A little late to the party as I know summer has recently wrapped itself up, I still wanted to touch on some of the meals I’ve been eating through the season. I usually go through phases of having favorite meals and snacks, a lot of them simple but still my favorite go-to’s. I admittedly switch these up pretty frequently, as I discover new recommendations and combinations that take the place of the one before it. I thought I’d share what some of my favorite meals and snacks are because quite frankly, I feel like writing and sharing something quick.
Breakfast:
All breakfast begins with hot lemon water for me, as it aids in digestion and the balance of pH levels. Lemon water also can improve skin quality, contains a high amount of vitamin C, and with the addition of apple cider vinegar, actually helps me get a grip on potential acid reflux (hiatal hernia girl over here) that I might encounter in my day. After that, I will either have a green spirulina smoothie (if you Google search Kenzie Burke’s Tropical Bub smoothie, I’m sure it will come up) and a form of protein after (scrambled eggs, piece of toast with almond butter, overnight oats), or a chlorella tablet and a larger portion of a different breakfast, such as a coconut yogurt bowl with one banana, half of a mango, cinnamon and cacao. Another one I love is specifically either an Ezekiel english muffin or the Food for Life brown rice bread (toasted twice) with pink salt, black pepper, and red pepper flake.
Lunch:
Lunch is usually a salad of whatever I want or have on hand. One of my favorite things is making a giant salad of some of my favorite heartier meals for when I want a meal that keeps me full and satisfied without stuffing me. An example of this is a “burger salad” that I exclusively make with a veggie burger patty. My favorite is the Dr. Praeger black bean burger patties, with Hilary’s being a close second, although they have the potential to stretch the budget a bit more. A burger salad usually is a bed of greens, burger patty, cucumber, avocado, cherry tomatoes, pickles, and a bit of ketchup and spicy brown mustard. Another version of this is a taco salad, which is just a bed of greens with all of the fixings I would put on a taco – avocado, salsa, nutritional years, black beans, baked tofu or crispy tempeh back when I ate soy, chickpeas, crushed up tortilla chips, any variety of those things.
Snacks:
I love snacks; I’ve always been a snacker or a grazer. One of my favorite snacks is currently kalamata olives (the best olives IMO) dipped in Trader Joe’s organic original hummus. I rinse the kalamata olives off before consuming as they typically have a thick coating of oil on them; it doesn’t change the taste or anything. Another snack I look forward to is Siete tortilla chips (plain in this case but the lime are my favorite to eat alone) with Trader Joe’s vegan nacho cheese dip. Life changing. I try and moderate this because it is a processed food, although with clean ingredients, but with this, sometimes I can’t help it. Back in college and before my healthy eating days, I was obsessed with the Tostito’s queso dip in the jar. I would consider this a step up from that.
Dinner:
Some of my favorite dinners that I’ve been making include red lentil dahl with coconut rice, honey garlic chicken and vegetables, and absolutely anything involving rice noodles.
Curry is a newer food for me, meaning I tried it for the first time this year. A few years ago I got green curry from a Japanese restaurant and didn’t love it by any means. I still don’t know if that was because it wasn’t spicy / a red curry, or because it was not well-done, but either way I admit the color, having been a neon yellowish green color, threw me off. When I make dahl, I mix some of the paste with a can of coconut milk and water to cook the lentils in. My favorite add-ins for this include mixed chopped peppers, spinach, chickpeas, and eggplant.
I’ll be posting the full and measured out honey garlic chicken recipe on either here or my Instagram as soon as I get around to making it for the third time. It is arguably the best chicken I’ve ever made, granted it’s in the Crockpot, but still. I use chicken thighs, honey, garlic, soy sauce, and ketchup. Serve it with whatever vegetables you like and are on hand.
Rice noodles have my heart. For some reason, I can eat an entire take out container of rice noodles; I love that they’re so light. When I make rice noodles, I rinse and add them to any mix of spinach, snap peas, edamame, shredded carrot, and shrimp. Sometimes I do no meat and whatever vegetables I have on hand; it’s a versatile dish. I bought a premade peanut sauce once and although it was an organic one, the ingredient list was a bit lengthy. Now, I regularly make my own using sesame oil, coconut amino’s, and peanut butter. The peanut butter melts down and smooths out in the pan when being heated.
Dessert:
Dessert for me is typically on any night a square or two of dark chocolate, most likely a coconut or mint flavor. I recently discovered Nadamoo ice cream (the strawberry cheesecake flavor) and it was a lot better than the dairy-free Halo Top in my opinion. If you do eat dairy, my favorite used to be the Outshine coconut bars dipped in dark chocolate. So Delicious makes a dairy-free salted caramel ice cream bar that is also dark chocolate dipped; that became my fill-in for the Outshine bars, as I remember the ingredient list being a bit lengthy.
Health with Hales 