I know women who have menu planning down to a science. They expertly weave through weekly sale papers, finding the best deals, the coupons to stack, and develop an incredibly delicious itinerary for their week that is the perfect blend of nutrition, frugality, and flavors that all in the family will enjoy.
I’ve yet to achieve that kind of menu mastery. I do my best to plan within my budget, trying to accommodate the extremely varying food tastes of my boys. Though my cooking is halfway decent, rarely do I find something that meets all of the requirements of my picky-eating brood. No wonder menu planning is stressful! When you add making special low-calorie meals to the mix, forget about it! That is enough to make a person give up.
The best tip I have for menu planning: find new, healthy ways to make the same meals you are already eating.
Use what is familiar, the tastes you already enjoy, and modify both what you make and the amount that you eat. Oh, and add more vegetables. There is no need to go and buy weight loss cookbooks and magazines.
If you’ve ever flipped through a cookbook marketed as a tool for weight loss, you’ll find recipes that have a hundreds of ingredients, take four hours to make, and end up tasting mediocre. Okay, I might be exaggerating a little. But really, when was the last time you complimented someone on a recipe and they told you they got it from a Weight Watchers cookbook? It doesn’t happen!
If you already have a list of meals you regularly prepare for your family half of your work is already done.
Look at your list for some easy substitutions. Making meatloaf? Use ground turkey instead of ground beef and add veggies in with the meat. Brats? Substitute spicy chicken sausages (there are some great flavors of chicken sausages out now, and they are really low in calories-- definitely worth checking out!). Spaghetti and meatballs? Use whole wheat pasta, turkey for your meatballs, and just a quick sprinkle of parmesan. Instead of bacon, use turkey bacon, or Canadian bacon. To grease your pan, start using nonstick spray instead of tablespoons of oil. Need to use breadcrumbs? Use ground oatmeal instead.
One of the trickiest ingredients to work with is cheese. It is high in calories, and its easy to go overboard with it in recipes. Some people buy low-fat or nonfat cheese as a substitution, but to me, the taste difference doesn’t warrant the extra expense. I use it sparingly in recipes. Parmesan isn’t too high in calories, so you can use that. Also, there are some amazing spreadable cheeses that taste great and are very low in calories that I’ve used in place of regular cheese in pasta dishes and omelets.
Remember, you don’t have to make any substitutions at all. You can lose weight making recipes the way you normally do, and just eating a lot less. Its a game of checks and balances: if you are hungrier, make the substitutions and you can eat more, or make it the usual way and eat less. Your choice.
Anybody have a favorite healthy substitution to share?
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