Healthy dinner ideas with a fussy husband!

[Snowwhite12345]

Looking for some meal suggestions as I feel like all I do is cook the same meals again and again!

My husband is SO fussy when it comes to veg and salad so I find it hard to bulk meals out

He will only eats carrots, Brocoli (osasionally ) and marrow fat peas, no form of salad (I love to habe salad with most dinners)

We tend to have chilli's, curries, spag bowl, flat wraps, chicken tandoori Wraps etc, all very boring and basic but all tend to be made from scratch (But I do love cooking and tend to prepare meals in advance)

We would usually have dinners with rice / baked potatos / chips (plus salad for me)

I do always measure rice/ pasta for appropriate portion sizes but we both find ourselves hungry in the evening

But looking for some different meal suggestions that we can both enjoy and find filling

To be honest OP - I am a pretty 'traditional mum' who cooks the main evening meal most evenings .. but fuck me would I cater to an actual adult human male ! He eats what I cook or cooks for himself

. unless you are entirely funded by his income .. in which case go get a job and let him take some of the mental load of meal planning when his headspace can be taken up with planning what YOU would like to eat ..

Vegetables taste quite different roasted as per a pp.
When we have curry I often roast some carrots ( no need to cut up ) in a little oil and garam masala. Similarly I roast cauli florets with cumin seeds, turmeric and a little chilli then squeeze over lemon at the end. They make a simple dhal or spinach and chick pea curry more interesting and add veg without them seeming too veg like .
I have a number of people to cook for with likes and dislikes and plan the meals for the week. If someone has a major aversion I would avoid but otherwise I try to have something on the plate that everyone will eat. I have also found that by plodding on putting eg salad on the table it wears people down and they will eat a little bit. You can eat the uneaten leftovers for your lunch the next day so as not to waste.

You could try asking AI? I do that when I'm stumped for something to eat, tell it what I've got, what other stuff I could buy, and what I absolutely can't have and ask it to come up with a recipe. It's pretty good!

For instance I just asked chatgpt:

Hey, could you please come up with a recipe for me? Using British measurements, to serve two adults. As much protein as possible, limited carbs, using carrots, peas and broccoli as the only veg but any other ingredients are fine.

And it's come up with a quite nice sounding chicken stir fry, and a beef and veggie skillet, and a turkey traybake. You can just adjust what you ask for as needed based on what you've got in, and if you're a competent cook fiddle the recipe to make it work anywhere the AI has done something weird.

@Snowwhite12345

I make Nigella's rapid ragu quite frequently as we love it. When I saw her making it on TV she used red lentils, not the green lentils in the recipe, so I use red lentils as well.

You wouldn't know it contained lentils, and it is utterly delicious.

Doesn't really get you past the veggie issue but a favourite quick meal here is steamed fillets of salmon mixed with bow pasta, cooked frozen peas and lemon flavoured oil. The whole thing is on the table in 10 mins flat. You could easily add broccoli florets too.

Roasted turkey or large chicken legs with green beans cooked in butter and garlic. Enough butter and garlic on anything and I find you'll get it past a fusspot. You can reduce the heart attack quotient over time 😉

Does he eat takeaway curries or Chinese food? Will he eat peppers and onions in those dishes

I agree with a PP who said that it would be better to start by thinking about what you might like to eat and then it might be easier to suggest ways of adapting recipes so that they'd suit your DH's tastes too. What sorts of things would you like to be cooking but aren't?

This is an answer made in good faith even if it's not directly what you requested. I suspect that your DH isn't getting as bored as you are, am I right? So may I suggest that you choose one (or two) new veg side dish or salad recipes that you fancy trying per week, have them as your side with the usual meals, and give him his usual. You can always give him a teaspoon on the side of his plate to try.

I'm thinking roasted carrots with honey, sesame and caraway seeds; coleslaw made with fennel, apple, cabbage sultanas and lemon; quick pickled veg; cauliflower cheese; tenderstem broccoli with lemon zest and slithers of almonds; creamed spinach with nutmeg; mozaeella, beef tonato and bazil. Make enough so that you have it yourself as a side dish 2-3 nights, and you'd get to try new ways to enjoy veg and get your variety that way without killing yourself in time and effort in the kitchen, and he gets to stick to what he knows and likes by having his usual, with a minor chance he discovers some new foods he likes.

If you are hungry later on it is likely because you are not eating enough protein. Maybe try adding in some beans, lentils, or other higher protein starch?