Here we go again—our third edition of our 2-day/48-hour healthy meal plan is ready for you to enjoy! (View the first two: 2-Day Meal Plan #1, View 2-Day Meal Plan #2). First, let’s back up a bit. Healthy is a broad statement, so let’s define what we mean by a healthy meal plan:
- Anti-inflammatory
- Balances blood sugar levels
- Used food as fuel
- Uses whole foods
- High in fiber
- No added sugar, processed ingredients, or refined carbs
- Correct portion sizes
- Ideal meal timing (allows for Intermittent Fasting to occur)
- Optimal mix of proteins, fats, and carbohydrates
- High nutrient-to-calorie ratio
- Sustainable (able to be replicated)
- View all of our Nutrition Tenants
In this complete meal plan, we offer you every single calorie from the moment you awake until your head hits the pillow (well, really, at least 3 hours before your head hits the pillow!). The meals are all designed in harmony, reusing ingredients when possible to reduce your shopping list and waste, and timed and portioned to perfection to balance your blood sugar (energy) levels. Balancing your blood sugar level is critical in reducing inflammation, a natural process that becomes deadly if chronic. When your body is chronically inflamed, cell, tissue, and organ damage occurs, eventually leading to DNA damage, and subsequently cancer.
The meal plan has been created in tandem by our classically-trained chef and our certified nutritionist, resulting in amazingly delicious, beautiful, and healthy food. You will find your energy levels increase, your inflammation decrease, and you will rediscover your overall feeling of being healthy. Plus, you may just fall in love with your kitchen again.
Notes about this Meal Plan:
- This meal plan is for you if you wish to reset your metabolism and reduce inflammation.
- This meal plan is based on a 1,200-1,400 calorie/day template for women and a 1,500-1,700 calorie/day template for men. Coupled with ample exercise (at least one 40-minute high-intensity workout or one 90-minute walk or hike), this will dramatically reduce inflammation.
- It has been specifically designed to repurpose ingredients across multiple meals to reduce your shopping list and food waste.
- All meals have been crafted so they are easy to make in any home kitchen, yet still full of flavor and beauty.
- The meal plan starts with your first dinner, allowing you to batch-cook some ingredients for use in future meals.
- A shopping list is linked at the bottom of this meal plan.
- A schedule for optimal meal and snack timings is also included at the bottom of this plan.
- This meal plan was made during a recent virtual Basecamp Weekend Retreat, an immersive at-home self-care experience expertly designed and guided by our award-winning team. If you wish to cook this meal plan alongside a classically-trained chef and nutritionist, plus enjoy morning yoga, hiking, creativity exercise, meditations, exercise classes, and more, join us for one of our next sessions!
Our Healthy Approach to Nutrition
For over two decades, we have refined and evolved our approach to nutrition. But the fundamentals remain the same.
1) We treat food as fuel, consuming the right ingredients at the right times to ensure a high metabolic rate, balanced blood sugar levels (energy levels), reduced inflammation, and a healthy, detoxified gut and microbiome. This approach also produces secondary benefits such as improved sleep, reduced cortisol (stress hormone) levels, enhanced fitness, and a stronger immune system.
2) Our meals are properly portioned, with each day’s plan starting at 1,200-1,400 calories for women and 1,500-1,700 for men. Each meal is what we call a Superplate—an optimal combination of proteins, carbs, and fats that evolves throughout the day dependent upon our energy needs. The ingredients we use are packed full of nutrients, antioxidants, minerals, and vitamins, and we avoid inflammatory foods.
3) We practice Intermittent Fasting, eating for the first 12 hours of our day, and then not consuming anything other than water for the second 12 hours. Two-thirds of your calories are consumed in the first 9 hours of your waking day, providing ample fuel to your brain and body when it needs it, but allowing your metabolism to taper off as you become less active and prepare for sleep. Aligning our fast around sleep optimizes both our metabolism and natural healing functions. Three primary meals are consumed each day—the traditional breakfast, lunch, and dinner—along with two snacks and a morning smoothie. The morning smoothie is consumed immediately upon waking, which breaks our fast, fuels our body and brain, and kick-starts our metabolism. Eating six times in the 12 hour period balances your blood sugar levels, preventing energy crashes (which is when we turn to coffee) as well as blood sugar spikes that lead to diabetes.
We hope you enjoy this 48-hour anti-inflammatory meal plan. If you want to experience an entire week eating this way, please consider joining us at our award-winning health retreat.
48-Hour Anti-Inflammatory meal plan
Our 48-hour anti-inflammatory meal plan starts by cooking dinner. This allows you to cook a primary meal and batch-cook certain ingredients to be repurposed in subsequent meals. This makes follow-up meals significantly easier, shrinks your shopping list, and eliminates food waste.
Dinner #1 – Pan Seared Chilean Sea Bass with Roasted Garlic Cauliflower & Fennel Apple Salad with Apple Cider Hemp Seed Vinaigrette
This Pan Seared Chilean Sea Bass recipe will start your meal plan off on a wonderful note. Featuring two nutrient-packed vegetables, cauliflower and fennel, this meal is a great source of fiber and nutrients, and is also rich in sulforaphane, an antioxidant that reduces inflammatory stress and improves the immune system function (and gives cauliflower its pungent aroma). Fennel is rich in vitamin C, which is critical for immune health, tissue repair, and collagen synthesis. These vegetables are packed full of what our bodies need.
Cauliflower and fennel are not the only ingredients bringing something to the party, however, as roasted garlic, a member of the allium family, has serious antioxidant and even, antibiotic, properties. In this recipe, we roast the garlic bulb whole, only cutting off the top and drizzling with avocado oil before going into the oven, a new method to most, but one that saves a ton of time. You may bulk prep garlic like this moving forward!
Chilean Sea Bass is our preferred fish for this dish, however, any white fish will substitute nicely. And if you’re a vegetarian, we recommend extra-firm tofu as a substitute. Chilean Sea Bass, with its buttery taste, is rich in vitamin D and protein, further adding to the benefits of this healthy dinner meal.
The Apple Cider Hemp Seed vinaigrette dressing is packed full of goodness as well. Raw apple cider is a wonderful probiotic, while hemp seeds and avocado oil pack healthy Omega-3 fats into this dish. Proper ratios of carbs, protein, fat, and Omega-3s make this a model Superplate. Learn more about Mountain Trek’s nutrition tenants.
Meal Plan Notes:
- Roast 2 heads of garlic during the cookalong and use one for a future recipe (lunch #2).
- Prep 2 shallots and use 1 ½ in future recipes (dinner #2 and lunch #2).
- Prep and roast the whole cauliflower and use half for lunch #2.
- Prep the entire apple and use ½ in dinner #2.
Break-the-fast Energizing Morning Smoothie
Drink 1 serving within 30 minutes of waking up. Even though this smoothie is consumed immediately upon waking, it is not your breakfast (we actually recommend drinking it a full hour before eating your actual breakfast). That is why it’s called a break-the-fast smoothie, as it breaks your overnight fast, ignites your metabolism immediately upon waking, and infuses you with nutrient-rich, brain-fueling calories first thing in the morning—all without the hassle of a full-blown breakfast.
Meal Plan Notes:
- You will have this smoothie both mornings. The recipe is for two servings so store the second half for day two.
- You will use 1/2 avocado for breakfast #2. Add 1/2 her to reduce waste and increase healthy fats.
Breakfast Day 1 – Overnight Muesli
This healthy breakfast recipe is a winner all-around. It’s healthy, nutritious, and incredibly easy to prepare. And thanks to fresh fruit and all-natural sweeteners like raw honey or natural maple syrup, it’s delicious.
When looking for quick breakfast options, we’re constantly presented with sugar-laden options. The less added sugar the better. Look for less than five to 10 grams per serving when possible. Also, remember that not all sugar is actually called “sugar” on nutrition labels—you also have to look for ingredients like brown rice syrup, tapioca syrup, or corn syrup – anything with “syrup” in the name, or “ose” at the end ie dextrose, maltose, sucrose.
The first ingredient on the label of any muesli or granola you buy should be a whole grain, like oats.
Pro Tip: on a product label, the ingredients are listed in order of predominance, with the ingredients used in the greatest amount first, followed in descending order by those in smaller amounts.
Meal Plan Notes:
- Prepare this meal on night #1
Lunch Day 1 – Orange & Fennel Salad with Endive & Apple Cider Hemp Seed Vinaigrette
This Orange & Fennel Salad with Endive & Apple Cider Hemp Seed Vinaigrette just screams elegance. Fortunately, it backs that elegance up with nutrients and flavor!
Meal Plan Notes:
- Your dressing will already be premade from the Chilean Sea Bass meal.
- Fennel will be reserved from the Chilean Sea Bass meal.
- Save 4 endive hearts for dinner #2.
- Top this salad with 1 serving of leftover Chilean Sea Bass for protein.
Dinner #2 – Filet with Pan Apple Chutney, Carrot Parsnip Mash, & Braised Endive & Celery
This Filet with Pan Apple Chutney dish combines unique flavors and ingredients brilliantly. Let’s start with endives—when was the last time you had endives? Perhaps never. If so, you’re not alone, but you’ve been missing out; endives are packed full of vitamin K, which helps to make various proteins that are needed for blood clotting and the building of bones. Endives are also rich in fiber and contain kaempferol, a flavonoid that has shown promising anti-cancer benefits. Pairing beautifully with the endives is celery, a low glycemic index food (won’t cause blood sugar to spike) rich in vitamins and minerals as well.
This dish also features a parsnip and carrot mash, the healthiest version of mashed potatoes you will ever come across. Adding a bit of greek yogurt to the mash gives it the creaminess you’re used to but with added protein and without the calories from butter.
Topped with a homemade apple chutney that brings everything on your plate to life, this Filet with Pan Apple Chutney, Carrot Parsnip Mash & Braised Endive & Celery recipe might become a go-to winter classic in your kitchen. It will certainly mix up your standard routine, if nothing else!
Meal Plan Notes:
- We will use endive hearts set aside from lunch.
- Your shallots will already be prepared from the Chilean Sea Bass meal.
- Your apple will already be prepared from the Chilean Sea Bass meal.
- If red meat is not desired we recommend boneless/skinless chicken thighs (recommended) or breast, favorite variety of fish, firm or extra firm tofu, or favorite variety of white bean.
Breakfast #2 – Ezekiel Avocado Nut Butter Toast
What’s better than avocado toast? This healthy avocado toast. Swap out your typical bread for an Ezekial sprouted grain bread, which is becoming increasingly mainstream, and for good reason.
Sprouting is the practice of germinating seeds. This process makes the seeds come to life, as they literally begin to grow little shoots, making their nutrients more digestible.
Whole grains naturally contain valuable vitamins, minerals, amino acids, proteins, and phytochemicals. When grains are sprouted, it makes these valuable nutrients more bio-available; offering more absorbable nutrients.
A wise teacher once said, “You are what you absorb, not what you eat.”
Lunch #2 – White Winter Vegetable Soup
Eating seasonally ensures you get the freshest ingredients possible. This White Winter Vegetable Soup uses winter vegetables and is sure to not just warm you, but fuel you as well. Leeks are packed full of vitamins, like A, C, and K, and minerals, such as iron and manganese. Our bodies use iron to make hemoglobin, a protein in red blood cells that carries oxygen from the lungs to all parts of the body, and myoglobin, a protein that provides oxygen to muscles. Manganese helps brain and nerve function. Leeks are also a good source of dietary fiber. This recipe is great as both a lunch or a light dinner, this recipe can be easily scaled if you want to make a large batch for family or save leftovers for future meals.
Meal Plan Notes:
- Garlic will already be roasted from previous dinner dish.
- Cauliflower will already be roasted from previous dinner dish.
- Shallot will be diced already from previous dinner dish.
Meal Plan Snacks
With this meal plan, you eat two snacks each day. These snacks are balanced between carb and protein, portioned correctly, and timed perfectly to ensure your energy levels stay elevated all day long and you avoid any crashes! You can see what the snacks are and when to eat them on the meal plan timing chart below. The snack ingredients are included in the shopping list.
Meal Plan Timing & Portions
We all know that how much you eat is important. What we undervalue is that when you eat is just as important as what you eat when it comes to your health. Spacing your meals across the first 12 hours of your day will balance your blood sugar levels, supplying your body and brain with steady energy. You will no longer feel a 2 pm energy crash or random cravings eating this way. Below is a chart that will give you proper portion sizes and an idea of how to time your meals and snacks for optimal results.
Shopping List
This plan reuses ingredients in multiple recipes, shrinking the size of your shopping list.
When shopping, you are always presented with a choice between conventional and organic. And now, you are presented with additional options like free-range and grass-fed. We always recommend choosing organic, sustainably-grown ingredients from a local farm. These ingredients don’t have toxins from fertilizers, pesticides, and herbicides, and have more nutrients from healthy soil. While these ingredients are often more expensive, they give your body much-needed nutrients and offer you the best chance of living a long, healthy, and happy life—something that is hard to put a price tag on.
Cook these meals alongside our chef and nutritionist
If you wish to cook these meals alongside our chef, our nutritionist, and an intimate, supportive group of like-minded people, consider joining one of our online Basecamp weekend retreats! From Friday afternoon through Sunday, our expert team, including our chef, nutritionist, yoga instructor, kinesiologist, and program director, will guide you through an immersive program specifically designed—and proven—to dramatically improve your health physically, mentally, and emotionally. Through proper nutrition, movement, nature immersion, and more, you’ll spend the weekend reversing the effects of aging, stress, and overworking, and emerge feeling refreshed, recharged, and back in control.
What is Mountain Trek?
Mountain Trek is the health reset you’ve been looking for. Our award-winning health retreat, immersed in the lush nature of British Columbia, will help you detox, unplug, recharge, and roll back years of stress and unhealthy habits. To learn more about the retreat, and how we can help you reset your health, please email us at info@mountaintrek.com or reach out below:
