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Real Plans for Single People


SunnieDays

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I attempted a Whole30 last year and made it through 27 days. I really want to give it another shot, but the time spent on meal preparation, planning, and in the kitchen was just too much for me.

I am considering purchasing a Real Plans subscription to help ease the burden, but would like to get some feedback from other single people who use it. 

Are you able to easily customize it for one person? 

Do you end up having a surplus of food that goes to waste? 

Approximately how much do you spend on groceries per week or month? 

While I value the opinions of all on this forum, I am specifically looking for feedback from single people who have used or are currently using Real Plans. 

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I use Real Plans.  I'm loving it. You customize the settings to your serving size. I'm using for 1.  Recipes that appeal to me I make double to go in freezer. So, far I've not ended up wasting food.  The first week I spent $67. I started using Wal-Mart pick up service which is available to me. With Real Plans shopping list, I go through ordering only what I need from the list. I feel this saves even more that I'm not tempted to buy what I don't need as I would if physically shopping. The recipes are fairly simple.  Although I will say my first attempt at making Ghee was laughable. Can you say smoky kitchen and burned pan?  But with a little patience the second attempt was successful. Most vegetables I get frozen, large bags of broccoli, green beans, cauliflower, etc.  

The first week, I started January 24, the amount of dishes to clean up was terrifying.  Last weekend I sat down to come up with a plan to help in that area. Baking pans I cover with aluminum foil, then add parchment paper. I use two different size iron skillets which I immediately clean up place back on stove, one sauce pot and my Cosori pressure cooker. I also spent some time chopping, slicing and dicing onions, peppers, cucumbers, and celery. I store the cucumbers in a mason jar, covering the cukes with white vinegar, this keeps them crisp.  Having those ready for use is a huge plus. 

I live alone, work the hours of 12 noon to 7 p.m. I could easily use the excuse of my work hours aren't working well with this life style change. That would not be true the only thing not working well with this life style change is me and my attitude. Thankfully that is gradually changing.  Here's to a successful Whole 30 journey for the both of us. 

Give Real Plans a try.  It's working great for me. 

 

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1 hour ago, Becky Henderson said:

Give Real Plans a try.  It's working great for me. 

 

This reply is super helpful... Thank you so much, Becky!  I have a Walmart that will deliver, but never crossed my mind to grocery shop there. I think that's a great idea to help in keeping costs down. Thanks again for the words of wisdom! :)

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  • 3 months later...

Hey there, I have a quick question that I have been wondering about RealPlans...

I am also single so it's good to know that you can adjust the servings to just one person.  That's great.

My other question is... are you able to input your work schedule so that you know when to prep and start making things?  My schedule is different EVERY week.  Sometimes I work days, sometimes I work nights.  Sometimes my shifts are 4 hours sometimes they are 7.  I work as a server at a restaurant and as anyone knows who has done that, your shift is over when it slows down.  And you never know when that could be.

I always know what my schedule will be about 4 days before the new schedule starts.  So it would be nice to know that I could input my schedule into RealPlans so that I can work all my prepping and cooking around it.

Is this even a thing on this app?

Thank you for the help.

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59 minutes ago, Squarabara said:

Hey there, I have a quick question that I have been wondering about RealPlans...

I am also single so it's good to know that you can adjust the servings to just one person.  That's great.

My other question is... are you able to input your work schedule so that you know when to prep and start making things?  My schedule is different EVERY week.  Sometimes I work days, sometimes I work nights.  Sometimes my shifts are 4 hours sometimes they are 7.  I work as a server at a restaurant and as anyone knows who has done that, your shift is over when it slows down.  And you never know when that could be.

I always know what my schedule will be about 4 days before the new schedule starts.  So it would be nice to know that I could input my schedule into RealPlans so that I can work all my prepping and cooking around it.

Is this even a thing on this app?

Thank you for the help.

Do you mean the timing of when to prepare food as in what time during the day or??  Or are you thinking maybe there's a different start date rather than the standard Monday thru Sunday? 

You might consider using the contact us feature on the Real Plans app to see from the source.  Altho it's something that is approved by the Whole30 team, the moderators and members here would only know the specifics of the plan if we paid for it ourselves - I believe there's a pretty good support system for Real Plans through the app.  Give that a try.

 

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@SugarcubeOD

Thanks for the reply!!!

What I meant specifically was... I would like to input my schedule into RealPlans so that the program could work around that.  So, in other words, I would enter in my schedule for this week which would be Monday 10-3, Tuesday 4-9, Wed 4:30-10:30, Thurs 10-2, etc.  (see what I mean about a schedule that's inconsistent? lol)

And then RealPlans would work around that.  

However, before seeing this reply, I did, in fact, go to the RealPlans website and chatted with someone from customer service.  Unfortunately, they do not have this feature.  But the lady I talked to said she was gonna forward it to the developers cause she thinks it's a good idea... so, we'll see!!!

My biggest problem is gonna be trying to figure out how to eat dinner on the days I work night shifts.  I don't work long enough to get a break and the average time that I get home is usually 10 pm.  Is there anything in the Whole30 that mentions eating too late or waiting too far in between meals?

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I think if you try and make yourself a consistent get up/go to sleep schedule (if  you don't have this already),then you can work your meal timing around your shifts for the most part.  So if you got up and ate your first meal around 6 then M2 right before you work on the 10 am shift or around 11 on days you have more time.  Then eat your M3 about four to five hours later (doing your best to make it a bit bigger on days you have to work through) and then M4 about four or five hours after that.

We suggest eating every 4-5 hours altho sometimes that's not possible due to schedules... when you have a longer time between meals, we suggest a mini meal of a bit of protein and fat (so maybe a hardboiled egg with mayo).  Even someone who doesn't get a break would have 60 seconds to eat that... as you become fat adapted, you'll be able to play with longer meal times sometimes and not have any poor reaction to waiting longer between meals.

The recommendation is to stop eating a few hours before sleep because eating right before bed can impact your sleep; however, you would want to consider how long it would be between your last meal and the next day's meal 1 - sometimes you just end up having to eat close to bedtime.

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  • 1 month later...

I cook 2 breakfasts a week. 2 lunches a week and maybe 3 dinners a week. And I do a lot of left overs and reheating. And I eat a lot of easy food. 

 

Food is not entertainment, it is not love it is fuel. I think I have over done meal planning in the past and wasted a TON of food and time. I would keep it simple and use the meal planning hacks they suggests. And don't plan to cook every meal. 

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  • 2 weeks later...
On 1/29/2018 at 2:38 AM, SunnieDays said:

I attempted a Whole30 last year and made it through 27 days. I really want to give it another shot, but the time spent on meal preparation, planning, and in the kitchen was just too much for me.

I am considering purchasing a Real Plans subscription to help ease the burden, but would like to get some feedback from other single people who use it. 

Are you able to easily customize it for one person? 

Do you end up having a surplus of food that goes to waste? 

Approximately how much do you spend on groceries per week or month? 

While I value the opinions of all on this forum, I am specifically looking for feedback from single people who have used or are currently using Real Plans. 

I don't know if this will help, but I'm also a singleton, did my whole30 and reintro on my own.  Within the first week I learned I couldn't live on the exact same thing each day.  I started making multiple smaller meals on my meal prep day (prep 2 3-serving meals instead of 1 5-6 serving meal or make things that build in variety- basic chicken and veggies, then mix it up with sauces).  I also made a HUGE batch of chili and froze it in individual portions so I can always grab one if I run out of time or just need some variety.  Also, frozen burgers (I have turkey, salmon and mahi-mahi from Trader Joes)- they are yummy with cauliflower rice or zoodles.  I did have some issues with waste, but mostly from meals I got sick of before eating them up- it taught me about myself.

To your other questions, my budget is $275/month (I live in the NYC area) and I went over a bit during Whole30, but I figured it balanced sine I wan't dining out at all (from another expense budget).

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