The time is 12.29 and it’s a sunny Saturday afternoon.
I’ve actually just come back from a long walk and I’m feeling ready to eat.
Of course, I won’t be cooking – but I’ve still not got OUT of the habit of thinking ok ‘wtf’ am I going to cook.
So let’s go through what’s actually changed for me one by one:
Table of Contents
Dropping body fat, gaining muscle
Thinking about my lunchtime meals over the last several months let me bring up the one’s that spring to mind.
- Subway 6/12-inch depending upon how hungry I am
- An Arabic pizza type pastry from my local coffee shop
- Microwave vegetables and microwave rice
- Cooking sometimes – sausages (I’ve actually got some right now in the fridge), chicken or otherwise
- Strawberry cooking fish and vegetables for us both
Naturally, when you go for a fresh-meal prep service – you don’t go for a service that sends you junk food (i.e anything you’ll find on deliveroo).
So moving from all of the above to nutritious freshly prepared meals is of course huge
………………
Also – it’s the first time I’ve actually written down what my meals look like for lunchtime…it’s pretty horrendous to read that being honest. I’m shocked.
But anyway, let’s go further still and now factor in time
Saving 3 hours 55 minutes per week
- Subway 6/12-inch depending upon how hungry I am (7-min walk, 5-min wait, 7 min walk back. Total ‘dead time’ = 19 mins)
- An Arabic pizza type pastry from my local coffee shop (3-min walk, 7-min wait, 3-min walk back. Total ‘dead time’ = 13 mins)
- Microwave vegetables and microwave rice (5 min walk, 5 min shop, 5 min walk back, 10 min prep = 25 mins)
- Cooking sometimes – sausages (I’ve actually got some right now in the fridge), chicken or otherwise (5 min walk, 8 min shop, 40 min cook = 53 mins)
- Strawberry cooking fish and vegetables for us both (Additional 20 mins cooking/prep time for Strawberry – 5-min table prep time for me. Total time = 25 mins)
- Saturday (cooking/purchasing ingredients = 90 minutes)
- Sunday (as above = 45 minutes)
So on a weekly basis, that’s 270 minutes (and as you can tell – I’m already relatively efficient) on time outside of actually eating. I’m also underplaying some of these numbers here. It could easily be 400 minutes a week.
Anyway, if we factor in my time spent now ‘preparing’ as being 5 minutes per meal – that’s 35 minutes a week.
Which means overall I’m saving 235 minutes a week or 3 hours 55 minutes.
For reference, I can write a 1,500-word blog post 45 minutes – so it’s allowing me to be way more productive! So the math done in other ways is – that’s 12,000 words of content OR £200 a week if my time valuation is £50 per hour.
The cost for this is £2.33p per day
Now it’s time to compare the economics of eating from a food delivery service like Key To Food as opposed to me cooking/eating myself.
So their meals cost £7.70 per meal which is £231 per month.
Let’s run some maths.
As I eat out heavily anyway, it’s safe to assume I’m spending on average £5 per meal per day.
So we’re looking at a net difference of £2.70 per meal which over 30 days is £81.
Although that’s just a random number I plucked out from the sky – let’s analyse it based upon the above
- £7 Subway 6/12-inch depending upon how hungry I am (7-min walk, 5-min wait, 7 min walk back. Total ‘dead time’ = 19 mins)
- £5 An Arabic pizza type pastry from my local coffee shop (3-min walk, 7-min wait, 3-min walk back. Total ‘dead time’ = 13 mins)
- £4 Microwave vegetables and microwave rice (5 min walk, 5 min shop, 5 min walk back, 10 min prep = 25 mins)
- £4 Cooking sometimes – sausages (I’ve actually got some right now in the fridge), chicken or otherwise (5 min walk, 8 min shop, 40 min cook = 53 mins)
- £6 Strawberry cooking fish and vegetables for us both (Additional 20 mins cooking/prep time for Strawberry – 5-min table prep time for me. Total time = 25 mins)
- £7 Saturday (cooking/purchasing ingredients = 90 minutes)
- £5 Sunday (as above = 45 minutes)
So if we total up all of the yellow we’re looking at £38 per week or £5.40 per meal. £5.40 x 30 is £162.
£231 – £162 is £69.
So basically I’m paying an additional £70 per month or rather £2.33p per day to have my meals cooked and prepped for me.
All day long I’d do that.
Improving my focus, reducing my stress by 15%
This for me is a big one. I really get frustrated with things ‘getting in the way’ of my work. And deciding what the hell I’m going to be eating for lunch is really, really one of them
It starts at around 11am and persists until 1230-1pm by which time I’m normally eating.
Of course, then there’s the challenge of trying to figure out what the hell I’m going to eat – something that doesn’t come to me naturally either.
This will of course lead me to often miss lunch, or rush lunch or overspend (often all three).
Knowing I don’t have to worry about any of this anymore has improved my focus, reduced my stress levels and allows me to focus upon growing my business
Having a happier relationship.
Strawberry (my partner) is a full-time student so she’ll often be at home as well, depending upon what day of the week it is.
During the Covid-19 period, this, of course, has been every day.
Invariably then, sometimes we’ll try and have lunch together and Strawberry will often prepare something for us both.
The economics of trying to eat at the same time, of preparing food for the window that I try and stick to (1-1.45pm) is often a challenge.
This occasionally has caused arguments between us.
Furthermore, the emotional toll that Strawberry get’s hit with by thinking about the fact I might not have prepared something for myself when she’s cooking weighs down upon her naturally.
It’d weigh down upon me if I had to think about it.
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Enjoying the food itself
I just pulled this from their website because I wanted to show you the plan I picked (I found these guys after Googling) –
But let me post in some of the pictures I’ve taken over the last couple of weeks itself:
This is the dude who delivers it to our flat:
This is the bags you get them in:
Here’s some of the food:
Yup.
I looked at what they send to you and I was damn impressed lol.
The range of meals they have is impressive.
I’m eating better now than I ever have before.
Trying to cook stuff like this for me – would simply never happen.
Strawberry – being Italian has also been pleasantly surprised every time I’ve gotten a delivery – as she’ll wander over and ask ‘what have you got today’?
My mum whom I’ve also told has been asking if they do catering haha.
So yes it’s definitely a success
Finally, a business that sends voicenotes
This was a real pleasant surprise as well – I had a dumb question about knowing whether I should microwave stuff or not and hopped over to their website – found a whatsapp phone number…
And was amazing to discover they actually use it –
The change this will make to my life
You know, now that I’ve written all of this up – it’s a shock to see what improvement this will make for me.
It harkens back to what James Clear talks about in Atomic Habits – making one-time changes in your life that lead to massive competitive advantages.
This is definitely an example of that.
For the cost of £70 per month, I’m eating great food for lunch everyday, saving 16 hours per month, have a happier relationship and am making Strawberry’s life easier as well.
I’m not looking back.
If you’re looking for an edge in your life – this is a perfect example of that.
Check them out.
Keytofood and see how you go
