Overview

This plan builds a full week of vegetarian lunches averaging around 22g of protein per day, using chickpeas, lentils, and tofu as rotating anchors so no single ingredient gets repetitive by Friday. Total weekly cost lands around $34, or about $6.80 per day including a side and dressing — competitive with most of the chicken-based lunch plans on this site.

Each day's protein source is batch-cooked once on Sunday and portioned into five containers, with dressings kept separate and added fresh to avoid the soggy texture that comes from pre-dressing a full week's batch at once.

Batch cooking order: Cook rice and lentils simultaneously on separate burners while chickpeas roast in the oven — all three finish within about 30 minutes of mostly hands-off time, and the whole week's protein bases are done in one session.

5-Day Breakdown

Day 1 (Monday): Chickpea and quinoa bowl with tahini dressing (26g protein).

Day 2 (Tuesday): Lentil and brown rice bowl with roasted vegetables (26g protein).

Day 3 (Wednesday): Crispy tofu and edamame stir fry (28g protein).

Day 4 (Thursday): Chickpea shawarma bowl with tahini yogurt sauce (25g protein).

Day 5 (Friday): Three-bean chili, made fresh Thursday night to close out the week (28g protein).

Shopping List

  • 3 cans chickpeas — $3.00
  • 1 cup dried lentils — $2.00
  • 1 block firm tofu — $3.00
  • 1 bag frozen edamame — $2.75
  • 1 can each kidney, black, pinto beans — $3.00
  • Quinoa and brown rice — $4.00
  • Tahini — $5.00 (lasts multiple weeks)
  • Mixed vegetables (peppers, onion, broccoli) — $6.00
  • Greek yogurt (for shawarma sauce) — $2.50
  • Lemon, garlic, spices — $3.00

Weekly total: approximately $34, or about $6.80 per day for a complete vegetarian lunch, all landing between 25-28g of protein per serving.