I feel like I've forgotten how to eat healthily

[TitaniasAss]

I've just completely lost my mojo when it comes to eating well. I've been working really long hours, but I need to start looking after myself better. I do want to lose a few pounds but it's mostly so that I stop feeling sluggish and just a bit shit really.

I'm so bored with all my 'usuals' and I would love some ideas of healthy breakfast, lunch and dinner options from actual real people! I know I can easily look up recipes etc but I want simple, healthy options which don't have a million ingredients. Anyone help please?

Don’t have any junk in the house. That’s the best starting point. No biscuits/cakes/crisps/sweets/ ready meals. Go from there. Good luck 🤞

I'm starting intermittent fasting this week
(16:8). I've become totally lazy and "un-mindful" when it comes to food, shovelling beige crap down me just because I can. I hope this will give me a kick up the bum and get me enjoying good again. It all started with the warm weather in April so I cba to cook, and just hasn't stopped. You're not alone OP. Good luck!!

Cajun roasted vegetables with feta cheese and rice - chop up some veg into chunks (we use yellow pepper, red onion, courgette, mushroom), toss in some cajun seasoning, drizzle with olive oil and roast for fifteen minutes. Serve on a bed of wholegrain rice and sprinkled with cubes of feta cheese or similar.

This is exactly like me. I'm normally pretty good, but I think I've just got so lazy and bored when it comes to food and it's a slippery slope isn't it.

Don’t have any junk in the house.

Agree with this. If you have no junk to eat, then you are likely to eat healthy, no matter what you choose to eat.

I like omelettes for something quick and healthy - with whatever fillings you like

That sounds lovely , one to try 😁

At times like this, go back to basics. Produce not products, plenty of fruit and veg, plenty of water, careful with saturated fats.

So, breakfast options such as
Poached eggs, grilled tomato and mushrooms
Fruit and yoghurt
Wholemeal toast with avocado and chilli

Lunch, in the summer salads, winter soups
Lemon and herb chicken salad
Tuna nicoise
Spiced cauliflower and chickpea salad

Dinner
Vegetable chilli and rice
Fritata
Butternut squash and red pepper curry
King prawn stir fry with rice noodles
Salmon and broccoli tray bake
Tuna steaks with balsamic, with green beans, griddled courgettes and broccoli
Peppers stuffed with rice, veg and herbs, topped with mozzarella

@AtleastitsnotMonday do you have recipes for the curry and tray bake you mentioned?

Love the sound of the spiced cauliflower and chickpea salad - both real favourites of mine. How do you make yours?

Veg lasagne, tins of ratatouille, reduce it if you have time, add a veg stock & celery salt and layer it. If you don't have time to reduce just chuck it on

Fry chicken pieces add some water & stock to the pan, boil, reduce, add a splash of cream, them add spinach, peas or tarragon

cook some sausages in the oven, in a pan fry onions and some smoked paprika for a few minutes, add a tin of chopped tomatoes. When you are ready to eat it chop the sausages up and add them with a tin of canaloni beans

I always have (ready made) mashed potatoes in, croquet potatoes, tinned and crispy, all from aldi

It's bloody hard but the above keep for a while in the fridge
Lazycook. Com in our house but we are healthy eaters

I'm trying to up my fibre and protein at the moment.

Perhaps porridge or overnight oats for breakfast? You can add chia seeds, fruit, etc. there are so many variations.

Love the idea of the Cajun roast vegetables that someone else suggested.

Couscous salad is also a good one - make up some couscous (can add a stock cube for more flavour) and add salad bits like tomatoes, cucumber, herbs, cheese if you fancy. Or chickpeas? Then add a bit of love oil, lemon juice and agave syrup / honey to bring it all together.

I always try to add green vegetables to every dinner. Check out the Doctors Kitchen - he has some great recipes!

I started ww to help me find my way again

The cauliflower and chickpea salad is really simple. I use a base of green leaves (whatever you like) with chopped celery, red onion, apple and cucumber. Then roast the cauli and chickpeas like this. Once cooked just use to top the base. I make a simple cucumber, mint and fat free yoghurt dressing to drizzle over the top.

I have porridge and fruit or greek yoghurt and fruit for breakfast. If I'm home I often have scrambled eggs and mushrooms or an omelette for lunch. For work I take a salad or leftover veg curry etc (usually just the main bit without the carbs). For dinner veg curries, stews, tray bakes etc. Small portions of carbs. Fruit, hummus and carrot sticks, greek yoghurt and honey or blueberries, cucumber and cherry tomatoes, popcorn, dark chocolate buttons for snacks.

I feel like this so I'm placemarking

This sounds amazing 😻

If you want to do it slowly and get rid of junk then instead of crisps have Walkers Sunbites and Nak'd fruit bars.

I try and have protein at every meal to fill up (and as perimenopausal need more). So Greek yoghurt/granola/ nuts/chia seeds/ fruit for breakfast.

Scrambled eggs with veggies mixed in for lunch. Or chicken, lentil, feta salad.

I’m still always starving around 4pm. Cottage cheese has loads of protein in it. So that on Rivita with sliced apple.

Think this has made a difference to hunger and snacking. Plus not having junk in the house.

Just go cold turkey. Just have whole ingredients and cook everything from scratch. So if you want chips and burgers - okay, but make it all yourself.

Google “Amelia Freer pyramid”. It’s a graphic way of representing what you should be aiming for each day, so 8 glasses of water (bottom row), 6 different veg, 3 different fruits, 3 protein, 2 complex carbs, 2 healthy fats, 1 nuts/seeds.

When I felt I’d lost my way a bit with healthy eating I found it really helpful- I’d just stick it on the fridge and cross off each item over the day, so a day might be a spinach and mushroom omelette with rye bread, chicken and avo salad with lots of different veg and seeds, chickpea and veg curry with brown rice, plus a piece of fruit with each meal or as snacks.

It’s only a very rough guide (of course lots of foods come under more than one category) but I found it helpful to remind me to build my meals around vegetables and to think about nutrition in terms of what you put in rather than what you take out. (So there’s more focus on getting the right nutrients and less on banning things, but naturally you eat less unhealthy stuff if you’re eating enough healthy stuff).

She has books too but you don’t really need them.

I find if you're out of the house for long periods, it's just so much harder to eat well. If you're able to, I try and prepare food at the same time (so while cooking dinner, I might lob a tray of veg into the oven as well to make a roasted veg salad for lunch the next day - I like it with giant couscous, or one of those quick microwave pouches with quinoa, and some feta crumbled in and fresh herbs chopped in.)

Breakfast I take to work with me - I have a small tupperware box with some Greek yoghurt, homemade compote (just because I have a rhubarb glut and need to find ways of using it lol), berries, muesli and some seeds. Takes seconds to prepare, and keeps me going til lunch.

My fitness Pal makes it quite obvious to see what you're doing and should do.

If you try to eat 30 different plants a week (a la Tim Spector and the focus on the microbiome) you'll find that you end up eating a lot of variety, lots of raw/minimally cooked stuff and lots of tasty things. Stir fries and wraps are the easiest things for me.I love your username :)

Don’t have any junk in the house. That’s the best starting point

I agree. I would go further and say deliberately buy lots of veg. I hate throwing food away, so having lots of veg that needs eating up makes me eat more of it! May be just me who is motivated this way however.

Curries, stir fries, salads and soups are the best ways to get lots of veg in.