Meal planning is one of the best things you can do to make your life better. This helps those who are trying to save money on their food budget, eat healthier more regularly, or even those who want to free up the time and energy spent on making decisions and preparing meals on a daily basis.
Most meal planning tools offer a weekly or monthly approach based on your lifestyle. There are two ways to go about meal planning. Either you can create a plan yourself by adding items, or you can let the app or an expert pick the meals for you. Of course they all come with recipes.
Mealime (Web, Android, iOS): Best for Beginners
If you're new to the idea of meal plans, start with Mealime. This does the heavy lifting for newbies who want an automated meal plan handed to them on a plate, along with a ready-made grocery list.
The installation process asks you for food preferences, diet preferences, and scheduling preferences. You can specify the serving size and number of meals you want to plan for. All this can be changed later in the settings, of course. Mealime will create a personalized meal plan for you, as well as a convenient shopping list that includes all the recipes.
The app takes ingredient lists from recipes, but doesn't intelligently combine them unless it's labeled exactly the same. Therefore, you will have to use your own judgment when purchasing products.
The best part? You can click a button at any time to create a new meal plan that will be different from what you currently have. If you don't like the plan, just change it until you find something you like. If you enjoy what you cook and eat, you are likely to stick with the process.
Download: Mealime for Android | iOS (free)
3) We go in for sports with the “Lose Weight in 30 Days” application.
Sport is another step, without which healthy weight loss is impossible, you just have to come to terms with it. Of course, a good option is to purchase a gym membership and contact a trainer to create an individual training plan.
But all this is not cheap, and in some situations (on maternity leave or in quarantine) it is also impossible. There is a solution - apps for training at home, without exercise equipment or a trainer.
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The undeniable advantages of such applications:
In general, the application will be a good solution for those who want to keep themselves in shape, but do not know which exercises to start with and what difficulty to choose
.
There are many applications and you can choose what is relevant for you: stretching, abs, buttocks, push-ups, etc.
Let's look at how such applications work using the example of the application “Lose weight in 30 days - Workouts”
which includes a set of exercises for different muscle groups.
What is inside?
As usual, let's take a look at the menu
, we have it in the upper left corner (three stripes).
On the main page - “Workouts”
—
the training “Lose weight in 30 days”
, the default level is beginner. There are also additional trainings “Your body calculator”, “Slender legs in 30 days”, “Perfect abs in 30 days”, “Royal posture in 30 days”. But, unfortunately, they can only be unlocked for a fee.
Next page - “Profile”
- gives us the opportunity to customize measurements, name, height, and also
adjust parameters
(weight, chest, waist, hips) before and after the 30-day program to track the results.
Third page - “Meal Plan”
— selects
ready-made options for breakfast, lunch, dinner and snacks
, including for vegetarians. However, you saw our recommendation above. For better personal results, you should put laziness aside and start counting calories.
Fourth page - “Reminders”
- the most laconic, we simply set the time when the application will remind us of our daily workout.
Overall, the app is as simple as it gets and lives up to its name by providing a 30-day full-body workout program for weight loss.
How to practice?
In this application, everything is as simple as possible: log in every day, start a daily workout and perform the exercises.
Budget Meal Planner (Online): Healthy Eating for $5 a Day
Budget Meal Planner is an amazing website run by one person, Dianna, that offers weekly plans for frugal living. It lists a whole week's worth of groceries that won't cost $40 while still providing healthy, filling meals that don't get boring.
Diana sorted meal into budget and vegetarianism . They include a selection of Thai, Potato, Mediterranean, Pineapple and Tex-Mex recipes. The site updates every Friday with new meal plans for each category, so you can buy groceries and cook them over the weekend.
The plan includes a shopping list for the week, recipes for breakfast, lunch and dinner, and snacks. Apart from Thai, other sections also have a vegetarian plan. Dianna recommends substitutions and other recipes, so feel free to try the best vegetarian and vegan apps. to mix and match.
What's for lunch?
A proper lunch consists of complex carbohydrates and protein so that you have enough energy until the evening. It’s also good to add fiber in the form of vegetables. They will help you get full without going overboard on calories.
Complex carbohydrates
- Cereals: bulgur, dark rice, whole grain pasta
- Legumes: e.g. chickpeas, beans
Protein
- Baked or boiled breast
- Fish steak or fish soup
Vegetables
- Choose any to your taste - tomatoes, cucumbers, herbs, broccoli. You can make a salad or add it to the main dish.
Example: frozen baked beans + salmon steak + fresh vegetable salad.
Sidechef (Android, iOS): Custom Meal Plans
Sidechef is a cross between a meal planner and a recipe app. When you sign up, you have to choose between several preferences, such as the diet you follow, the ingredients you don't like, and so on. The app will then show you a list of recipes based on this.
Go to the Meal Planner section to decide your plan for the week. Here you can add recipes for breakfast, lunch and dinner for every day. Sidechef makes recipes from many different sites and blogs, so you'll get a wide variety of choices.
Click on any recipe to see the list of ingredients in a neat format. Select what you don't need to add to your shopping list. The app is smart enough to increase the number of overlapping items instead of adding them twice, but still double check when purchasing.
Sidechef is also one of the few apps that allows you to add your own recipes that you might otherwise find outside of the app's list. We haven't found any other app that does this, making Sidechef so special.
Download: Sidechef for Android | iOS (free)
2) Monitor your water balance with the “Water, Health and Water Balance” app.
For the normal functioning of our body (and for healthy weight loss as well), it is necessary to monitor your water balance. We are accustomed to all doctors and nutritionists advising us to “drink more water,” but if we approach this point responsibly, many questions arise.
How to calculate the amount of water I need?
Do tea, coffee and other liquids count as water?
Can there be too much water?
An application that helps you calculate and track the amount of liquid we consume daily will help you quickly navigate all these issues.
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There are a lot of applications that help you track your water balance, and they are all roughly similar in functionality. Just type the phrase “water balance” into the AppStore or Play Store search engine and choose the one that visually appeals to you the most.
For example, we use the “Water, health and hydration balance”
, which is supported on both platforms.
What is inside?
The application greets us with very brief and clear instructions for working with it. A pleasant and minimalistic visual makes you want to use it for its intended purpose as soon as possible.
We select the units of measurement, weight - and we’re done, the application has calculated for us the required volume of water for the day
.
Also, we can enter the number ourselves. Urologists recommend drinking 30 ml of pure water per 1 kg of weight
(in the absence of kidney problems).
At the same stage, we can set the frequency with which the application will remind us that it’s time to drink water
.
On the main screen we are greeted with a water balance scale
(for today), a glass of liquid and a cute drop of water.
We can choose a drink under the scale; for starters, we have available: water, tea, coffee and juice. To unlock additional drinks you must purchase a paid add-on.
This is, of course, a minus, but in general the application functions perfectly and performs its main function (water metering) without purchasing additional functions.
To change the volume of liquid
, just press on the cup and hold your finger for a couple of seconds. However, it’s easy to figure this out on your own; the app provides regular hints.
In addition to the main page, there are several additional ones at the bottom of the screen.
Statistics
— we can see
how much water we drank on different days
, look at the history of the drinks we drank and our Achievements (the number of days on which we drank the required amount of water).
Star
— read more
about paid subscriptions,
disable advertising, rate the application and read the privacy policy.
Settings
— set up language, gender, units of measurement, weight. Here we can also set up synchronization with Google Fit, recalculate our water norm and set up different containers (glass, mug, bottle) for different drinks.
By the way, your character on the screen (a drop) can also be changed if you have a strong desire.
There are a couple of additional functions, such as drinking water reset
and
sports mode
, by turning on which we will increase the amount of water for today.
Also, the application gives useful advice when first used about coffee and other drinks and their effect on water balance
so that you don't have any questions.
Thanks to the application, you no longer need to calculate whether you have drunk the required amount of water today, and notifications will help you remember about water and, perhaps, choose the second between the next glass of tea and a glass of clean water.
Family Freezer Plans (Online): 17 Free, Printable Meal Plans
Family Freezer is a fantastic recipe blog that balances being frugal and healthy. Over the years, the blog has provided several meal plans for different scenarios. You can check them all on one page and choose the one that suits your needs.
As you might have guessed from the name, the focus is on meals that you can make ahead and freeze. These are all plans that last a week, not a month. Freeze-based meals are some of the most popular options for novice planners, as they allow you to cook up a storm for one day and live in peace for the rest of the week.
The 17 plans vary in needs and categories such as time-based meals, vegetarian meals, store meals, kids meals and so on. There's a handy big PDF of all the meal plans that includes grocery lists, recipes, and everything else you need. This is huge.
Download: 17 Free Printable Meal Plans and Grocery Lists (PDF)
4) Learn to walk and run with the Running Tracker (Leap) application.
Walking and running are very important components in the process of losing weight. And if running is absolutely not your thing, and you are not yet ready to establish friendship with him, then walking is absolutely necessary for losing weight, increasing endurance and overall tone of the body.
You can go for walks on purpose - to the park, for example, or around the city - and “maintain” your daily number of steps, or you can walk “on errands” at different distances: to the store and back, to work, etc.
Many people start by replacing the elevator with stairs, and a trip by transport with walking.
In this seemingly difficult task (which may soon become your favorite pastime), it would be nice to get help from an application that will help you track your results and set your daily step count.
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For example, let’s take the “Running Tracker”
.
After installation, we are greeted with the usual settings: gender, weight, height and creating a goal for the week.
Next comes the most interesting part - choosing a training program
.
What is inside?
At the top we are greeted by two main pages - “Course” and “Plan”.
"Well"
contains
two programs for the treadmill
(“With a change of pace” and “Interval running”),
exercises for warm-up and cool-down
(which is very important).
On the “Plan”
There are four training plans available for us to choose from (the developers promise to add to the list soon):
- “Walking for weight loss”,
- “Running for weight loss”,
- “Working on tempo”
- “My first 5 km.”
In addition to the main workouts, there are a few more tabs that are worth paying attention to:
"Home"
— the main page, on it you can see the % of the weekly plan, today’s workout and records.
“Running tracker”
— opens a map of the area where you are running, showing running time, kilometers, your pace and calories burned.
"Analysis"
— history of results and the “Start the race” proposal.
"Profile"
— settings, the ability to log in to synchronize data, your personal progress and all statistics.
How to start walking or running?
The application offers us two options.
- We choose a ready-made plan
and simply follow the instructions. The application itself will tell you what to do, remind you to warm up, and also offer to turn on music and praise you at the end of the workout. - We launch the running tracker
and just... run. Or we go. The application will record your result. Convenient if you just want to run or walk without following a workout.
Adviсe.
Perhaps the most necessary tips and tricks you can find in the application. And we, in turn, remind you that the main thing is the result, and not the speed of achieving it. And, of course, you should always remember about your own health, increase your loads gradually and listen to your body.
No matter how easy it may be at the beginning, no matter how much enthusiasm you have, remember that if you start too actively, you risk being blown away and not reaching the final. Start all new habits and exercises gradually, do not chase quick results, then you will have a better chance of reaching the end and maintaining this result for a long time.
As they say, the quieter you go, the further you will go.
Five More Tools for Weekly Plans
The best part about meal planning is that these apps have many different approaches. In fact, there are fantastic subscription services like Eat This Much that will offer new plans based on what you like and don't like, as well as deliver groceries, making it as easy as possible for you.
If you're new to meal prepping, it's best to start with a weekly plan rather than a monthly plan. Once you get used to planning your meals for the week, it will be easier to switch to a monthly plan. So if the above apps aren't your thing, start with these 5 web apps to create quick and easy meal plans.
What foods are the basis of proper nutrition for weight loss for girls?
Protein foods for weight loss
What should a proper nutrition program for weight loss for girls include? The best protein option is fish. It contains Omega-3 and 6 fatty acids, phosphorus, fluorine, iodine, vitamins A, E, and D that our body needs.
Based on the amount of fat, fish can be divided into three types:
- Oily (more than 8%). Calorie content – 110–145 kcal per 100 g of product. For example, fish of the sturgeon family, mackerel, halibut, eel.
- With medium fat content (4–8%). Calorie content – 100–145 kcal per 100 g of product. This group includes sea bass, lean herring, carp, pink salmon, pike perch, and trout.
- Low fat fish (4%). Calorie content – 75–100 kcal per 100 g of product. These are cod, river perch, hake, flounder, bream, pike.
For girls who want to create a proper nutrition menu for weight loss, we advise including low-fat options in their diet. It is worth giving up smoked and fried fish. Cooking methods: steamed, grilled, baked. However, there is no need to place much emphasis on fish dishes, since an excessive amount of beneficial elements can even be harmful. You can eat fish no more than four times a week.
For meat, you should choose turkey or chicken. They are high in protein and contain fewer calories and fat than pork. The caloric value of chicken breast per 100 g of product is 113 kcal. The elements present in poultry fillet cleanse the liver of fats and improve fat metabolism. The proteins found in chicken and turkey help build beautiful muscles.
Use eggs in your diet. This product has a calorie content of 70–80 kcal and serves as a source of proteins that are well absorbed by the body. The egg contains 12 different types of vitamins (B, D, E and others) and makes you full.
Dairy
Your proper nutrition program for girls for weight loss should contain a sufficient amount of dairy products. They contain important elements, calcium and phosphorus. In addition, they speed up metabolic processes. Previously, nutritionists argued that losing weight involves using only low-fat foods. However, today it has been proven that this is the wrong approach.
Milk fats contain linoleic acid, which helps convert fat into energy, so it is not stored in adipose tissue. There is almost the same amount of this substance in dairy products as in vegetable oils. However, the latter have a very high energy value. But we still do not recommend consuming too much dairy products, since excess linoleic acid, on the contrary, leads to excess weight, and proteins remove an important element from the body - calcium.
