Monday Night Meal Prep

As much as I’d like to start the week with all meals prepped, I’d have to be honest and tell you that does not happen most of the time. Most weekends I will have done the grocery shopping and attended to other household matters in addition to whatever studying I can get done. By the time Sunday evening rolls around, I am flat out tired and have no energy for meal preparation. I tell myself, I’ll do like I always do: wake up at 5 AM every day to get lunches prepared and I’ll figure it out for dinner. Sounds like a great idea until Monday when I arrive home between 6 and 6:30 PM exhausted and hangry! I’m a glutton for punishment because I do this to myself every week and have yet to learn my lesson by week 4 of my third semester in PA school.

I decided to write this post to demonstrate how I get dinner on the table on a weeknight because that’s what I did tonight. Luckily, this morning I baked salmon for my lunch so I had leftovers in the fridge for my little guy. This week mama is running a solo show so I have a little more flexibility in what I prepared for dinner for myself. Below I have shared the recipe with you as well as a picture of the finished product, which I topped off in 0.2 seconds!

Lentils with Kale

1 – 32 oz Trader Joe’s Organic Hearty Vegetable Broth

1 1/4 cups Trader Joe’s small, green lentils (dried)

1 – 10 oz bag Trader Joe’s Organic Tuscan Kale

12 baby carrots, diced in 1/2″ circles

1/4 yellow onion, diced

3 cloves garlic, minced

1 T extra virgin olive oil

1 bay leave

salt and pepper to taste

Note: Many of the ingredients I used are from one of my favorites places to shop, Trader Joe’s, but you can use ingredients from anywhere.

1. On medium heat, warm olive oil in a large pot.
2. Add onion and sauté 2-3 minutes until soft.
3. Add garlic and sauté 1-2 minutes.
4. Add broth, bay leave, salt, pepper, and lentils.
5. Cover and bring to a boil.
6.  Reduce heat and simmer until the lentils are slightly tender (about 25-30 minutes).
7. Add carrots and cook for about 10 minutes or until they are slightly tender.
8. Add kale and cook until it withers and is tender.
9. Enjoy alone or with bread, rice, quinoa, or like I did with a gluten-free corn muffin (thanks to my freezer stash)!

This is definitely a go-to one pot meal for me and I like that it can be modified. For example, if I want more substance to my meal, sometimes I’ll substitute in chicken stock and add a few small potatoes and either smoked beef sausage or Applegate Farms turkey bacon (another one of my favorite brands). This dish freezes well! I typically layer quinoa in the bottom of a Mason jar before adding the lentils and I make sure to leave a little space for expansion during freezing. Stay tuned for a future post when I will share some meals I prepare when I actually do weekend meal prep!