Some ongoing battles of mine are to eat:
- more cheaply
- more healthily
- more variedly
- and less of it.
I don’t mind Point 1 that much, I already shop at ALDI for almost everything. However, trying to cut down on any kind of meal out is something I’m working on. Lunches being a particular problem.
Point 2 is something I’ve been working on recently, and have started to nail. Obviously, “healthily” is an incredibly subjective term and can mean a wide variety of things, but right now I’m specifically referring to aiming for a government recommended target of 5 portions or fruit or veg/day.
Point 3 is something I still need to work on I think. I have recipe books, I have the will power, I need to make this happen more.
Point 4 is actually what I’m trying to solve right now whilst also hitting “eat more cheaply”.
There are some great places for lunch near work that do great hot food, or a nearby ASDA. We have a toaster, fridge, kettle and microwave so in theory, one could be quite creative. In practice, the trick is to cheat!
On Sunday night, I made pasta and a wonderful vegetable/tomato pasta sauce for tea. The sauce contained onions, peppers, leeks, celery, kidney beans, sweetcorn olives and lots of tomatoes. I made loooads….
Then I grated some cheese into a tupperware box, added a few spoonfuls of pasta, filled it to the top with super-healthy sauce and took them to work. Here is my lunch for Monday-Wednesday.
They keep just fine in the fridge, can be quickly reheated in the microwave, probably could be frozen and reduce my lunch bill by a considerable margin.
The way that this means one eats *less* is that one completely take away any decision about portion size at the point when you are least qualified to make it – eg. when you are very hungry.
Now all I have to do is just to keep in flow, probably do some soups and other exciting things, build up a supply of stuff in the freezer and make this a routine.
Look on the bright side: it even cuts down on washing up! 😀
