Cooking Smart for Phase 2

Many who chose to take the hcg journey struggle with preparing hcg friendly meals along with having to feed their families. As you know, I have six children. My two teens have struggled with their weight and are doing the hcg protocol with hubby and I. The four younger children eat what I call a nourishing traditional approach to food. They do eat grains and starches, but not necessarily every day. One of my four littles, as I call them, has food allergies. He is autistic and functions best on a diet free of gluten and casein. So when on protocol I am often faced with the challenge of preparing three DIFFERENT meals for one meal time. I have found that if I don't get our protocol foods ready in bulk, so they last several days, I don't have the mind power or energy to cook well for the other children.

This round I am the bulk cooking queen! :-) One day I cooked up over 20 chicken portions, 20+ ground beef portions, 8 french onion soup servings, and 20 shrimp portions. Yesterday I made 30 round steak portions. Today I hope to do about 20 more chicken portions from the 4 chickens I have thawed. This may sound like a lot to those of you who only have one person in your house hold on the protocol, but for us, it will not last long. FOUR of us are on phase 2 right now. That means that I need 8 portions of protein daily. AND the rest of my family needs to be eating nutritious meals.

I believe that cooking in bulk can be advantageous for anyone on the protocol. By doing so you will always have the phase 2 foods you need readily available. Emergencies occur, life happens, schedules change so by having cooked protein, pre-made soups, washed and ready veggies we have a meal ready at all times. If we have to run to a sporting event, to the hospital, or out the door on an emergency, we are able to grab a complete phase 2 meal in a matter of minutes.

Here is how I cook in bulk for phase 2:

Chicken
We have whole organic grass fed chickens. They require that I thaw the chicken, debone the breast meat, weigh, and cook it. I usually do this with 4-5 chickens at a time. I use my kitchen scale to make sure that the chicken portions are 100 grams each. The Legs & thighs are then fed to the littles as Parmesan chicken legs (phase 3 compliant) or honey chicken legs (phase 4 compliant). I will post those recipes some day. :-) Once the boneless chicken breasts are weighed and portioned out I place them on a cookie sheet or stoneware bar pan, season them with salt and other seasonings, then bake them at 350 degrees for about 15 minutes or until done. I then immediately pour off all the juices. Then I allow the meat to cool for a while. When it is somewhat cool I put each piece in a snack baggie, then each snack baggie into a gallon size freezer zip lock style baggie.

95% Lean Ground Beef
We are blessed to have lean organic 100% grass fed ground beef. I thaw about 10 pounds at a time then I start making 100 gram patties. I cook the patties in a frying pan with water or they will burn because there is so little fat. Once the patties are mostly cooked I remove them to a plate for cooling. Then I package them the same way as I do the chicken. I leave them a little pink so that we can finish cooking them when we warm them up.

Round Steak
Round steak is a lean cut of beef and has worked well for our family. I weigh out the 100 gram portions and cook them the same as I do the beef.

Fish
I like finding wild white fish, not farm raised. According to the research I've done farm raised fish has a lot of toxins, so we do not eat it. For the fish I line a cookie sheet with parchment paper that well overlaps it so I have plenty to fold up. Then I line the parchment with the 100 gram portions of fish. Sometimes I add spices, other times I drizzle it with lemon juice & dill, sometimes I just salt & pepper it, I always add a little water so it can steam and stay moist. I then make a pocket by folding the parchment above the portions and folding it in the middle and on the ends. I bake the fish at 350 degrees for about 15 minutes. Once the fish is cooled I package it the same as I do the rest of the meat, in smaller baggies then into a larger one.

Shrimp
I have had a difficult time finding fresh shrimp. So I find non farm raised cooked & de-veined shrimp. I then weigh out portions of about 80 grams to compensate for the fact that they are already cooked. I place each serving in a small baggy then all portions into a larger freezer baggie.

This may sound like a lot of work. In reality it takes me about 3 hours to do up 80 or more portions of protein, plus a few soups. If you are cooking for just one person on the protocol, 3 hours would give you enough meals for a complete 40 day round. You then can just take your food out of the freezer in the morning and have the time and energy needed to prepare good meals for your family daily.