-Bagging Morning Recipes

The sooner you start soaking the better. It's great if you remember to start soaking them in the morning, but it’s also totally fine if you are just starting to soak them now; by the time you get to the recipe, they’ll have soaked long enough. If you want to learn more about the benefits of soaking nuts and seeds, head over to the Nut Milk From Soaked Nuts section, within the “Beverages" sidebar tab.

Below is a quick reference list of all the nuts and seeds to prepare today. Store, cover, and refrigerate them in their separate jars and containers.

Time-saving tip: Store your nuts and seeds in the container that you'll later be using for the recipe itself.

[_/su_spoiler]

Pre-Make Smoothie Bags

It doesn’t take much time to make a smoothie, but saving even a few more minutes will give you an extra edge over your old morning routine.  You have a few smoothies during the week.

After you finish shopping:

1. Head to the kitchen.
2. View the Meal Plan and see which days have smoothies.  Click on the day to get the ingredients list for that smoothie.
3. Pre-bag the ingredients for each smoothie.
4. Label the bags with their respective recipe name and whatever additional ingredients may need to be added later (liquid, sweeteners, etc).

Quart-sized Ziplock bags work best, but you can always smash or chop greens to fit into a smaller bag.

When labeling the bag, remember to include anything else that you might need to add into the blender with the smoothie ingredients. When finished, place the smoothie bags in the freezer for a hassle-free treat.

[_/su_spoiler]

-

2. Base Recipes

---

Blueberry Muffin Bites

Time: 20 min | Amount: Used in 2 snacks = 4-6 bites needed

[_/su_spoiler]

---

Pineapple Melon Chia Fruit Salad

Time: 10-20 min | Amount: Used in 4 morning snacks

Mornings snacks are important, especially if you need a little more food to carry you into the afternoon.  These snacks keep your energy high and keep you away from the junk food.

Many of us miss this time of the day out of habit.  To make it easy, get your morning snack ready before the day begins. Past reviews have indicated that quick and simple is best.

Your Personal Preference To Fruit, Nuts and Seeds?

Our bodies are unique and learning about your personal preferences is crucial to your health.  For example, some people do not react well to eating a lot of fruit in the day, while others thrive. Some do not react well to eating a lot of nuts and seeds.  Some gain weight after too many nuts and seeds while others seem to do just great.  Eliminating nuts or fruit is not what we are saying (cause that would be terrible on your health), it's about finding the right amounts for you personally.  The macro nutrients are balance in the Refresh, this morning snack is a time to learn about fine tuning your needed and adjusting accordingly.

Here's our suggestions to help make it easy.  Your goal is to find the morning snack that satisfies you and keeps your energy levels at peak performance well into the afternoon.  We suggest making a fruit salad and a chia pudding.  Keep them separate and each morning snack add the desired amount of fruit salad into a bowl and top wine the chia pudding.  Continue to adjust your portions amounts until you find what keep you satisfied until the afternoon meal.  You might find that a piece of fruit is all you need OR you might find that a little extra chia pudding feels better. You might even prefer to forget the fruit salad and go with veggies with zucchini hummus.  We are all different and understanding yourself and your personal food preferences is crucial to your health.

Below we have the fruit salad recipe that is included in your shopping list.  By all means, if you have a favorite fruit like a pear, apple or grapefruit, grab 1 of those and you're good to go.  If you want to save time and be a little easier on your stomach you could go mono fruit and eat a half a watermelon one morning snack and half a cantaloupe the next morning and so on.  If you want to just stick to the menu then jump on down below!  It's delicious!

Pineapple Melon Chia Fruit Salad

---

Here are some fruit ideas if you want to switch up your fruit salad.

Other Fruit Ideas:

• Go simple'n quick and eat a pieces of fruit or a cup of berries or grapes.
• If you are trying to lose weight grapefruit, watermelon and any other high water content fruits will help with that.
• Keep it cool with fruit smoothie popsicles. Just blend your favorite fruit with a little water and place the mixture into a cup with a popsicle stick.
• For another cool idea try the Cupcake Smoothie Bites
• Make a Fantastic Fruit Salad.  Click here for Fruit Salad Ideas.

[_/su_spoiler]

---

Taco Meat

Time: 13 min | Meals: used in 2-3 meals

[_/su_spoiler]

Black Pepper Cashew Cheese

Time: 10 min  |  Meals: used in 3 meals

[_/su_spoiler]

Thai Almond Sauce

---

Thai Almond Sauce

Time: 10 min  |   Meals:  used in 2 meals

If you don't have Miso don't worry.  It's a great fermented food that gives your recipe a huge healthy boost but sense it's in only one meal this week we didn't want to add it to your shopping list to help save you money and time.  We use it a lot more in the 21 Day Reset but for now we'll but it aside.

[_/su_spoiler]

---

Prep Lentils For Sprouting

Time: 10 min  |  Meals: used in 4 meals

[_/su_spoiler]

Place Grapes In Freezer

---

Freeze 1 cup of grapes OR blueberries

Time: 10 min  |   Meals:  Dessert on Day 2

Day 2's dessert is going to be quick and delicious.  Just wash and freeze a cup of grapes OR blueberries. You can also keep them separate on a sheet, tray, plate or wax paper but it's not mandatory.

[_/su_spoiler]

-

3. Optional

 

Mediterranean Marinated Veggies

Time: 10 min  |  Meals: used in 3 meals

This is another veggies chop that you can do now if you would like.  This will be in 3 meals and the first meal is Day 1 evening.  If you have time in the evenings you can wait till then.  If the veggies marinate for an hour or more then they will be softer and tastier, that is why we added it here incase you wanted to start them soaking now for tomorrow nights Curry Soup.  It's up to you, either way it will be great:)

Here is the full recipe below if you want to make it now:

[_/su_spoiler]

Pre-Make Snack Bags

Participants found that having quick access to the daily snacks was a big advantage and really helped to keep them on track, even when it was just a pre-bag veggies.

This step is for you if you’re the type of person who is used to grabbing a coffee or quick breakfast in morning or afternoon; we want to keep your routine as close to your old habits as possible, saving you mental energy and ensuring that you don't miss your snacks.

After you’re finished pre-bagging the smoothie ingredients:

1. Go through each day and loo at the snack options for the day.
2. Pre-bag the ingredients for each morning's snack in the first 4 days.
3. Put them in ziplock bags or small container.
4. Label with their intended day and anything that needs to be added later (liquid, sweeteners, etc).

When finished, place the snack bags in the fridge or freezer and you are all set for snack time.

Your morning routine will now consist of grabbing a bag and enjoying it on-the-go. This can replace whatever morning ritual you had before and give you a tasty snack when needed.

[_/su_spoiler]

Nut Milk from Soaked Nuts

To make a milk from raw nuts, you’ll first need to choose a nut. Different nuts soak for different amounts of time so be sure to check out the “Soaking Time Chart," Most nuts need to be soaked overnight or for at least a 3-4 hours. Use a high powered blender to process until smooth. Strain and blend with a little salt, dates, and vanilla. Enjoy. Homemade nut milk is soooo much better than store-bought nut milks. just remember since it contains no artificial anything, it goes bad more quickly too. Always smell before you sip!

There are lots of nut milk options, including a quick nut butter alternative to soaking nuts. Head over the the Nut Milks section in the “Beverage” sidebar tab to learn why, how, and which nut or seed milks to make.

[_/su_spoiler]

Strawberry Mint Smoothie

Remember to add 1 Tbsp of chia seeds OR 1 Tbsp of hemp hearts OR 1 scoop of pea, hemp OR rice protein.

[_/su_spoiler]

Fruit Salad OR Favorite Fruit

This can be any type of fruit. Berries are a delicious low sugar option but go for your favorites. If you already made the fruit salad and chia pudding during the prep session then you are good to go.

Split it 1/4 of fruit salad and 1/4 of chia pudding and dig in.  Adjust amounts to your preference.

If you want more fruit salad ideas click here.

Taco Fiesta

Time: 10 min | Servings: 1

You should have most of your bases covered for the taco so all you really need to do is assemble your ingredients and VOILA!

The recipe says guacamole but if you want to save time just top with a few slice of avocado on top.  The recipe also says Taco Meat which you can ignore if you did the prep session.

[_/su_spoiler]

Blueberry Muffin Bites

If you’ve already made these bites then you’re good to tart snacking.

The bites are scheduled for 2 afternoon snacks, with a possible 3rd option. Have about 2-3 bites for each afternoon snack.

To help preserve these bites for the whole week make sure you keep them stored in the fridge.

[_/su_spoiler]

Coconut Curry Soup

Time: 15 min   |   Servings: 1

[_/su_spoiler]

Mediterranean Marinated Veggies

The recipe is below is you haven't already made the veggies during the prep-session.

[_/su_spoiler]

Chocolate Avocado Pudding

Time: 10 min   |   Servings: 1

[_/su_spoiler]

Berry Crunch Smoothie Bowl

Time: 10 min   |   Servings: 1

[_/su_spoiler]

Fruit Salad OR Favorite Fruit

This can be any type of fruit. Berries are a delicious low sugar option but go for your favorites. If you already made the fruit salad and chia pudding during the prep session then you are good to go.

Split it 1/3 of fruit salad and 1/3 of chia pudding and dig in.  Adjust amounts to your preference.

If you want more fruit salad ideas click here.

Crunchy Asian Salad

Time: 15 min   |   Servings: 1

[_/su_spoiler]

Nutty Banana Raisins

Time: 31 Seconds | Servings: 1

[_/su_spoiler]

Creamy Cashew Alfredo

Time:  10-15 min   |   Servings: 1

The Cashew Cheese will be involved in 2-3 more meals, so use no more than half of the cheese.

[_/su_spoiler]

Candy Grapes OR Blueberries

Quick’n easy dessert option.  Grab your frozen treats and favorite book and enjoy 🙂

Maple Walnut Oats

Time: 5 min | Servings: 1

[_/su_spoiler]