Packaged Meals and Clinics - Nutrisystem, Medifast, Jenny Craig, EtcFor support and questions about diet meal delivery programs, or weight loss clinics that offer prepackaged meals and products.
1. I really hated the boil in the bag pouches from Bistro though. How do you guys warm up your food i.e do you keep it in the freezer of fridge, remove from pouches after warming or before warming etc
2. I am also going to skip their breakfast? What do you replace their breakfast with?
3. Is it worth it to do the lunch and dinner with snacks or without snacks, if I forgo the snacks, what snacks can I buy to use on the plan?
1. I really hated the boil in the bag pouches from Bistro though. How do you guys warm up your food i.e do you keep it in the freezer of fridge, remove from pouches after warming or before warming etc
2. I am also going to skip their breakfast? What do you replace their breakfast with?
3. Is it worth it to do the lunch and dinner with snacks or without snacks, if I forgo the snacks, what snacks can I buy to use on the plan?
thanks all
It's my understanding (and I could be wrong because what I'm getting works for me so I probably just didn't pay alot of attention) that you can ask for all microwavable meals. I think you can also micro wave in the bag too. I take my meals for the next day out of the freezer the night before so they are pretty much thawed for use when I need them. They are sending me microwaveable trays for lunch and boil n bag for dinner. That is working for me.
Right now I am so burnt out on food planning that I am getting the whole package for each week. But, if I did not want to do their breakfast I would probably just do oatmeal every day because I am not making one muffin or a couple of pancakes. You could always do a whole grain bagel (I love Bistro MD bagels!!!) and really measure out the cream cheese. Their amount allowed is miniscule compared to what I was eating before!!! Fixing a small egg beaters omlette would probably not be too bad, add a turkey or veggie sausage. Take a look at their menu plan and see what is reasonable for you to try to replicate.
I'm still debating the snacks. I am not a chip kind of person so the savory nibbles don't always appeal to me. But, if I have to be out and about I wll take a package of say the sour cream and onion O's and they are satisfying. It will keep me out of a drive thru and there are alot in the bag. I do love the few desserts (one a week?) they allow. I love the protein bars and shakes and rely on them every day. If I were you again I'd look at the menu and see what I could easily replicate.
Keep it low on the sugar and processed food, higher on the protein, whole grain & fiber side, watch your sodium and you should be fine. You can snack on something as simple as a few grapes and a piece of string cheese. An ounce of raw nuts would also work. Or you could go to your local health food store and see if they have protein bars and/or shakes. Just read your lables.
Let me know if you decide to go with Bistro MD and how you like it.
It's my understanding (and I could be wrong because what I'm getting works for me so I probably just didn't pay alot of attention) that you can ask for all microwavable meals. I think you can also micro wave in the bag too. I take my meals for the next day out of the freezer the night before so they are pretty much thawed for use when I need them. They are sending me microwaveable trays for lunch and boil n bag for dinner. That is working for me.
Right now I am so burnt out on food planning that I am getting the whole package for each week. But, if I did not want to do their breakfast I would probably just do oatmeal every day because I am not making one muffin or a couple of pancakes. You could always do a whole grain bagel (I love Bistro MD bagels!!!) and really measure out the cream cheese. Their amount allowed is miniscule compared to what I was eating before!!! Fixing a small egg beaters omlette would probably not be too bad, add a turkey or veggie sausage. Take a look at their menu plan and see what is reasonable for you to try to replicate.
I'm still debating the snacks. I am not a chip kind of person so the savory nibbles don't always appeal to me. But, if I have to be out and about I wll take a package of say the sour cream and onion O's and they are satisfying. It will keep me out of a drive thru and there are alot in the bag. I do love the few desserts (one a week?) they allow. I love the protein bars and shakes and rely on them every day. If I were you again I'd look at the menu and see what I could easily replicate.
Keep it low on the sugar and processed food, higher on the protein, whole grain & fiber side, watch your sodium and you should be fine. You can snack on something as simple as a few grapes and a piece of string cheese. An ounce of raw nuts would also work. Or you could go to your local health food store and see if they have protein bars and/or shakes. Just read your lables.
Let me know if you decide to go with Bistro MD and how you like it.
Good Luck!
Thanks for your detailed reply, just one more question, when you say microwavable tray, do you mean the food doesn't come in those pouches?
The microwavable trays are just like the frozen dinners you can buy at the grocery store. No pouches.
Good Luck!
awesome, I will call and ask, if I can get all MW tray meals, for some reason I had a weird distaste for seeing food in the little pouches, and cancelled after a week. Maybe, I was just looking for a reason to sabotage myself.
I just saw a little video about them on home shopping netweork, and the food looked like a good amount, I hope that was not just false advertising. I was really going back and forth, but now it looks like I am going to pull the Bistro MD trigger.
Well, I just read through the last 20 pages of this thread. thanks all, and I think I will pull the trigger and call Bistro tomorrow.
I plan on having the lunch and dinner for 7 days with snacks, and figure something out for the breakast.
Having now read through the thread, I see my aversion to the boil in the bag pouches, can be fixed with crenita's heating instruction (thanks crenita), but are they still having problems with the heating trays, boxes etc, because I live in the south and the temps here in the summer are in the 90's.
I don't know if Crenita is still around, but can you post your grocery list, for some of the items, like snacks, breakfasts etc. that you posted on this thread, or if anyone has a link to kuhljeans blog.
Thanks y'all, you guys are awesome. let's keep this thread going.
awesome, I will call and ask, if I can get all MW tray meals, for some reason I had a weird distaste for seeing food in the little pouches, and cancelled after a week. Maybe, I was just looking for a reason to sabotage myself.
I just saw a little video about them on home shopping netweork, and the food looked like a good amount, I hope that was not just false advertising. I was really going back and forth, but now it looks like I am going to pull the Bistro MD trigger.
thanks for all your help
It is not false advertising--the meals are a good amount. Granted, my dinner plates are a little on the small size but a dinner fills it up and fills me up. The lunches are a wee bit smaller but they are also filling. I have no complaints about hunger with this food.
I'm so excited to hear back from you and whether or not you like the food and find it filling.
hi! just happened to wander in (haven't read this thread in a while) - blog link is http://freezerbags.blogspot.com/. i haven't posted to that either, in a while! but feel free to PM me if you have any questions. once i got it figured out i sort of stopped writing about figuring it out!
the protein bagels can be ordered from www.westernbagel.com, and i make the eggs by baking eggwhites in a non-stick muffin tin a dozen at a time, then flash-freezing, then vacuum-sealing. you can leave them frozen in a ziploc bag, but they're more prone to freezer-burn.
also, if you have questions about sous-vide cooking, i can hopefully answer them!
Last edited by kuhljeanie; 08-04-2009 at 09:37 AM.
hi! just happened to wander in (haven't read this thread in a while) - blog link is http://freezerbags.blogspot.com/. i haven't posted to that either, in a while! but feel free to PM me if you have any questions. once i got it figured out i sort of stopped writing about figuring it out!
the protein bagels can be ordered from www.westernbagel.com, and i make the eggs by baking eggwhites in a non-stick muffin tin a dozen at a time, then flash-freezing, then vacuum-sealing. you can leave them frozen in a ziploc bag, but they're more prone to freezer-burn.
also, if you have questions about sous-vide cooking, i can hopefully answer them!
If you write to the Dietician she will provide you with a list of good snacks.. The snacks the Bistro uses are really high protein so look for the protein content of the bars or snacks or drinks.. Most of the bars you find in the grocery ..are too low in protein.. You can order the good bars or Snacks from another site like Diet Direct.com and get exactly what you want...
Breakfasts are pretty easy eggbeaters and Pepperidge farm 7 gr bread(45 cal per slice) and sugar free jam, oatmeal( high protein ones ) with blueberries, low cal english muffins with eggbeater and veggie sausage sandwich Any of those breakfasts will work well with the program. Just be sure there is plenty of protein in the meal. That is what keeps the hunger under control.
I have been off the Bistro food for awhile and miss the heavy does of protein at each meal. I can really see the difference in my hunger level.
Good luck ladies..
flash freezing is super easy; all it is is portioning out before you freeze, so for example if you're doing a batch of chili, when it's done cooking, measure the individual portions into containers like gladware bowls and freeze overnight, then remove the frozen soup from the bowls and vacuum-seal in a freezer bag. it's like laying chicken breasts out separately on a cookie sheet and freezing before putting them in a freezer-safe bag, so you don't end up with a frozen mound of chicken that's hard to separate when you're ready to cook a single portion.
Last edited by kuhljeanie; 08-05-2009 at 08:27 AM.
flash freezing is super easy; all it is is portioning out before you freeze, so for example if you're doing a batch of chili, when it's done cooking, measure the individual portions into containers like gladware bowls and freeze overnight, then remove the frozen soup from the bowls and vacuum-seal in a freezer bag. it's like laying chicken breasts out separately on a cookie sheet and freezing before putting them in a freezer-safe bag, so you don't end up with a frozen mound of chicken that's hard to separate when you're ready to cook a single portion.
For the people not getting snacks, how does that work for you? According to bistromd, they charge $20 for 2X, 7 days of snacks. I tried to price the D'lites cheesecake, and those alone were $3.99 a piece, then the shakes where about $2 each. So it seems more expensive, to get the snacks on my own. Also the price for the breakfast, were $18 for 7 days. It seems getting the full package is easier, but I can't fathom, spending $200+/week on food for just myself. What to Do, what to do
you can get equally good snacks from other places. for example, fibergourmet does a lovely cheese-it substitute, 80 cals a bag, for less than a dollar a bag. i used to make the cheesecakes from a mix from dietdirect.com, used low-fat graham crackers and canned cherry or raspberry pie filling - yummy! and a lot cheaper. dietdirect.com also has protein chocolate chip cookies by chef jay, the crisp n crunch bars bistro uses, and some wonderslim products (LOVE the chocolate bars) that have the same nutrition profile, but which you can get cheaper if you buy in some quantity. i started experimenting with baking my own cookies but that quickly degenerated into a lot of non-diet-friendly baking.
