Preparing all your meals for the upcoming week is smart: You eliminate stress, eat healthier stuff, and spend way less energy agonizing over what’s for dinner.

Plus, you lessen your chances of swerving into the drive-thru on your way home from work.

Related: Don’t Make These 6 Mistakes When Prepping Your Meals

So we came up with a plan to take care of a week’s worth of meal prep in one session. You can brown-bag the chili to fuel your workouts, or, to prevent flavour fatigue, transform the leftovers into new meals using our fast, simple recipes.

Related: The Beginner’s Guide To Mastering Food Prep

You’ll need about 90 minutes, prep to plate, to make this one-pot muscle meal. But for most of that time, you don’t have to do anything except let it simmer until delicious.

What You Need

• 2 Tbsp olive oil
• 2 medium onions, diced
• 2 cloves garlic, minced
• 1 green pepper, seeded and diced
• 1 red pepper, seeded and diced
• 2 medium carrots, peeled and diced
• 900g ground beef, preferably grass-fed
• 2 Tbsp chili powder
• 2 tsp cumin
• 1 can diced tomatoes
• 2 cans kidney beans, drained and rinsed
• 2 cans pinto beans, drained and rinsed

How To Make It

1. In a large pot, heat the olive oil on medium.
2. Add the onions, garlic, green and red peppers, and car­rots. Cook until softened, stirring occasionally, about 2 minutes.
3. Add the beef and cook, stirring frequently, until the meat is no longer pink, about 5 minutes.
4. Stir in all the remaining ingredients except the beans.
5. Bring every­­thing to a boil, adjust the heat to medium low, cover, and simmer until the liquid has reduced and the flavors meld, about 45 minutes.
6. Stir in the beans and cook, uncovered, until the chili has thickened, another 15 minutes or so.
7. Season with salt and freshly ground pepper to taste. Serve or store immediately.

Makes 8 servings

Originally posted on menshealth.com

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