Hey Reader!

In the 67th issue of The MF Kitchen, you'll slice into the details of:

• Recipes for my Elotes Inspired Mac & Cheese and XL Triple Chocolate Protein Breakfast Cookies!
• The surprising timeline of pineapples (and an 18lb one that is bigger than a baby)...
• The truth behind why I use a food scale instead of 'normal' measurements...
• There is one recipe you HAVE to make (here are three variations)...

Preheat your ovens…

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Weekly Recipe Roundup 🍽️

Elotes Inspired Mac & Cheese If you're looking for an easy way to spice up your meal prep for the week, this 1 pot Elotes Inspired Mac & Cheese is a must try! Make 4 solid-size servings with only 532 calories and 47g protein! Click below to download the recipe and make it easy yourself: ​​​Elotes Inspired Mac & Cheese.pdf​

XL Triple Chocolate Protein Breakfast Cookies Take your breakfast to the next level with these XL Triple Chocolate Protein Cookies! Dense, delicious, and incredibly easy to make! Plus only 329 cals and 21g protein. ​​Click below to download the recipe and make it easy yourself: ​​​XL Triple Chocolate Protein Breakfast Cookies.pdf​

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Recipe Recreations Of The Week 🤌

Fruity Pebble Cereal Milk Protein Ice Cream 🍦

Macros for the WHOLE Pint w/Fruity Pebble Mix-Ins:​
365 Cals, 43g Carbs, 5g Fat, 37g Protein

Here's the recipe and video:​
👉 https://www.instagram.com/theflexibledietinglifestyle/reel/CtPP1yoNDdX/?hl=en​

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Zach's Beats 🎧

I put you onto 90s Rock meets EDM last week. Now I’m putting you onto the true goated genre of mashups 🤠 ​Down Under Country Vol. 6​

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Weird Food Fact 🤓

Imagine deciding you want to plant your own pineapples at home.

You head to the store, grab a fresh pineapple, slice off the crown, carefully plant it, and proudly mark your calendar.

In just a few weeks, you'll be eating fresh pineapple, right?

Wrong. So, so wrong.

Turns out growing pineapples isn’t a weekend DIY gardening project.

From planting to harvest, pineapples take their sweet time (literally), often taking over two full years to reach their full potential.

Imagine waiting two birthdays, two Thanksgiving feasts, and enduring two full football seasons before tasting the fruit of your labor.

But the craziest pineapple story I've heard comes from Australia, where a family decided to test just how big their homegrown pineapple could get.

After a few years of dedicated gardening (and probably daily pep talks to their pineapple plant) they harvested a monster fruit weighing a jaw-dropping 18.25 pounds.

So next time you're casually tossing pineapple chunks into your smoothie or onto your pizza (no judgment here), pause for a second.

Each juicy, golden bite is the culmination of literal years of waiting 🙌

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One FAQ ❓

Answer: This is one of the top questions I get asked!

So I wanted to dive much deeper into this question because it’s really REALLY important.

We have to remember our goal here…

Delicious & Macro Friendly

We are trying to have the best of both worlds.

And in order to do that, it means attention to detail.

The ingredients we use matter.

And the precise amounts of each ingredient matter.

That’s where the food scale comes into play.

The grams on the scale are precise. The imperial system (aka cups/tbsp/tsp) are not (the amounts can easily vary by 20%-50%).

And why does that matter?

Two big reasons:

1. 20%-50% more of an ingredient means more calories/macros (aka less macro friendly).
2. The food science component of the recipe can/will be thrown off (and we don’t want a cardboard-tasting dish).

When we are making a macro-friendly recipe (especially when baking), we are relying on complex interactions of ingredients to achieve a rare result.

We don’t have the luxury of the high-calorie versions of the foods we are creating (aka endless amounts of butters/oils, sugar, and flour).

So if you are using the imperial system (cups, tbsp, tsp), you run the risk of throwing off these complex interactions aka the recipe not coming out how it should.

The food scale leaves zero doubt.

And it’s actually MUCH easier to use than the imperial system anyway.

1. Add bowl to scale.
2. Tare (zero) out the scale (aka press one button on the scale to zero it out so it only accounts for ingredients being added to the scale).
3. Add your first ingredient to the scale until it reaches the grams in the recipe.
4. Press the tare button to zero it out and add the next ingredient.
5. Repeat for all your ingredients!

Soo easy and saves dishes!

With that said, if I had one takeaway for you to remember, it's that the food scale doesn’t lie.

The imperial system can and will.

We are creating the best of both worlds (aka delicious and macro-friendly).

So this rare result requires us to be precise.

A food scale is much easier to use than the metric system and makes fewer dishes.

And if you want to get the food scale I use, here’s the Amazon link.​​

*I get zero kickback on this, I just like the scale

Hope that all makes sense!

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Serving Surprise 😮

There is this one recipe you HAVE to make.

It’s a category of recipes that require a tad bit more effort.

BUT damn is that extra work worth it!

So what recipe is this?

It’s my Cereal Milk Protein Ice Cream!

I have made so many different cereal milk flavors and it’s a life-changing realization when you make it.

Here are a few people who agree:

A whole pint for only 284 calories with 36g protein.

But one common question I get is, “How do you accurately track the cereal milk?”

So let me walk you through my process...

How to Accurately Track Cereal Milk for Your Protein Ice Cream

Since the cereal absorbs liquid and leaves behind extra calories in the milk, we need a simple but accurate way to track it.

Here’s my exact process:

Step 1: Steeping the Cereal

• Start by weighing 56g of Frosted Flakes and adding them to a bowl with 240g Fairlife Fat-Free Milk and 240g Unsweetened Vanilla Almond Milk.
• Stir it up, then refrigerate for 6-7 hours to let that cereal-infused magic happen.

Step 2: Straining the Cereal

• After steeping, strain out the soggy cereal, pressing gently to extract as much liquid as possible without forcing excess starch into the milk.
• Weigh the leftover cereal mush. This tells us how much of the original dry cereal didn’t get absorbed into the milk.

Step 3: Calculating the Tracked Macros

• The difference between the starting weight of the dry cereal (56g) and the final weight of the soggy cereal is the amount that dissolved into the milk.
• In this case, I estimated about 10g worth of Frosted Flakes’ macros made it into the milk, which is roughly 36 calories, 9g carbs, 0g fat, and 0g protein.
• Since the total milk volume dropped from 480g to 330g, I add 100g more Fairlife milk to balance it out.

Step 4: Blending & Freezing

• Once I have my final cereal milk, I mix it with the rest of the ingredients.
• I blend everything together with a milk frother, then freeze it overnight.

Step 5: Churning It to Perfection

• Once frozen, I pop it into my Ninja Creami and run the Lite Ice Cream function once. That’s all you need for ultra-smooth, creamy goodness.

Tracking cereal milk isn’t an exact science, but this method keeps it simple and macro-accurate enough without overcomplicating things.

The end result? A creamy, delicious pint of protein-packed ice cream for only 284 calories with 36g of protein.

So if you haven’t tried this yet… what cereal flavor are you making first?

1. ​Fruity Pebbles Cereal Milk Protein Ice Cream​
2. ​Cinnamon Toast Crunch Cereal Milk Protein Ice Cream​
3. ​OREO Cereal Milk Protein Ice Cream​

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I was in Miami for the weekend and had a chance to capture the GOAT score the game-winning goal:

Anyway...

Hope you had a great week and decide to cook up something macro friendly this week!

Much love and happy cooking,​
Zach

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