What is the One Easy System?
Learn these 3 Easy Steps
to get REAL food on your table REAL fast!

Now you're ready to find out about Step 3 in the One Easy System!

Learn key steps on HOW to prep your family for a week of healthy REAL food eating.

Feeding your family REAL food can be challenging. Planning and Shopping are essential. The third step of Our One Easy System is what will help you get REAL food into the hands of an overly-hungry toddler, a ‘starving’ 4th grader after school or an on-the-run teenager REAL fast! It will help you get REAL food on your table for a family meal before anyone can whine, “How long until dinner is ready?”
 
Step Three is all about prepping. Prepping is how restaurant chefs get food onto the table – many tables actually – within minutes.

Chefs create prep boxes. Your prep boxes depend on your menu for the week. So, after you've planned and shopped, you need to set aside some time to do some prepping - maybe once a week, or maybe a few times each week. We like glass prep boxes best so that the food is not sitting in plastic. Some examples of prep boxes you might create for a week of REAL food meals and snacks include:

Protein Boxes – Hard boiled eggs; cooked chicken; bacon; sausage; cooked beans; sliced/cubed/shredded cheese; tuna or chicken salad; and any other protein source you feed your family.

Salad Boxes – Clean and chopped lettuce, spinach, arugula and any other greens for salads, sandwiches, tacos, etc.

Vegetable Box 1 – Cleaned cucumbers, carrots and celery sticks in water.

Vegetable Box 2 – Peppers sliced into strips and onions peeled and diced. 

Blanched Vegetable Box – Blanched broccoli, cauliflower, and asparagus.  Blanched vegetables cook faster and maintain a fresher, brighter color.

Fruit Box - Fresh fruit chopped - combine or keep separate.  Keep pineapple separate from other fruit.

Herb Box -  Fresh herbs covered with wet paper towel and a small glass container inside with pre-chopped herbs.  Garlic and ginger root would be kept in this box.

Baked Goods Box - Homemade muffins and cookies made with whole grains and REAL food ingredients like sucanat and butter.

Trail Mix Box - Make different kinds of trail mixes each week.  They can include nuts and seeds but don't have too.  Add dried fruits; unsweetened, shredded coconut; fresh fruits like blueberries and grapes; shredded carrots; jicama, etc.

In less time than it takes you to order carry-out food, you will have a nutritiously delicious meal for you and your family.  It may take a few weeks to incorporate this routine into your weekly schedule, but don’t become discouraged.  It’s worth the effort when you know your family is thriving because of all the Real Food meals and snacks they are eating! 


More Suggestions:

Create dressings and marinades for the week. 

Before you begin creating your weekly prep boxes, mix up some healthy cookies or brownies (see our recipe section) and bake them while you are working.  Make a double batch to get through the week.

Package snacks in individual serving sizes ahead of time so you can just grab and go!

Double any recipe that can be made ahead and frozen.

Develop a system to keep your weekly plans and shopping lists so that you can repeat it every 3-4 weeks.

Adapted with permission from the Fresh Dinner Express Class through www.purefood2u.com.  Chef Kelli Lewton and Chef Jackie White