Rishi Dhanaraj

i prepped meals this week 🤗 ft. ChatGPT

Rishi Dhanaraj -

i'm so proud of myself!

on Sunday I made:

chicken breast, rice, broccoli (+ indian spices)

on Wednesday I made:

ground turkey + peas, rice, green beans (+ kheema curry masala mix)

i'm proud of these meals because they were simple, tasty and healthy 😃

this is a milestone for me bc i've found meals i can see myself sticking to cooking regularly. the key is SIMPLICITY

I know, I'm a noob

notes

i'm an absolute beginner lol but i hope this helps someone

  • I bought meal prep containers. They were worth every penny! It felt more rewarding to cook the meals, and to eat them, because I got the right-sized, right-shaped containers. I did a lot of research and decided on the Pyrex 6-cups. The next smaller rectangle is the Pyrex 3-cup which definitely wouldn't work for me, but could work if you eat much less.
  • I bought a wok! I learned this about myself, I only like to use the stove when cooking (also the microwave lol). The oven feels confusing. And the wok is so convenient to sauté large amounts of food. I got this one cuz my mom has it.
  • I kept the meals simple. I played a game with my coworker where he guessed how I cooked the broccoli. Stove? No. Oven? No. Microwave? Ding ding ding! Same for the green beans. And the meat, it's just meat and spices. On Wednesday, I wanted to cook a full curry and bought onions and tomatoes but I had to cut scope in the end to be realistic.
    • I want to cook fancier and also include more vegetables, but I tend to lose the habit so quickly, I gotta keep it easy.
  • I made it taste good! I used a lot of oil and salt. Reading Salt, Fat, Acid, Heat finally came in handy lol. I made sure to get a sear on the meat by making the wok hot af first. It wasn't tooo unhealthy. IIRC 0.67tbsp oil + .67tsp salt. I'll probs reduce the oil and salt over time.
  • I also learned how to cook rice, finally. NO ONE FREAKING EXPLAINED IT LIKE I COULD UNDERSTAND. UNTIL CHATGPT! The finger trick is bullshit, first of all. Second, after you wash the rice, the rice is wet. So how do I take that into account when adding the requisite water? Idk how everyone else does it but I always screw that up. I realized the trick is to weigh out the rice and water with a scale! Use grams not cups! Thank you for ChatGPT for putting up with my hyper specific line of questioning. I believe you are the future.
  • Again, another plug for ChatGPT. All my recipes for the meat are ChatGPT. ChatGPT helps me improvise, fix mistakes, etc. ChatGPT helps me understand why I'm doing something. ChatGPT can answer super specific questions quickly, which is most of cooking for me lol.

My ChatGPT history unedited:

Sunday - Chicken, rice, broccoli (misc Indian spices)

    • cooking chicken breast pieces in pan, sauté. should i just season in pan
    • i’m cooking with a wok without too much flat surface available. how do i approach the searing / flipping prr
    • how much turmeric chili powder garlic powder salt pepper for 1 pound chicken breast
    • how many grams chicken broccoli rice for balanced bodybuilding meal
    • so how much raw chicken breast, rice and broccoli is that? each in grams
    • how many grams is a pound
    • 200g chicken breast cooked amt of protein
    • 1 pound chicken breast coooked becomes how many grams
    • 340/3 g cooked chicken breast protein
    • i only have 3 minutes to marinate
    • how much water to use for brown jasmine rice? how to tell trick
    • how to steam broccoli

Wednesday: Ground turkey, peas, rice, green beans (kheema curry masala)

    • kheema curry - i have the spice mix, but i only have ground turkey and peas. how can i make it
    • how long to cook onions, ground turkey, and tomatoes?
    • .5 kg in pounds
    • i want to make something using only the following ingredients: ground turkey and kheema curry masala (as well as oil, salt). how to make
    • is it helpful to put powder into turkey before cooking it, or after it's already in pan
    • adjust the above recipe considering i also have frozen peas
    • what heat to cook turkey on
    • cooking the turkey created a fluid in the pan. what is that and does it matter? also when do i tell if the turkey is good to add kheema curry? it definitely changed color to brownish, pretty immediately
    • i'm a bit stuck on measuring water with rice. i tried the finger trick and it didn't seem to work well for my pot (not sure if because it's a smaller rice cooker). but then i struggle with measuring cups out since when i wash the rice, it's still wet and that remaining water messes with the measurement. i don't have a fine strainer. what do i do?
    • i weighed out 175g of rice how much water do i use then? for brown rice
    • can cups be converted to grams like that for rice?
    • one teaspoon salt how much sodium
  • cooking validation from coworkers and parents definitely kept me going.
  • I also had a lot of smoothies for breakfast most days! Nutribullet gang 💪
  • next, I hope to cook tofu, rice, brussels sprouts, where I use a jarred Indian curry sauce for the tofu and do microwave-able brussels sprouts. Done it before so I know it'll work.
  • I kept the ingredient list short, which made it feel easier to get groceries. Chicken broccoli rice. So simple!
    • Separately, I don't like to get groceries for midweek cooking on the weekend. Bc I don't have a strong understanding of how long ingredients are good for, and there's always a risk I don't actually cook the ingredients I buy. I'm going to work with this reality and do mid-week groceries.

there's 100% a risk I stop cooking next week but I'm optimistic I won't!