Most nutrition plans die in the store, not the kitchen. They assume Sunday meal prep, eleven spices, and a fridge bigger than a Manhattan bathroom. What works instead is a short list of foods that combine into meals without recipes — the same fifteen items, every week, boring and undefeated.
The basket
Proteins: eggs, Greek yogurt, chicken thighs, canned salmon, lentils. Carbs: rice, oats, potatoes, bananas, bread you like. Fats and flavor: olive oil, peanut butter. Volume and defense: frozen mixed vegetables, spinach, onions.
- Five proteins mean no two days must repeat
- Frozen vegetables end the produce-drawer graveyard
- Canned salmon is the cheapest omega-3 in the store
- Bread you actually like beats bread you abandon
How it becomes meals
Every meal is the same sentence: a protein, a carb, something green, fat for flavor. Eggs, toast, spinach. Chicken, rice, frozen vegetables in the same pan. Yogurt, oats, banana, peanut butter in a jar overnight. Salmon on rice with whatever the pan has. Nobody needs a recipe for a sentence they've said a hundred times.
Why boring wins
Decision fatigue is the real diet killer. Every novel meal is a small negotiation, and negotiations get lost on hard days. A default basket removes the negotiation: the store trip takes twelve minutes, the kitchen holds only good answers, and the interesting meals move to restaurants — where they belong in this city.
Notes are general education. Training is specific. If you want the version of this written for your body, your schedule, and your city — that's the work.
Begin with Andre