Sick of salads?

One of the most common complaints I hear every week is "I'm sick of salads"!   The best way to lose fat is to increase the amount of fibrous veggies you consume, to eat a lean source of protein with your meals and to modify the carbohydrate content of the meal.  So, if you apply this, you do need to find a way to have veggies or salad with your lunch.  Get creative.  I don't call a few lettuce leaves, half a tomato and a piece of cucumber a salad. That is a diet meal and that is boring.

Go to a farmer's market or your veggie shop and look around.  Choose a wide variety of vegetables to fill your plate with.  Cherry tomatoes are generally sweeter than regular tomatoes, red onion or spring onion give a nice bite, celery is crunchy, chickpea sprouts, radish sprouts, different coloured capsicum, all these things add texture, taste and colour to your salad.  Extras like feta cheese, avocado, seeds, nuts, sliced fruit can be swapped out for your complex carbs. Talk to me and we can work them into your lunch to keep things interesting. 

You could roast up pumpkin at the weekend and keep it in the fridge.  Add roast pumpkin to a smoked chicken and feta salad, yum!  Have a look at my recipes for ideas.

Something else I hear quite often is how, often through lack of planning, dinner ends up being takeaways.  I totally understand how dinner is often just one more job when you are busy with work, kids and life, but with a little forward planning, it is possible to prepare healthy, simple meals at home.  Keeping it simple is the key when you are busy, but planning ahead so that you have a repertoire of quick ideas is important too.  Always have some ideas for a quick protein source available, things like eggs, cooked chicken, smoked chicken, a piece of meat cooked in the crockpot so that there are leftovers, or tins of salmon in the pantry. 

Stopping at the supermarket on the way home and grabbing a cooked chicken + frozen veggies + kumara takes less time than going back out for takeaways.  At the weekend consider planning dinners for a few days ahead.  Maybe make a large stir fry so that there are leftovers.  Make a big frittata using up any veggies lurking in the fridge and take leftovers with salad for lunches.  Hard boil eggs so you can use them for snacks or lunch.  Roast up pumpkin to use as your complex carb at lunchtime.  Cook up rice, cool in the fridge, then portion it out into packets and freeze for instant rice when you want it.    A little planning can go a long way to helping you be successful with healthy eating.

Keep in mind that there will always be demands on our time and energy, but when you eat well and exercise regularly you actually have more energy at the end of the day.