When you are always on-the-go, processed and packaged foods seem like the logical solutions, but they can quickly become large obstacles that prevent you from meeting your healthy eating resolutions. Pre-packaged, processed food options are loaded with chemicals and other unnatural additives, and are usually loaded with sodium and fat. In essence, they provide nothing more than just empty calories. So, when you feed on those food products, you are merely filling on calories, but you miss out on the good-for-you nutrients that you get from fresh foods. However, when you’re tight on time, it doesn’t mean you have to rely on these foods to fill you up. There are simpler, and smarter food choices that are just as easy to prepare, and will actually taste more delicious and be more nourishing too!
Throw out: frozen fries.
Commercially packaged fries are first deep-fried, seasoned and then flash frozen before they are packaged and shipped off to your local supermarket. Hence, it is not a surprise that these frozen French fries are high in fat, high in sodium and high in calories.
The smarter homemade option: oven baked fries.
Oven fries are the healthier alternative to deep-fried fries. Using fresh ingredients and a combination of herbs and spices, you can easily bake up a quick batch of tasty, crispy, lower-calorie oven fries in no time! Making your own fries allows you to choose what ingredients to use and how much to have, giving you total control over the calorie count and portion size. Try making some Zesty Oven Baked Fries for a start. Then, for a change in pace and a boost in fiber and beta-carotene, make some Sweet Potato Fries.
Photo by Gudlyf
Throw out: frozen entrees
Frozen entrees are tiny, over-priced and unappetizing. Frozen TV dinners often come in small portion sizes which means you often have to eat more than one to feel full or you will end up nibbling on other foods to satisfy your hunger — in short, it is a surefire recipe to launch yourself into making more poor food choices. In addition, frozen entrees, like other processed foods, are also high in fat and high in sodium, which are both key risk factors for developing chronic diseases such as heart problems and high blood pressure.
The smarter homemade option: frozen veggies + dried pasta + jarred sauce
Preparing your own pasta dish at home using frozen veggies and jarred sauces will take no longer than the time it takes you to unwrap the entrée, read the instructions, and microwave it. All you need to do is boil water, cook the pasta and during the last minute, pour in some frozen vegetables to heat them thoroughly. Then, you can simply stir in the pasta sauce of your choice (microwave it briefly to warm it) and have it as it, or sprinkle on some grated cheese for a gourmet touch. It takes very little preparation to prepare your own pasta and it will certainly be much more appetizing, a lot cheaper and definitely way more satisfying that the pricy, poor-quality, miniature-sized frozen entrée. For a simple, light meatless lunch idea, try Roasted Red Pepper & Pea Pasta. And for the weekday nights when you want to indulge in comfort food without going through the trouble of making it from scratch, try Last-minute Lasagna, the perfect last-minute weekday night solution!
Photo by my_amii
Throw out: store-bought salad dressings
Salad dressings that come in a bottle often have way too many ingredients than needed (just check out the super long list of ingredients on the back of the label and challenge yourself to reading it aloud). The creamy dressings are the worst offenders – they are loaded with saturated fats and may contain trans-fat as well; both saturated fats and trans-fat will lead to an increase in LDL (“bad cholesterol”) and lower HDL (“good cholesterol”).
The smarter homemade option: homemade vinaigrette
Preparing a homemade vinaigrette is not just the healthy way to go, but it is also the tasty way to go. Just learn the basic formula and then you can create your own dressings, making it more fun and enjoyable to eat more salads (and thereby include more veggies into your diet!). Plus the healthy fats in the oil will help to boost your HDL level and aid in reducing the risks of chronic diseases. Once you figure out how to make basic vinaigrette, check out Emily @ Healthy Eating Naturally and learn about her template for making salad dressings and try out a few of her delicious salad dressing recipes!
Photo by chrisdlugosz
Eating healthy is about adapting healthy habits one at time, so why not start out with changing the way you purchase food — skip out on the processed, fast food items and start loading up on healthy and fresh foods!
2 Comments
Great post! I rarely use store bought dressing, but that was a great link to dressing recipes. I’m always looking for something different to try.
The best part of making your own dressing at home is that you can come up with an endless amount of flavour combinations, so that you can dress your greens with a different dressing each time! Have fun trying out the different recipes!
Cheers,
Stephanie