What is minimalism?
Are there certain rules to follow?
Do I have to throw out everything I own?
Can I not keep extras of anything and strip my home of all excess?
Deep breaths!
Minimalism has come into the mainstream as a hot flashy word, but it’s alot less complicated than it appears.
Minimalism is purely a tool to help simplify your life.
Nutritional Minimalism is no different. It is a tool to simplify your eating habits and environment to help you nail your nutrition better.
Here are 3 ways to live a Nutritional Minimalist lifestyle.
Want to learn more about our AMPed 12-month, habit-based nutrition program?
1. Stay Organized
This seems like a big intimidating task. But before you panic and run away screaming, lets talk about why an oranganize pantry is so valuable in your nutritional minimalist lifestyle.
Picture your newly organized and cleaned pantry. You can clearly see what you have and what you don’t have. As you make your grocery shopping list for the week you can easily see what you will need based off what you actually have.
No more buying an extra spice bottle or buying a bag of chips when you already have one! It helps to keep your pantry clean and money in your pocket.
Need to create a meal or a snack on the fly? There is NOTHING worse than opening up your cabinets or pantry only to see chaos of food options that raises your blood pressure and you give up, close the door and buy food out.
So a clean, organized pantry will help to:
- Keep you from spending money on food you already have
- Support you in making easy food choices without getting overwhelmed.
Now How to do it??
- Pour yourself a glass of your favorite beverage, turn on some good music and rip off the bandaid.
- Pull everything out of your pantry.
- Wipe of the shelves.
- Decide where the food will go when you go back in it. Baked goods, canned food, breakfast items, spices, pasta and grains….. However it helps you to stay organized
- Put three boxes on the floor: 1.) Keep. 2.) Donate 3.) Throw out. (Arrange the food according).
- Put back ONLY the food you want to keep. Donated the extra food to a food pantry and throw out any old, expired, stale and gone bad for items.
- Sit back and sip your beverage while admiring your new gloriousness cabinet or pantry.
2. Review and Stick to Your Shopping List
We are creatures of habit. We buy food items out of pure habit. Ever wonder why you have the same container of cereal or chips in your cart and you didn’t even want it? This is because you have created a habit of reaching for these items.
Before you walk into the grocery store. Look at your list. Stay as close as possible to your list.
This way you’ll spend less money on items that you didn’t want in the first place and items that just clutter up your pantry.
3-5 ingredients
Want to cook more meals but the thought of putting on the chef’s apron makes you sweat?
Me too.
This is why keeping meals simple will help. A member of the AMP Nutrition Program started to make “One Pan Meals” to help with this very thing. They took chicken breasts, diced up tomatoes, broccoli and potatoes seasoned it all with olive oil, salt and pepper and put it all on the same baking sheet.
Cooked it all at the same time. Washed one pan after the fact and enjoyed a meal full of veggies, protein and carbs. With no more than 3-5 ingredients.
Easy-Peasy “One Pan Meals” can be done with a variety of seasonings or sauces to change the taste. But the point is that it’s simple.
3. Know Your Go-To Seasonings
There is nothing worse than wanting to cook a meal but not knowing what to use to make it taste good. We all have different palettes so something that worked for one person might not work for you.
Make a list of the types on spices that you like and sauces that use so you will know what to grab when the time calls for it. Keep these items stocked and you’ll always have a favorite go-to way to spice up your meals.
Here are some great places to start:
Meat:
- Steak rubs
- Simple salt and pepper
- BBQ sauce
Veggies:
- salt and peper
- garlic
- diced up onions
- Olive oil
Carbs:
- rice – butter, garlic, chicken stock
- potatoes – diced up onions, garlic, salt and pepper
- Grains – meat or veggie stock, butter
One of the Quickest ways to improve your nutrition is through simplifying. Simplifying your pantry, your grocery list, your meals in other words using Nutritional Minimalism to help improve your habits and life.
Have a burning nutrition question? Ask in the comments section below or send us a message here!
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