My Secrets for Eating a Balanced Diet All Week Long

Have you ever tried to change your diet and eat super healthy, 100% clean, only to fall off the wagon and find yourself binging on junk food and takeout? I've been there many times, and I'm here to tell you there is another way. You can eat a nourishing plant-based diet that gives you the nutrients you need while also enjoying yourself and never feeling deprived. In this video, I'm going to walk you through some of the techniques I've developed over the last few years that have helped me break out of this seemingly endless cycle. And to show you what this looks like in practice, I'll be sharing what I eat in a typical week. I like to start my week off with something fun and outdoorsy, like an early morning hike or a picnic in the park, or both. And of course, a trip to the grocery store. Ideally just after I've eaten, so I'm not super hungry and tempted to buy a bunch of things I don't need. Then I'll head home to begin prepping for the week and put some of those strategies into action. So over the last few years, I've actually learned a few tips and tricks that have helped me stick to eating a pretty balanced diet throughout the week, week after week. And the first tip is actually what I'm about to start doing right now is to do some upfront meal planning and meal prepping at the beginning of the week. I find that if I take just 10 minutes, maybe 15 minutes to plan out very roughly what I want to make the next week, and then buy that grocery list, I'm much more likely to actually eat the meals that I make and to eat a pretty wholesome diet than if I don't do that upfront work. If you've seen some of my meal prep videos, you know that my style of meal prep is a little bit different than the conventional, make a big batch of the same recipe and then eat it for lunch and dinner for the next four days, which after day one I'm just not interested in doing and then I waste all the food. So instead what I do is I meal prep a couple different staples at the beginning of the week, maybe one or two proteins, one or two sauces, a whole grain, maybe some vegetables. And then I have that stuff in my fridge. I can mix and match it with other fresh ingredients, maybe some pantry staples. And I get to eat unique and different meals every single day. Another thing that has helped me stick to a balanced diet throughout the week is having some healthy, but very delicious snacks on hand. When I was younger, I used to think that the only way to have a healthy snack was if it was super healthy, like raw carrots or raw almonds. But inevitably I would get tired of that because it kind of gets boring. And then I would just go out and get a giant chocolate chip cookie the size of my head. And I also used to think that I had to make all of my snacks and everything had to be homemade. But I realized that relying on convenient snacks and convenience foods from time to time just makes my life a lot easier. And so I'm no longer afraid to do that. And by keeping healthy, but tasty snacks on hand, like roasted chickpeas or almond butter or dates, I'm very excited to eat those. I'm much more likely to eat that stuff than a giant chocolate chip cookie, the size of my head every single day, or a big bag of potato chips. My last strategy is to give myself room for indulgences. To me, a balanced diet doesn't mean that every meal has to be perfectly healthy. Instead it means eating a mix of foods, mostly home cooked foods, a lot of nutrient dense foods that are going to give me the nutrients I need to stay focused and energized, but no strict rules and certainly a lot of room for fun. By having that baseline of nourishing, wholesome plant-based food, I don't feel bad or guilty when I go out to dinner with friends and order a glass or two of wine with a big bowl of pasta and some chocolate cake for dessert. But it is crucial for me to start with that baseline of nourishing plant-based food, which brings me to the meal prep that I'm about to do. So right now I've already got my frijoles in the Instant Pot. That's going to be the protein for the week. Frijoles is just the Mexican word for beans. My version is spicy. It's got onions, red bell pepper, garlic, jalapenos, some spices, vegetable broth, dried pinto beans. Super simple because it all gets cooked in the Instant Pot. This recipe is actually from my cookbook, the Vegan Instant Pot Cookbook. And I've also included the written recipe in the free PDF guide. You can download it by going to the description box and clicking that link. And in the PDF guide, I've also included a written recipe for every meal I plan to cook this week. In addition to the frijoles, I'm also going to have some brown rice just kind of as my grain to eat with different things. When the pandemic started, I really struggled to eat enough greens because I just wanted to eat comfort food because, well, you probably know what I'm talking about. To get over that, the strategy I developed was when I got home from the grocery store or the farmer's market to grab my kale or whatever green I bought and to immediately wash it, chop it, massage it with some lemon juice and olive oil. Because I found that once it was in my fridge, I was more likely to use it. I could make a salad really quickly. I could throw it into a soup or a stew. And so that's what we're going to be doing this week with the kale. The last thing I'm going to prep is our everything sauce. But the idea is that you can pair this sauce with everything you make that week in the fridge. The value in doing this is that if I have just five minutes to make lunch, even if it's something simple like rice and beans, the flavorful sauce is going to make that meal so much tastier. For this everything sauce, I'm going to start with a quarter cup of creamy vegan yogurt. This is a Greek style almond, one, three tablespoons of tahini, one jalapeno pepper that I just really roughly chopped up, a big handful of cilantro leaves and tender stems, the zest from one lime, a few tablespoons of that lime juice, half teaspoon of ground coriander and cumin for a little extra flavor, tiny bit of agave nectar, just to balance the tanginess and heat. And of course some salt and pepper to season. And just going to blend that all up until it's smooth and creamy. It's tangy. It's spicy. It's creamy. It's going to go perfectly with everything. Oh, hello. Good morning. It is day one, 7, 7.30 AM. And I'm just enjoying my Indian spice tea. This is something I drink every single morning. It's part of my ritual. And I just take out my Indian masala dabba and I add one teaspoon each of cumin seeds, coriander seeds, fennel seeds, and fenugreek seeds. Let that steep in boiling water for about 10 minutes. And it really helps improve your digestion, relieve some of that annoying gas and bloating, helps your body absorb the nutrients it needs. And it also just kind of warms me up from the inside. It's a really nice way to start my day. And because I've been doing it for so long, it's now a ritual that signals to my brain, once I've had this tea, it's time to start my work day. I was deep in the zone working on my cookbook. So I grabbed a quick matcha to stay energized. And this is by no means the traditional way to make matcha, but it works for lazy people like me. Just before lunch, Max and I went on a walk to visit our local bakery when I stumbled upon free herb, not that kind of herb, this kind of herb. This is a great steal. It's not stealing though. They said free rosemary, but I'm just going to put it in my bag. At the bakery, I picked up some sourdough to have with dinner. And let me show you this amazing loaf. She a beauty. I do not normally wear an apron to make lunch, but the dress I'm wearing was giving the camera some weird feedback. So here we are wearing an apron to make lunch. And for lunch, I'm making a burrito bowl using some of the stuff I meal prepped yesterday. And when I'm making lunch, I usually only have like five minutes, maybe 10 minutes because I'm busy working or testing recipe or taking photos or something. So I love having everything prepped in my fridge. It just makes it a lot easier to eat a wholesome lunch than if I had to scramble and make everything from scratch. So for this burrito bowl, I reheated some brown rice in the microwave alongside a couple of ice cubes. Weird, I know, but the ice cubes steam and soften the rice. Without melting or making it soggy. This is pretty much science at its finest. So you should definitely try it. On top of that, I added some of the frijoles, which I reheated on the stove and a generous amount of that cilantro yogurt sauce and two store bought condiments, salsa and sauerkraut. This is delicious. It might seem weird to have sauerkraut in there, but it actually works pretty well. And to me, a big part of a balanced diet is having a lot of fermented foods. I try to eat a lot of wholesome plant-based home cooked food, as you might know from my channel, but there are a couple of gaps in my diet and certain nutrients that are just hard to get enough of on a plant-based diet, which is why I am a big fan of the sponsor of today's video. Compliment. 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Later in the afternoon, I headed outside for snack time in the sunshine. A thing I like to do because it's always sunny here. I had some crunchy roasted chickpeas, which are rich in fiber and a kombucha for more of those fermented foods. And I also had a couple of these cuties, aka mandarins. For dinner, I'm testing a recipe for Livornese white bean stew. The inspiration for this recipe comes from the TV show, Searching for Italy with the extremely delightful Stanley Tucci. Most of the food on the show is not vegan, but it is really inspiring for me to see how Italian chefs and farmers in the countryside take so much pride and care in their ingredients and craft. The ingredients and cooking techniques here are inspired by those used in Livorno, a port city west of Tuscany. For the stewed beans, I started off by heating my Dutch oven up with a pretty generous amount of extra virgin olive oil in true Italian style. Over medium heat, I sauteed the chopped onion until it was nicely golden and soft, seven, eight minutes. Then came the celery, carrot, and garlic. That cooked for three to four minutes and then some fresh sage, parsley, and red pepper flakes for a nice little kick. A very generous amount of tomato paste went in here, four and a half tablespoons, almost an entire tube. It makes it a little sweet, tangy, and so savory. And again, in true Italian style, quite a bit of white wine went in to deglaze the pan. This simmered for about three minutes. And then I added in the whole peeled tomatoes that I crushed earlier, salt and pepper and a bay leaf. I cooked down the tomatoes until most of the liquid had evaporated, 12, 13 minutes. And the last step, I added some veggie broth about one and a half cups and two cans of cannellini beans, which are so creamy. And this simmered on low heat until my kitchen smelled like a rustic Italian restaurant, about 30 minutes. The stew is almost done. So in the meantime, I'm just going to chop up some fresh basil. It's going to add a nice fresh finish to the hearty, cozy stew. And we're going to serve the stew with this extremely beautiful sourdough we bought earlier. Obviously she is way too big for the next few days. I can't eat all of this. So I'm going to cut off a few slices and then freeze the rest for another day. I've literally butchered the bread, but my bread knife is about a quarter of the size of the bread. Due to my very embarrassing butchering, I let Max take over on slicing the bread. What are you going to do with all this bread? Do you think we went overboard? This might've been a little bit too much. All right, let's see what it tastes like. This is excellent. It is really hearty and warming, kind of like a hug in a bowl. It's got a slight kick from the red pepper flakes, but it's not spicy. It's a little tangy, almost sweet from the tomatoes. This is really good, but I think it's going to be even better with a little bit of this bread, glass of white wine, and I'm going to enjoy myself a nice little dinner. After dinner, I made myself a little snack plate, apples and almond butter with some cinnamon, nothing fancy, but it's always satisfying. I retired to the couch to watch some TV and Max brought me a nice hot cup of herbal tea. He wants you to know that he is a total gentleman and also very humble. I started the day off with my favorite ritual, my Indian spice tea. Later that morning, I headed to my outdoors office to get some work done because it was 76 degrees, hence the sundress. And I enjoyed some mandarins while I worked. Easy to peel. So sweet. Very juicy. It's kind of the perfect fruit. I've also got my jar of water here. Hot take. I love the taste of water. I think it's great. It's delicious. Also it's good for your hair and your skin and your nails and your health in general. And I like having these little visual markers of how many ounces I've drank. Drunk drink. How many ounces I've consumed. It's a good reminder to stay hydrated. Quick aside. I don't actually eat breakfast most days because I do intermittent fasting, which means my first meal is typically around 11am. I do intermittent fasting because I like to stay laser focused on my work in the morning and I don't like to be distracted. Also, I tend not to wake up hungry very often. And as you might've noticed, my job is to test recipes and to eat them. So I don't really need to fuel up for a day of eating, but this is just what works for me. Obviously, I think you can eat a balanced diet whether or not you do intermittent fasting. But if you have questions about my specific experience, definitely let me know in the comments below. Hello. All right, it's lunchtime and I'm going to be making a big kale salad today. This is the massaged kale I did two days ago and it's been massaged with a little bit of lemon and olive oil. I'm going to massage it again with a little bit of avocado. So good for you. All those healthy fats for your hair, your skin, your heart. And this is going to add a lot of creaminess to the salad. I feel like a lot of times salads are boring for people because they don't have enough different textures. This salad's going to have crispness, crunchiness, creaminess, chewiness, lots of good things. Some more vegetables. Just got some shredded raw carrots. I buy these pre-shredded at the grocery store because I can't be bothered to do it myself. Now for some protein, I've got some edamame, which I love. I'm also going to add my favorite Hodo tofu nuggets. I love these nuggets. They're curry flavored and just so good. And they're also really high in protein, 14 grams per serving. And these are real chewy boys. So it's going to add a lot more texture to the salad. Now for something fermented, as I mentioned yesterday, maybe. I love adding fermented foods to my diet. They're so good for your gut. I try to have at least two sources of fermented food per day. I also really like the salty tanginess that sauerkraut adds to salads. What else? What else? This is why I don't sing. I sound terrible. What else? Some pepitas. These are also high in protein, good, healthy fats, nice little crunch in the salad. Same thing right here. Walnuts. So good for you. Omega-3, one of the best plant-based sources of fat. And that's also going to add some more crunch. Oh, some fresh herbs again, like just layering in extra flavors. It takes maybe two extra minutes to chop up some cilantro or parsley or mint or whatever it is, but it's really going to make your salad taste a lot better. All right. Herbs are all set. Another thing I'm going to add are these roasted seaweed snacks. Definitely not a conventional ingredient. Also a great snack, by the way, but I'm going to crush them up. I think it's going to make a good pairing with the flavor of the edamame, the tofu nuggets. I'm going to add some sesame oil. So it's going to be kind of a Asian flavor profile. Maybe one more. And the last two things I'm going to add are just a little bit of sesame oil, toasted sesame oil, and just a light drizzle because this is a very powerfully potent ingredient. Last thing, a spoon of tahini, possibly my favorite ingredient. It's going to add another layer of creaminess in addition to the avocado, a nice nutty smooth finish. Honestly, I am so excited to eat this salad. It smells really good. I know all the flavors are going to be good together. And that's generally how I feel when I make a salad. I'm excited to eat it. And that's because again, I'm using ingredients I actually like. I'm using a variety of textures and different flavors that work well together. And I'm making sure that it's going to be satisfying and filling. I'm going to go enjoy this delicious salad and I will see you the next time I'm hungry, I guess. It's so good. Every bite is just so good. And after finishing this amazing giant salad, I took my compliment plus. About an hour later, I brewed myself a nice cup of decaf black tea, a little creamy oat milk with cinnamon and freshly grated nutmeg. Very cozy. And I took this time to contemplate the meaning of life. Oh no, that's not cute. Okay. Much better. There I am contemplating. Today's afternoon snack, possibly my favorite snack ever. It tastes like grown up candy. Just grab a couple of big medjool dates and your favorite nut butter. Stuff some in the dates and add a little flaky sea salt. Stick that in the freezer for 15 to 30 minutes and get after it. This was so good that I had to make a third one and I washed it all down with an ice cold glass of the old kombucha. For din din, aka dinner. I don't know why I called it that. Sorry. I heated up some of the livernese white bean stew. I'll be doing a bit more recipe testing tomorrow. So I froze the leftovers so that it wouldn't go to waste. I topped it with some fresh basil and served it with this incredible garlic bread. All I did was toast the sourdough bread under the broiler, rub it with a sliced garlic clove and added a drizzle of some basil olive oil. Honestly, this meal was so good that I would eat it every week. I poured myself a little glass of pinot noir and had a few squares of this very delicious hazelnut dark chocolate and enjoyed it in my pajamas on the couch because I can. My idea of a balanced diet always makes room for dark chocolate and red wine. Good morning. We just pulled up to the farmer's market. I'm really excited. I love going as often as I can because I love seeing what's fresh and what looks good. Eating in season is always delicious. So I'm going to head in and see what they have. Being in Southern California, we are very spoiled with the quality of produce and the long growing season that I didn't even want to show you this, but I was able to buy both berries and Brussels sprouts on the same day. I know. You're enjoying yourself. After the farmer's market, we decided to go to brunch at our favorite vegan restaurant in San Diego, Donagene. They grow some of their own herbs and chilies and make everything in house. It's so good. We started brunch with a mango masala kombucha. Again, I love kombucha and I basically have mango masala in my blood. So it was the perfect choice. Our first dish was a spinach salad with vegan goat cheese, pistachio butter, roasted turnips, frica, smoked dates, and a harissa vinaigrette. Such an interesting salad. And it definitely inspired some potential recipe development ideas of my own. We also split the brunch plate and a pizza, which is Donagene's specialty. The breakfast plate had roasted potatoes, a tofu scramble, greens and a biscuit with vegan butter. The pizza also had potatoes, maybe a mistake on my part to order two potato things, but it also had roasted garlic, broccolini, za'atar, vegan mozzarella and Parmesan. It was delicious. And yes, I am an elegant eater. Thank you for noticing. Max and I eat out about once a week. It's something I always look forward to because we try to make it special, kind of like a date night or in this case, a date day, a day date, a brunch date. Yeah. A brunch date. Oh no. It went in and went out. All right. So snack time got a little out of hand. Max and I were having a little snack outside. Blueberries from the farmer's market. Honestly, Max is not a huge fruit person, but these are so sweet that even he is very excited to eat them. And the roasted chickpeas I had the other day, just a very delightful, crunchy snack. Later that afternoon, I made my dal tarka recipe, mostly because I needed to update the photos for my blog, but also it's just really delicious. And I will always happily eat dal. It's the food I grew up eating almost every day as a kid. So it inherently feels nourishing and comforting and it's just really good for you. The prep work is also pretty minimal. Just soak a cup of moong dal for 15 minutes. Dice up a medium onion, mince four cloves of garlic, grate an inch of ginger, dice a green chili pepper, grab a small can of diced tomatoes and measure out a few spices. I typically make dal in my Instant Pot because it requires the least amount of hands on cooking. I heat up a little bit of coconut oil on the saute setting, saute the onions until just soft, then the ginger garlic and chili for just a minute or two and the ground spices for 30 seconds. Then comes some water. I don't add too much because I like my dal on the creamier side. And finally the soaked lentils, salt and pepper and the tomatoes. I pressure cook this for 10 minutes and allow a natural pressure release for another 10 minutes. And as it rests, the dal is going to thicken quite a bit more. I just finished making the dal in my Instant Pot and it is tasty, but the real flavor in this recipe and in a lot of dal recipes comes from the tarka, which is the tempered spice oil. You pour it right over the top before serving. It's so good. It only takes two minutes. All you need to do is grab a small little pan. This is a special tarka pan. If you don't have one, that's okay. You can just use a small frying pan, heat up a couple of tablespoons of oil of your choice. And then once that's hot, you're going to add in some mustard seeds, about a teaspoon. Once those start to sizzle, you'll add in a half teaspoon of cumin seeds, then 10 curry leaves or more. I love the taste of curry leaves, so more is always better. And one or two dried chili peppers. Once you add in those final ingredients, it needs just 30 seconds. You want to swirl the pan frequently so they don't burn. I'm just going to add the tiniest bit of the tarka to my little sample bowl here just to make sure all the flavors work together. Tastes like my mom's kitchen. I love you, mom. For dinner, I had some dal tarka over brown rice that I reheated and to round it out, I roasted some of the broccoli that I picked up earlier at the farmer's market. I just sliced the broccoli stems into coins, cut the crowns into florets and roughly chop up some garlic. Of course, I add garlic to everything and toss it all on a sheet pan with olive oil, salt, black pepper, and some chili flakes. Roasted in the oven at 425 degrees Fahrenheit for 20-ish minutes without stirring. It gets perfectly browned and crisp this way. And I top the dal with some vegan yogurt and pickled onions for a little bit of tang. Good morning. I started the day with my go-to Indian spice tea before beginning my work day. Later that morning, I spent some time reviewing my weekly planner. I could not live without this and it's pretty much how I stay sane. And enjoyed a cup of this Earl Grey tea from Sama Tea, which was created by my friend Ravi. My super rad recipe tester slash kitchen assistant, Hannah was here today and we spent the afternoon testing a bunch of different recipes. One of the things I tested was a Brussels sprout salad. I shredded those farmer's market Brussels sprouts in my food processor. Finely shredded some Lacinato kale, also from the market, and added in a Granny Smith apple for some tartness. A food processor slicing disc really though, it's magical. I also made a quick red wine vinaigrette with crushed garlic, Dijon mustard, maple syrup, red wine vinegar, lemon juice, oregano, extra virgin olive oil, and salt and pepper. I massaged the kale with some of the dressing, did the same thing with the sprouts, added it in the apples, along with some shredded carrots, sliced almonds and tart dried cherries, and tossed it all together. As with every recipe I share, Hannah and I spend a lot of time discussing our notes on flavor and texture and how we can improve each recipe. It's just a lot of chewing. There's too much chewing. I kind of feel like this is like your, your vegan salad. Yeah, no, this is what people think of like vegan. Like it's so much chewing. Yeah, it is. It's a lot of chewing. Even though the salad needs some tweaking, it was still quite tasty and I hate wasting food. So I had a big plate of it alongside some dal and brown rice for lunch. And of course I took my compliment plus. Later we also tested some roasted winter squash and chickpeas for a recipe that'll be in my second cookbook. Now this recipe was a banger. All right. Well, that was delicious. I think acorn squash is my favorite squash. Based on this recipe alone? Yeah. We also tested some vegan fudge for the blog. And whenever I make a dessert like this, I try to give some of it away because if it's all in my fridge, I will absolutely scarf it down pretty mindlessly, especially when it is wildly delicious like this fudge, which tastes like a Ferrero Rocher. After a long day of recipe testing and writing, it was time for a glass of wine, at least a small one, because that's all we had left for dinner. We did a taco night for the tacos. I charged some corn tortillas directly over my gas flame, top them with the cilantro jalapeno sauce along with those frijoles and finish them with some diced avocado, sauerkraut and cilantro. And to get some veggies in, I reheated some of the roasted broccoli I made yesterday. I also ended up defrosting some of the leftover white bean stew and brought out some of that very cruciferous Brussels sprout salad, which to my delight had softened a bit after rusting in the fridge. So it was kind of a smorgasbord of a dinner. So I'm on my morning walk and this has nothing to do with what I'm eating in a day or my balanced diet, but I thought I would just show you because look at this fog. Say hi, Max. Back inside, I warmed up with a cup of jasmine green tea and got started with my work day. That crazy fog ended up burning off, so I went outside with my laptop, some more tea, obviously, are you surprised? And a couple of my new favorite cookbooks, which I flipped through for inspiration for new recipes. For lunch, I made some more brown rice in my instant pot and reheated some of the dal on the stove. It took about five minutes of active cooking to make this super nourishing bowl. I topped it off with some avocado and pickled onions, which is definitely not how my mom serves dal, but it was still good. And of course a couple of multivitamins to get in some more of the good stuff. Oh, and I made a little soy latte. Okay. It wasn't a latte at all, but I don't know what else to call it. I heated up some soy milk, added some of this turmeric and saffron chai masala and cinnamon from burlap and freshly grated nutmeg and a tiny bit of maple syrup. So comforting and warming. And later for snack time. Yes, I call it snack time like a child. I sliced up an apple and had some of the fudge we tested yesterday. So freaking good. Honestly, you have to try it. Well, I certainly had enough leftovers to make dinner tonight. My family insisted we come over. My mom made one of her specialties, palbaji, which is a quintessential Mumbai street food. It's a spicy mashed vegetable gravy served hot with soft lightly toasted bread. This might not fit into everyone's vision of a balanced diet, but my diet always makes room for mom's home cooked Indian food. And of course, quality family time. Thanks for watching. Bye.