How to Eat Healthy Even When You’re Super Busy + Whole-Food Plant-Based Couscous Breakfast Bowl

Eating consistently healthy can be hard, especially if you’re busy. And who the hell isn’t busy? Everyone is juggling at least 1567 different things, a couple of which are probably kids and a job or two.

This makes the juggling act really damn hard because who wants to drop their kids on their head? If I had kids I might make that mistake, which is why I’m not having kids. But that’s not the point.

The point is, you’re busy, and I’m willing to bet that for every stretch of time that you eat really healthy, there’s an equal stretch of time that you eat like crap.

You might go a week, or maybe two with being diligent about cooking in advance, planning out healthy meals and being on top of the healthy eating game. But then something happens.

You have a stressful day, you get into a fight with your partner, your kid is acting like an asshole, your boss is being extra douchey, or you got a really bad haircut.

It’s like you were sailing along on your baby blue Schwinn, all energized, happy and healthy, and all of a sudden the bully from down the street shoved a stick directly into your spokes and you went flying off your damn bike.

It’s times like these that you wake up to find yourself amongst empty pizza boxes and Twix wrappers. There’s part of a baguette stuck to the side of your face and a few mac and cheese noodles in your hair. To top it off, your breath smells like ice cream and pizza, which in theory doesn’t sound too bad, but in reality is smelly enough to offend even your cat.

You shake off your food coma and you’re ready to get back into the kale eating game. You go through another stretch of eating healthy, and then BAM, the fucking bully does it again.

The most common reason that people find themselves going back and forth between eating healthy and eating like crap is lack of preparation.

When you’re hungry, stressed, and doing a really damn good job just to get out of bed and deal with life, and there’s nothing healthy at arm’s reach to whip up in 10 minutes or less, all bets are off.

It’s convenience food city.

And you’re okay with that because in that moment, eating leafy greens isn’t your priority. Getting calories into your mouth so that your tummy stops rumbling is the only thing that’s important to you.

The fix for this is to make sure that you do weekly batch cooking.

Yeah, no shit.

But what if you didn’t get around to it this week? Are you destined to eat instant noodles, Taco Bell, pizza, and cereal all week long? Put down the fortune cookie. I have a better plan.

All you have to do is stock up on some key ingredients and you can get through the week without having ice cream / pizza breath. Here’s how.

Go to the grocery store and buy the following ingredients:

• Organic corn tortillas
• Sprouted bread
• Almond butter
• Tofu
• Sunflower seeds
• Canned refried black beans (make sure they don’t have lard)
• Hummus (choose the one with the fewest ingredients)
• Canned garbanzo beans
• Whole wheat couscous
• Bananas
• A couple of avocados
• Berries
• Red onion
• Mushrooms
• Cucumber
• Celery
• Tomatoes
• Lemons
• Kale
• Collard greens
• Lettuce

From this list alone, along with a few staple items that you already have in your kitchen, you can make the following items in a hot second.

1. Green smoothies
2. Hummus, tomato, kale soft tacos with sunflower seeds
3. Garbanzo mash (add to salads, in sandwiches and in corn tortillas)
4. Bean, couscous and veggie soft tacos
5. Couscous breakfast bowls (recipe below)
6. Bean and veggie bowl
7. Almond butter and berry sandwich
8. Salad with veggies, hummus, sunflower seeds and lemon juice
9. Veggie sandwich with sautéed tofu and avocado mayo
10. Steamed collard greens over couscous and topped with sautéed mushrooms
11. Salad with sautéed tofu and hummus
12. Celery with almond butter

This food should last you into the weekend. Even if you have to eat convenience foods a couple times, it’s better than chalking up the whole week as a healthy food fail and eating like you don’t give a shit until your next batch cooking day.

Here’s a hearty breakfast recipe that takes 10 minutes to whip up. Don’t think about it, just do it.

Whole-Food Plant-Based Couscous Breakfast Bowl

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Author: Molly Patrick of Clean Food Dirty Girl

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Ingredients

• ▢ Cooked whole wheat couscous
• ▢ Non-dairy milk unsweetened
• ▢ Strawberries sliced
• ▢ Banana sliced
• ▢ Raw sunflower seeds
• ▢ Raw pumpkin seeds
• ▢ Toasted Coconut
• ▢ Pinch of cinnamon
• ▢ Small drizzle of 100% pure maple syrup

Instructions

• I'm not giving you measurements, because who am I to say how hungry you are? That said, here's what you need to know about the couscous part.
• If you cook just one cup of couscous, you'll have enough for at least four breakfast bowls. Cooking couscous is super easy. Here's how.
• Bring 2 cups of water (475ml) to a boil in a small pot.
• Add 1 cup of whole wheat couscous (180g), stir, turn off the heat, cover the pot with a lid, and let sit for 10 minutes.
• After 10 minutes, fluff with a fork, and bam, ready to go.
• After the couscous cools, put it into a container and store in your fridge. When you're ready to make your breakfast bowl, do the following:
• Place as much couscous as you're hungry for into a small pot, and add enough non-dairy milk until a consistency that you like is reached.
• Heat the couscous and milk and pour it into a bowl.
• Top with strawberries, banana, sunflower seeds, pumpkin seeds, toasted coconut, cinnamon powder, and a drizzle of maple syrup.

I hope that you have a happy week. May it be filled with being authentic, even amongst people who don’t get you.