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Meal Prep With a Bit of AI

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Since I work in tech and I was playing around with AI anyway I thought I’d leverage it to help me with meal planning.

I’ll go into some detail about what I’ve been doing and how, but before I do that I’ll give a very quick overview.

Can you plan meals using AI?

Yes you can. And it can also help you to minimise food waste, pander to your quirks and essentially come up with a fairly complex meal plan for you.

BUT

It messes up basic stuff constantly, so you need to check its output constantly. If you don’t you’re going to end up staring at a list of meals for which you are missing half the ingredients or with recipes that have phantom ingredients that “magically” appear without any explanation. So you also would need to know how to cook reasonably well to pick up on some of its hallucinations and general stupid ideas – like I’m sorry, but there’s no way you’re going to make a huge stew unless you add enough liquid to it!

So what I’ve been trying to do for the last few months is stick to a “meal prep” regime during the week for breakfast and lunch. I then “freestyle” in the evening and at weekends. That sort of worked, but I was also conscious that I needed to be a bit better organised, waste less food and probably get a bit more aggressive.

I’d been using ChatGPT a bit over the last year or so to come up with some recipes and suggestions for what to cook based on various ingredients that I had. I’d found it was usable, even if it also wasn’t anything close to reliable. As the features in ChatGPT have evolved it’s become clear that it and other similar tools can be used for potentially more complex tasks. So what have I got it doing?

First off I’ve given it information about my dietary preferences, my cooking skills, what kind of foods I like and even how I like to buy them. Over time I’ve added more detail to this so that it’ll now know to suggest things that I can get in Aldi or Dunnes (two of the local supermarkets). What’s really useful is getting it to plan efficiently, so that a jar of pesto can get used for multiple meals over the course of a few days, so it’s unlikely to go off. I also got it to do things like setting up breakfast to be the same on weekdays, but allowing for a repeat of lunch while also adding lots of variety.

This is an experiment of sorts and it’s uncovering how really bad AI is at doing even simple things. You might ask, logically, if it’s so bad why do I keep using it? The answer is simple – it’s really good at doing some things and that’s where it gets really interesting.

For example take this photo:

I gave that photo to ChatGPT and it was able to quickly give me a list of the vegetables in the box. What’s even more interesting is that as I fed it more information about the contents of my kitchen it was then able to take that information and prioritise using the fresh ingredients first. So a delicate enough vegetable that could easily have ended up buried in the bottom of the fridge gets into a recipe in the first day or two of the week while it’s still at its best.

Using the tech to plan the meals takes advantage of a number of things:

  • food I have in my fridge and cupboards (taking photos of inside the fridge ChatGPT was able to build a quite accurate list of its contents)
  • food I grow in my own garden, including fresh herbs
  • local shops and their likely stock
  • quirky foods I’ve picked up while travelling
  • reusing ingredients in multiple recipes to get around the size of containers – a jar of pesto for example is too big for one meal for one person, but could easily go off if not included in future recipes quickly enough
  • the contents of the veg box I bought – again using AI to scan photos of it and work out its contents

So with all that information it can generate a fairly good meal plan for a week:

DayBreakfastLunchDinner
Sat 16 AugFreestyle (eggs, yoghurt, or light option while shopping)Tuna & feta pasta salad with leftover tomatoLight summer stir fry (butcher’s beef + seasonal veg)
Sun 17 AugOvernight oats (if prepped Sat) or yoghurt + fruitGreek-style salad with feta, cucumber & herbsPesto pasta with roasted veg (courgette, peppers)
Mon 18 AugOvernight oatsBean & chicken salad with leftover potatoesTrout fillet with herbed butter + seasonal veg
Tue 19 AugOvernight oatsRoasted veg & chickpea salad (courgette, aubergine, peppers)Lamb mince ragu with pasta
Wed 20 AugOvernight oatsEating out (lunch)Eating out (dinner)
Thu 21 AugOvernight oatsTuna & bean salad with parsley dressingChicken breast with roast veg (potatoes, carrots, peppers)
Fri 22 AugOvernight oatsEgg & feta salad with mixed leavesVenison steak with seasonal veg

Overall that plan isn’t bad, but it’s far from perfect. There’s no way I can get some of the ingredients for this specific schedule as some shops are closed on a Sunday! So before I finalise the plan for the week I will need to get it to fix this silly mistakes that it’s made – it’s also contradicting its own plans, as it had previously put things in a totally different order.

Here’s the “fixed” plan taking into account practical realities like shops being closed on Sundays etc., to avoid problems it’s now showing clearly the protein source:

Meal Plan: Sun 17 – Sat 23 August

Day & DateLunchDinnerProtein Source
Sun 17 AugTuna & feta pasta salad (cucumber & tomato)Salmon (pan-fried, herb butter, veg + potatoes)Pantry (tuna), Fridge (feta, veg), Supermarket (fish)
Mon 18 AugChicken & bean salad (leftover potatoes, pesto dressing)Lamb mince stir-fry with veg & riceButcher (chicken, lamb)
Tue 19 AugRoast veg & halloumi salad (courgette, peppers, chard)Trout (air fryer, dill butter, green beans)Fridge (halloumi, veg), Supermarket (fish)
Wed 20 AugEating outEating out—
Thu 21 AugSardine salad with roasted peppers & parsleyChicken breast with roast veg + potatoesPantry (sardines), Butcher (chicken)
Fri 22 AugGreek-style egg & cucumber salad (feta, dill, olives)Venison steak with seasonal vegPantry (eggs, olives), Freezer (venison)
Sat 23 AugMackerel pasta with courgette & lemon zestAubergine & tomato bake with mozzarella (or halloumi-style cheese)Pantry (mackerel, pasta), Fridge (veg, cheese)

For now I’ll keep playing around with this as a way of planning meals. Overall it’s usable, but it’s far from perfect. I like the idea of having the meals for the week planned out in advance – it means that when I go shopping there’s less waste and I’m not picking up random things on a whim. However it’s a totally different way of shopping for me – I’ve always had the (bad) habit of just grabbing things that I generally used without really thinking too much about it.

Is AI good at meal planning? Sort of. It’s a tool. But it’s not reliable or consistent. Planning meals for me is not rocket science and it’s not “mission critical” and yet it’s managed to screw up all sorts of things even with very clear instructions.

I’ll probably keep using it to help me plan my shopping and my cooking etc., but the constant mistakes are tiresome!

Meal Prep One Month In

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I’ve been sticking to the entire meal prep thing for breakfast and lunch for about a month now.

So far it’s going pretty well.

Breakfast is overnight oats most days. From time to time I will vary it if I stumble across an ingredient that really strikes me as being “worth it”.

I’ll also admit that I’ve found myself having the overnight oats as a snack as well. Probably not the best choice, but also probably better than some alternatives.

With the overnight oats I’ve been experimenting a bit with the recipe, both in terms of ingredients and method.

On a recent trip to the US I was able to pick up a few interesting freeze dried berries and other fruit (without any added sugar or other rubbish). So I’ve been trying different fruits in the overnight oats. I’ve also been playing around with different ways of putting them together and whether I mix them in advance or not. At this stage I think that mixing them all together when you’re assembling them in the jars works better. While just putting in each ingredient and letting the liquids work away naturally is mostly okay, things tend to get a better soak if you mix it all together.

I need to look into more variations on the recipe and change things up a bit. But so far I’m pretty happy with doing 4 or more days’ worth of overnight oats and just grabbing one in the morning.

Lunches are always salads.

I’ve been playing around a little with ingredients, but tend to use a lot of chicken and tuna (though not at the same time!) I like using Shine’s tuna, though I probably need to change how I’m buying it. Would larger family packs be better value? I need to look into this.

Doing a whole chicken in the Instant Pot is a game changer. It’s quick, it’s easy and it’s really tasty. And did I mention that it basically falls apart?

A small chicken from any of the supermarkets will be just over 1kg. Once fully cooked and with all the bones and other stuff removed you’re probably looking at around 800g of meat. (I really must weigh it next time I do one!) That’s more than enough meat to do a full working week of lunches, so you’ll probably end up with more than enough for other things, like post lunch snacks or whatever takes your fancy.

I need to look into a wider range of salad options. While I do like the ones I’ve been doing I’d really like to add a bit more variety into the mix!

Also protein. It’d be nice to switch things around a bit more – there’s only so much chicken and tuna that you can eat!

Trying Meal Prep to Eat Healthily Consistently

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Over the last couple of years my travel schedule has changed quite a bit. Yes, I do still travel quite a bit, but I’ve started being both more selective about which work related events I attend while also spending more time attending events for my own pleasure. What that means is that I can easily be at home for several weeks at a time.

When I’m not travelling I tend to go to the office 5 days a week. So my Monday to Friday is relatively stable and predictable in terms of meals. Sure, there is the odd event that will involve a lunch or an evening “out” somewhere, but mostly I have breakfast at home, lunch in the office and dinner at home.

I’ve been seeing a lot of “those” videos on Youtube and Tik Tok where these very attractive people talk up the advantages of meal prepping to:

  • save money – never a bad thing. If you can eat well AND spend less I’d see that as a win
  • lose weight – obviously this would be a benefit and is, in many ways, a goal
  • eat well – this is key for me. “Well” for me also means more than just nutrition – I have to actually like the food or I simply won’t eat it
  • save time – breakfast and lunch in the week are always time restricted. Some of the breakfast recipes I see floating around out there are only suited to people who have live in personal chefs!

You know the type of video. They always seem to have immaculate kitchens with oodles of space. Anyway even if the videos themselves can be a little annoying, the underlying messaging is still valid. There is definitely a space for meal prepping. Over the years I’ve mostly rejected it, though I have been known to prep 3 or 4 days’ worth of overnight oats or something else from time to time. What was the decider for me, however, was some of the videos I saw of layered salads. And it got me thinking. Why can’t I do this? It’s not particularly hard and I live in a country that has ample fresh produce (mostly).

So in order to give this a proper try I knew I’d need to do a few things:

  • get some equipment that would help achieve my goals (see below)
  • change how I shopped for vegetables
  • collect suitable recipes and inspiration (I’ve no intention of following all recipes to the letter, but I definitely want some inspiration – especially around flavour and ingredient combinations that I might not have considered)

I got a set of meal prep containers from Igluu. What’s nice about them is that they come in multiple sizes and they have really tight seals, so you don’t have to worry about liquids escaping between my kitchen and the office. They also stack neatly in the fridge, so make a great option for shoving ingredients into rather than messing about with clingfilm and ill fitting plastic containers. Glass is a great material as it doesn’t pick up on the flavours of what’s been stored in it. Sadly the same cannot be said for plastic. Once you’ve used that lovely Sistema Klip container for coffee, then you’re stuck using it for coffee! You will never get rid of the smell!

So the “plan” is to do (mostly) salads for lunch in the office. I should be able to prep a few days of those in advance. I’m not 100% sure how many days in advance works before the salads start go get a bit iffy, but I’ve done 3 or 4 in the past without any issues.

The idea behind a layered salad isn’t that complicated. You simply pack in ingredients in layers, starting with a bed of greens and going from there. As you’re doing meal prep, you’re obviously doing either a big batch or multiple containers of salad at once.

Let’s see how well this works out and how long I last!

Simplifying Food Tracking With Technology

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No matter what diet you might be on tracking your food consumption is kind of key. Unless, of course, you’ve got the metabolism of a 19 year old! One of the biggest headaches with tracking food, for me at least, is that it’s hard work. No matter which app or service you use it’s hard to track with any degree of accuracy when you eat out or with a lot of home cooked meals. So, paradoxically, it’s easier to track lower quality prepared food that you might get from a supermarket! Mad really!

Enter Hava.

It’s not perfect, but what it does do very very well is handle food logging.

How? What makes it different?

They’ve leveraged some quite clever tech so that instead of having to search for a food that might be a close match to what’s on your plate, you simply snap a photo and it does the rest.

So for example this afternoon I stopped off for some overpriced Asian food in Amsterdam airport. I snapped photos of my plates:

And it worked out what was on the plates:

It’s often slightly off and I’ve found that some foods can confuse it a little. You also need to keep an eye on quantities, as it can often decide that you’re having a LOT more of something than you would be.

Unlike with the majority of other dieting apps it isn’t solely focussed on calories or carbs. Instead it looks at “satiety” ie. how nutritious and filling the food is. Sure, it does “care” about some things, but it’s not going to whine at you if you go over your carbs or your calories by a few points. What it does do, however, is “advise” on how you could improve your eating habits. So you learn fairly quickly that you need plenty of protein and that fresh leafy vegetables are generally a “good thing”.

Personally I like the food tracking and the tips. I don’t like that it’s pretty much isolated from everything else, so it doesn’t pick up on any data from smart watches or other devices or tie in with ANY of the other apps you might be using to track your weight loss and health.

It’d also be great if you could scan barcodes. Right now you can search for food and drink but the search function is pretty awful and I’ve no idea what database it’s using, because it’s very hit or miss.

For now, however, I’ll stick to Hava simply because the photo function works so well. Other apps claim to offer similar features, but they’re rubbish by comparison (I’m looking at you MyFitnesspal!).

A Fresh Start?

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Time is an odd thing. Blink and it’s a year, blink again and it’s two or more. The last time I posted anything on this site was back in 2021!! That’s nearly 4 years ago!!!

Since then lots of things have happened, both to me personally and in the wider world. So what about this site?

Like a lot of people I do tend to try to do new things at the beginning of the year. From a purely practical perspective this is also down to it being when a lot of the various subscriptions I have are up for renewal. So as I choose which ones I keep and which ones I let expire it’s a good time to reflect a little on choices.

So I will try to post a little more frequently here about:

  • Diet
  • weight loss (or the lack of it)
  • tools
  • growing food
  • cooking
  • exercise (and the lack of it!)

I’m not going to make a broad commitment to anything, but I will try to be a little better!

Honest!

Growing my own Chillies

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Over the past year I’ve been spending a lot of my time, like everyone else, at home. So one thing that I have spent time energy and money on was my garden. I’ve written about that quite a bit over on my main blog.

Previously I’d noted how hard it was to get chillies in Ireland and what you could get was severely limited. With my greenhouse setup I tried to fix that situation.

I was able to get a couple of fairly standard chilli plants locally, but in order to get a funkier selection I ended up having to go online.

In the end I was able to get most of the plants to bear fruit, though I suspect that I could have got bigger peppers if I’d done things a bit differently.

Peppers are really really slow to grow. And once they’ve grown into something pepper shaped they’re very slow to ripen. I planted most of my chilli plants at the end of May when they arrived from Germany. Back then they were tiny:

A few months later (nearly November!) I have harvested the last of them and there’s no shortage:

I’ll probably pickle some of these though I’ll be keeping some of the bigger to cook with directly. They should keep for a week or two in the fridge and they’ll be a nice addition to a ragù!

Being able to pick a few chilli peppers directly from the plants and use them in my cooking over the last few weeks has been great. Though not knowing how strong some of them were going to be has been a tad risky!

Walking for Movember

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Man in shoes standing on cobblestones

Every year thousands of people around the world raise money for men’s health charities during the month of November. Most of them do it by growing a “mo”. So the name of the charity movement is, logically, Movember.

However some people opt to do something different.

I’m one of them.

This year I will be walking for charity.

I need to walk more, but I hate walking for the sake of walking. Giving my walks a purpose means that I’ll actually do it.

So you can encourage me to walk more by donating and you’ll also be helping a charity.

It’s a win win.

So if you want to motivate me AND help a good cause you can donate here.

For now both the distance and donation targets are set quite low, but I’ll tweak them if the targets are hit. Either target.

So the more donations I get the further I’ll have to walk.