145: Easy Whole Food Plant Based Meal Planning - Travel Edition

Anita: 0:58

Hey there, Sunshine. Welcome to the Power On Plants podcast, where your host, Jarrod and Anita Roussel and we're absolutely head over heels for whole plant foods, and helping you navigate this incredible plant based journey. That's because our lives have been completely changed by plant based goodness, we used to struggle everyday with excess pounds and low energy, vascular disease, joint pain and lack of sleep, just to name a few. And even though we're medical professionals, we still weren't getting practical answers that actually worked. So we dug into the research, we started living what we learned. And now we both of our lives back. And that's what we want for you to the truth is you can do this, and it's not hard, you just need a way that will bring real and lasting change. And that path, it has to be simple and enjoyable. And it's got to be delicious, too. So are you ready to live your life to the fullest, then you're in the right place, because Living without limits. That's what Power On Plants is all about. So pull up your chair, grab a matcha latte, and let's get started. Hey there, sunshine, it's great to have you joining us today. Whether it's your first time with us or you're a longtime listener, we absolutely love having you as a part of the power plants family. And you're here at the perfect time because we're in the middle of a podcast series that's all about traveling whole food, plant based style and loving it. So if you didn't catch our first two episodes of this series, which starts with number 143, be sure to give them a listen. In number 143. We talked about the five simple steps for planning the perfect healthy plant based trip. And in episode number 144 plant based road trip Food Made Easy. It's all about the simple plant based foods we enjoy eating during our travels while in the car, journeying to and from our destination. So if you haven't heard these two previous episodes, you've got to go back and listen to them as well, because they are packed full of strategies that are going to make your entire trip much more enjoyable and easier to and today, we're sharing how to plan and prepare some super quick and tasty meals during your stay. This is all about how to fuel your body. Well once you reach your destination, there are five simple steps that are important to set you up for success as you travel. And step number one is how much food to take. So what you want to consider here is how often you'll be at the home or the hotel where you're staying. And the approximate number of each type of meal you want to make while you're there, breakfast, lunch and dinner. How many will you need during your stay of each? And if you aren't sure the key is to go ahead and get started with just a few ideas from each category. I mean, if you really think about it, who gets to define what is breakfast, lunch and dinner fade right? Jared and I had never thought about that before. But really, it's very interesting. Somebody has predefined that for us.

Jarrod: 4:02

I thought it was a little Quaker guy.

Anita: 4:06

It might just be the Quaker guy

Jarrod: 4:09

made oats official breakfast food. Although I do eat me a lot of oats. I mean, I can't hate on the oats because we do eat a lot of that. Yeah,

Anita: 4:16

I don't know who defines it, but it could be the Quaker guy. He is a sneaky little man. But what makes them different, what makes breakfast lunch and dinner different because when you really think about it, you can eat the same types of foods for lunch and dinner, and even breakfast breakfast. And we have been known to do that. So if you really want to simplify your life, don't let others definitions of what foods you can eat at certain times of the day, stretch you out. Just think about how many meals you might want to eat at the place where you're staying during your time away and write that number down. And next for step number two, I want you to take a pencil and a paper or a pen and paper or just use the Notes app or something similar and jot down some of your very favorite healthy plate base meals that you enjoy that are simple to prepare. It can be as easy as nut butter and jelly or a nut butter banana maple syrup sandwich. It could be raw oatmeal and water. Then you mash that up to make oat milk right there in your bowl. Then you add raspberries maybe a little date syrup. And there you go. breakfast lunch or dinner. Not just breakfast, right?

Jarrod: 5:26

That's right. And sometimes we've done breakfast for dinner and sometimes for breakfast. We've had leftover dinner.

Anita: 5:32

That's right. It just ended up getting crazy.

Jarrod: 5:37

It just depends

Anita: 5:38

on what you want at the time and don't think that you have to stay stuck in that rut that you know sometimes we all get stuck in. How about avocado toast that's a great idea for a meal we do that often easy. Yeah, and you don't have to do it one way you could smash it and add some guacamole cuacamole Add some guacamole. Yeah,

Jarrod: 5:57

add some salt Somebody might add some salsa to it.

Anita: 6:01

So I've loved doing that. Just take it, mash it up, add the salsa, maybe add a little garlic if your salsa doesn't have that squeeze of lime, or lime Yeah, lemon works great. And those are really the three main ingredients that I love and guacamole but you can leave your avocado slices chunky, somebody told me I don't like it all mashed up like that. I like the chunks, well then by all means just slice sure avocado. Just make it chunky. Make it how you like it. And then you can pile it up not just with avocado, maybe you'd like some tomato, or some cucumber or some lettuce. Maybe you want to add another sauce on top, whatever you like. Just think about making it simple and not too many ingredients while you're on the right. It just keeps it easy. And then what about bananas and cream? Did you ever like that? You know, when Jared and I remember a long time back when we went on a cruise together. This was before we even had children and our children are nine 317 now so you can imagine how long that's been since we've been on a cruise. We so need a craze

Jarrod: 7:00

actually our last or? Well we do. Our last cruise was when I graduated PA school 20 years ago. Good. So we're way overdue.

Anita: 7:11

But on that crease, I remember thinking, you know there's this meal that I eat sometimes for breakfast, but it's very rare. It's just kind of like a tree for me. And it was bananas with cream poured over them. Do you love that too, because let me tell you that is just one of the wonderful wonderful things that I just it was one of those treats because she think heavy cream Yeah, really shouldn't be mad. But so think of bananas and cream like this. If you can make a quick and simple nut milk and under five minutes with a tiny little Nutribullet that's really easy to just throw in your trunk or in your bag when you go or on the go. Look is the simplest thing if you can put nuts and water and if you want to get fancy a little date for some sweetness and a little pinch of salt into blender. You can make the most fantabulous netmail better than anything you can find in your case at the store. Okay, in the dairy case. So what does it think about your cream to go on the banana? I want you to think how would I make cream if you already know how to make a five minute nut milk, which if you're thinking that would be so hard, I can't do that go to power on plants.com forward slash plant milk recipe plant milk recipe, power plants.com forward slash plant milk recipe and right there you can get the simplest, most tasty plant milk ever. If for some reason you're traveling anything I want to write that down. But I can't just go to power plants calm it's on our main page about halfway down and you can find it right there. Super easy. Grab your grab your copy of this recipe. It's a game changer. But if you want to make cream to go on those bananas, what do you think you need to do? Can you answer if you've been listening for a while I bet you can figure it out. You add some extra nuts. That's all you do to make cream. Okay? Don't go overboard because you're going to end up with something so, so thick, it's going to be like a gravy and you don't want that on your madness. Just add a few extra at a time until you get it the creaminess that you want. Okay. And also I like man a little sweet spot thrown extra dates into my

Jarrod: 9:13

thank you. Because it also gives us a little more of a caramel like flavor to it. Say you're saying bananas and cream. But when I grew up, we called it bananas, sugar and milk. Now you didn't I've never heard of that. Are you serious? You I'm just now as we're talking about I'm thinking yeah, we didn't call it that. But we just said bananas, sugar and milk, we just use regular milk. So it wasn't quite as creamy as the cream. But I sent your thinking we added the sugar so it's a little bit sweeter. So if we added an extra data to it would give it extra sweetness, but also gives a little bit of that de caramelly flavor to

Anita: 9:48

my goodness, it is so delicious. We'd love that. And we do that sometimes for dessert, it's just the best dessert. You don't even have to add any type of sugar at all except for just a love having a little sweetness so that whole day. Remember you're eating whole food when you do that whole thing. So you're getting all those nutrients in there. That is one of the easiest things to do for breakfast. And if you feel like you need a grain, you know, you can always have some oatmeal along with it. It's not hard to do that. And it's just so tasty. And so good mail. What about quick instant pot meals? Those are a big go to for us at home and on the road. So I have been known to pack our instant pot into our car. It's very easy to do. It doesn't take up a lot of space. Although we have I think the biggest Instant Pot there is of that of the Insta pot bring.

Jarrod: 10:38

It's a court. Yeah. And you say you have been known to everyone else. Yes, I would say it would be an oddity if we did not just because it's so easy to use,

Anita: 10:51

right. And I'm going to talk and embed mentioned spices again. But if you're going to take some spices you think I just don't want to pick up spices and I'm going to make chili. So I'm going to take chili powder and cumin and maybe some garlic powder or I know I'm gone. I'm going to make this soup that I love Italian seasoning and, and they're in glass, little glass jars, like your spices, put those inside your instant pot, store them in there for the trip so they don't take up any extra spice in your class doesn't get broken. There's a big, big tip for you right there. It makes such a difference to have some of those spices and not have to look for them or waste your time when you get there. Just toss them inside your Insta pot, put the lid on, boom, they're safe, and they're ready to go. Once you get there. What do we like to make in our Instant Pot beans, I mean, it's so easy just to have a couple of bag little bags of beans that you throw in there with some water. And they're just they're so good. If you want to really make good beans, take a can of salsa with you and throw a can of salsa or to opened. Of course not the entire can you know you want to open the jar of salsa and pour it into your beans, and then top them off with water and cook those mains for somewhere around an hour. That's about the right time on a pressure cooker to kick your beans. And they'll be delicious. We did that the last time we went on a trip we did beans. We did rice, we did pasta dishes in there. Oh, it's so good. And sweet potatoes, you can cook sweet potatoes, you can cook regular potatoes in your instant pot. Very quick, really easy, and they're not dry.

Jarrod: 12:53

And that's what I was thinking it makes him very moist.

Anita: 12:55

We love that. And then there's just I mean, there's almost, it's almost an ending. I mean, it really is what you can make an instant pot. It's unbelievable. Now, what about pre made plant based burger patties, get yourself a really simple recipe for a burger that you love, you think you have to buy them in the store, you don't, it really doesn't take any more than 15 minutes to whip that burger patties and it is super easy to do. And then you just plop them down on a pan bake them, you can already have them pre made and then you just heat them up on your trip, take them in a baggie, put them in the refrigerator in your room, and boom, you're done. And that's it.

Jarrod: 13:34

The ones that you buy. Yes, it is convenient. But many times they use a lot of coconut oils or palm oils. And those just are high high in saturated fat. So I would say avoid those, if at all possible don't

Anita: 13:46

clog your system. And guess what, when you get your trip, you'll have more energy, wherever you're going, you're gonna feel better have more energy, not gonna have a heaviness after that meal are what we call food hangover. Yes, we don't have those anymore, and you shouldn't have them either you're going on this trip, you've paid good money, we want you to enjoy it to the fullest and enjoy life to the fullest. And that's why we're all about healthy plant based living. So it's worth a little bit of extra effort to do this for yourself. That's just something good to have on hand period plant based burgers, if you can make big batches of those and just freeze them, freeze them. It's not hard to get your kids involved. It makes things so much faster too. And then they'll be on board and all excited about eating healthy plant based. Now, green smoothies are a big guy too. We've been known to either pack the Nutribullet or the Vitamix.

Jarrod: 14:33

With six of us. Yes, we take the Vitamix.

Anita: 14:36

The green smoothies are great and you're gonna feel good. You can just get bags of kale and berries. If especially like we talked about in the previous episode, things to look for in a hotel room when you're booking a hotel, or you're picking a home to stay in. These are things to look for. I mean, what size is the fridge does it have a fridge that you can just store a few simple things so you're gonna make your life beautiful while you're there. And kale and berries are great to have on hand and think about what the berry she might not want to buy five different bags of berries, this might be a good time to buy some frozen mixed berries. Because everything's in one bag, you can put it right in it doesn't have to say smoothie blend. It doesn't have to say that sometimes they do. Sometimes it does, but they don't. Sometimes it's just mixed berry shoe for those in there with a little Mike

Jarrod: 15:20

See, blueberries, strawberries and raspberries mix together.

Anita: 15:25

Right and they're so good. We love those. Alright, and don't forget to add your greens and then if you've got your Vitamix, you can make Vitamix soups, I mean you just blend them up the Vitamix gets gets so fast and so powerful, it will heat your soup for you. As it blends. It's amazing what you can do look up Vitamix soups are plant based or vegan Vitamix soups, you're going to find a lot of good options there. And also,

Jarrod: 15:49

it's gonna open up a whole new world for you. Because the first time we did, we took some raw tomato, and just it blended it's so fine and so smooth. And if you do let it go for a few minutes, it will warm it up so that you don't and you don't have to get it hot where it's it's cooking and boiling type temperature, but it'll warm it. And then here was something else that when we learned this that this kind of floored me I thought this is so simple. You make this the smooth part of the soup. Then you throw in some other things like you could do rice or peas or whatever, and just kind of pulse it so that you have the smooth, but then you also have to take the chunks for the texture part of it. If I just wow oh yeah, I can't believe you can do this. So easy or like we made a fort Southwestern soup. Yeah, the tortilla soup and you can put a little bit of those in there.

Anita: 16:37

So cuz yeah, well and the other thing is at the end you've blended that tortilla soup and at the end you pin and some drain beans and some corn hole. So you have those chunks and yeah, it's really really good we love so

Jarrod: 16:49

it gives you more of a hearty soup if you don't like just a straight CPC

Anita: 16:55

CPC. Alright, and then other things, what are some simple snacks you can have on hand for your trip the net better packets are amazing. Let's say you're traveling and you're going for a conference. Those are great just to put in your pocket or your purse. Other things that are good for that are trail mix. It's wonderful. It's so easy to throw together. You don't have to buy a trail mix, you can get nuts and dried fruits. Remember though, on your nuts and dried fruits, look for ones that just say the nut or the dried fruit name, don't buy the ones with added oil or sugar. You don't have to there are other options available. But leave those off. It doesn't make any difference in how they taste but it will make a big difference in your help in how you feel long term and short term. And then the another thing we love as hard apom You can buy it in a jar, drain it off. These are wonderful snack, she just grabbed them out and eat them. They're so easy. apple chips sometimes in the fall. You know, we just saw him recently, I can't believe that in the spring. You'll see apple chips, organic ones, even at Costco that carry these. They are low, wonderful little guy two snacks. Now want you to go back and listen to episode 144 tips for a delicious car ride or car trip for even more great snack ideas. But we're going to move on to step number three. What you'll do in this step is circle highlight or mark in some way the meals you like to make while you're away you've made this list of the things you like to eat. Now I want you to mark our highlight and choose the ones that you're going to have while you're away and jot down the ingredients you want to have on hand for each of these meals. At that point. If any of the meals you're considering seems to have too long of an ingredients list, or it just feels a bit too overwhelming, you're going to toss that meal idea out and not do it on your trip. And you're just going to replace it with a simpler one, just make it easy. And step number four mark each ingredient on your list is one that you'll take with you or one that you'll get after you arrive. It's really easy to do this with two different color highlighters. Or if you're doing this in notes and you're making your list there, you would just put an asterisk by the ones that you'll get when you arrive make it easy, make it whatever works best for you, whatever you like. So I'll look over my ingredients list of the things that I need. And I'll pack things like the spices I just mentioned of course as they're going into my instant pot, or maybe bulk ingredients I already have on hand and I don't want to purchase again like rice or oats or we'll take a small cooler of produce that we want to use that might go bad while we're away. And that way we don't waste it exactly we don't like to waste or we take any product or brand that we want to use. We feel like it might just be difficult to find that while we're away like the organic me so that we know and love so much. Now anything like that that you think would be difficult to locate now for the items to get once you are arrived. I want you to know that many times you do not need to shop for these things instead, you can often have them delivered straight to your door. We have done this using whole fades or a personal shopper and this works amazingly well Jared even brought up the fact that you can do this through Instacart you know there are

Jarrod: 20:14

different there are different places and different services that will do this for you.

Anita: 20:18

So when doorstep delivery is available, we highly recommend it because it's a huge time saver. The shoppers know the stores in their local area and can very quickly grab your items for you

Jarrod: 20:32

because that can be kind of intimidating. You just get somewhere especially if it's more of a vacation than a business trip. And you think I don't really want to try to find where the store is. It's a store I'm not used to and even though like we like going to Publix in they're generally fairly similar but they're not all identical. And so you don't want to have to waste time finding where each of these items are. So having it delivered straight to your door the first time we had that done it was a dream. It was glorious. Glorious, like wow, you could arrange to have it like if you were to arrive maybe around noon time. You could arrange it for later that afternoon or evening or in the case of what we have done is have it delivered the very next morning so we'll take food enough for that first meal or two and then usually have it arrive first thing that next morning

Anita: 21:19

it's I like Jared said a glorious but how can you make your travel even easier? You can start today by keeping a running list of easy meals right really enjoy and simple meals you've previously enjoyed while traveling. And you're gonna file that list on your computer where you can easily locate it. Call the list something like travel meals in the title, and keep adding to it and revamping it over time. Pretty soon you'll have traveling whole food plant based down to a science and it'll be easy peasy lemon squeezy. I know I just couldn't resist. Now, for step number five, pack the appliances that number one will save you time. And number two will bring you joy for us. We've mentioned some of these already, it's going to be your high speed blender, maybe a NutriBullet, maybe a Vitamix, we love the Nutribullet pro 900 as well. And Instant Pot, any tools we need for the meals we've chosen and utensils, forks and spoons depending on what's provided at the hotel or the home where we're staying. But what if you'll be dining out more than you'll be dining in while you're there. Don't worry, it's totally possible to do that too. And we'll be sharing the exact strategies for dining out whole food plant based style in an upcoming episode for you. So we've got you covered. And for dining in all you need to do is follow these simple steps we've shared with you today. Step number one, that's to figure out the approximate number of meals you'll be eating at your house or your hotel while you're away. Step two, take a pen and paper or just use the Notes app and jot out some of your favorite healthy plant based meals that are easy to make. Now for Step number three, circle highlight or mark in some way the meals from the list you'd actually like to make while you're away and make a quick list of the ingredients you'll want to have on hand for each one. Step number four, decide what ingredients you'll take with you and which ones you'll get once you reach your destination and remember to use the personal shoppers when they're available. And step number five, you want to pack the appliances that are going to save you time and bring you joy. Wow, this episode has been jam packed with incredible information. Now you're armed with the exact steps you need. And when you follow these, your plan based travels are sure to be much easier and more enjoyable to and remember, you do not have to do everything at once or even absolutely perfectly. The big key is to just get started. Thank you so much for joining us on this episode of power plants. Now, here's what we want you to do next, take a screenshot of the episode you're listening to right now and share it out on your Instagram stories. And when you do that, make sure to tag us at power on plants official so that we can see you are listening. Sharing on stories is going to help more people find the podcast so they can learn how to heal and gain incredible energy to live life to the fullest. And when you share. We want to add it to our stories too, so that you can get some exposure that way as well. And if you really love this show, head on over to Apple podcast and leave it in a review to give the show a boost. Each week, we'll feature a new review on the podcast because we love giving you a shout out to and until next week. Stay focused on that one simple step and keep moving forward and we will see you very soon.