Pictured: Chef Jeff and his team package almond-crusted chicken breast with cranberry pilaf Photo Credit: Sarah Emily Miano.

Out of a Chevron station on Lakewood Ranch Boulevard, Jeff Houser cooks three thousand meals per week alongside his wife, Kim, a longtime nurse. Green chili turkey with saffron rice. Sambal-and-honey salmon cake with whipped sweet potato. Almond-crusted chicken breast seasoned with olive oil, lemon juice and Himalayan salt. “The same breast I would serve at the Ritz Carlton, for ten dollars,” he says. “They’d pay forty to fifty, if I did that in a saute pan and put it on a white tablecloth. The Houdini act is no different.”

Ninety percent of Jacked Panda’s farm-to-table prep service is subscription. No shipping. Seven pink vans, painted with a weightlifting panda, deliver every Monday from Anna Maria Island to Venice and inland past I-75. Clients range from doctors and firefighters to people staying in a calorie pocket. His 20 programs center on “whole products from God’s garden”: four to six ounces of high-quality protein, fresh local vegetables and low-glycemic, single-ingredient carbs. “You can get all your essential and non-essential amino acids from your food,” he says. “Anything more than that, I don’t find the body can digest or use.”

A classically trained chef, French and Asian, with stints at Spago and his own high-end restaurants, Houser came to meal prep by transforming himself. At 210 pounds, he changed his diet and by forty-five emerged a competitive bodybuilder. His daughter named the company poolside, back when Houser was, in his words, chubby and getting strong. At fifty, he sounds like a coach. “I’ve never met a human being who gets a second body.”

Portioned meals reheat in two minutes and sell out within forty-eight hours. Plans are customizable, no extra charge. “That’s service. For some people, it matters.” The lasagna layers 90/10 ground sirloin, fresh pasta, three cheeses, San Marzano tomatoes. “You have to have food available. I make it available.” Desserts include tres leches overnight oats with Greek yogurt and whey protein. “Is the juice worth the squeeze?” he asks. “You have to decide.”

Jacked Panda Prep to Go, Mon-Fri, 8 a.m.-9 p.m., Sun 8 a.m.-7 p.m., 941-544-9696, jackedpandapreptogo.com

Pictured: Chef Jeff and his team package almond-crusted chicken breast with cranberry pilaf Photo Credit: Sarah Emily Miano.