How could you eat the same thing every day for the rest of your life?

I have a good friend who insists she could live off hummus and Chardonnay for the rest of her life. I believe her. I know plenty of people who eat a variation of the same foods every day. Some do it because they’re lazy, some because they don’t know how to cook and others because they just know what they like.

I try to vary my meals, testing out new recipes and going out for dinner a few times a month.

But throughout university, I too ate pretty much the same thing every day: cereal for breakfast, sandwich for lunch, stir fry for dinner. It was boring, cheap and easy.

I brought those habits back — healthier this time — to test the idea of uniform eating.

The 5-day meal plan I followed: á Breakfast: Smoothie made with banana, peanut butter, almond milk, protein powder. á Lunch: Salad with lettuce, sweet potato, lentils, noodles, red onion and goat cheese. á Dinner: Quinoa with stir-fried vegetables and soy sauce. á Snacks: Rotation of granola bars, yogurt, nuts, vegetables, apples. á Grocery total: $50 Here’s how it went:

á Sunday: Food prep day. Cutting up vegetables takes a long time.

á Monday: My taste buds and stomach are satisfied with this meal plan — it’s basically a healthier version of what I usually eat.

á Tuesday: I wake up with a cold. The smoothie tastes fine, but the salad looks totally unappetizing. By lunch, I want a bagel. I eat the salad. I’m not looking forward to dinner, but I eat that too.

á Wednesday: I’m feeling better and food tastes normal again. I go out for drinks with friends after work and I happily devour my leftovers for dinner when I get home.

á Thursday: The repetition is starting to get to me and I think I’m consuming way too many vegetables. But then my colleagues see my food as we’re walking towards our go-to lunch joint and say, “Oooh, good salad.” They buy $10 versions of the same salad.

á Friday: The home stretch! I realize I’ve unintentionally gone vegetarian for the past week — the thought of saving some animals is nice — and I saved around $30 not buying lunch. I also saved time, shaving 10 minutes off my morning routine and 30 minutes off my night schedule, though Sunday’s food prep did steal two hours from my weekend. I don’t think I’d want this diet forever, but five days was doable. Now, give me pizza. Katrina Clarke