Tips For Meal Planning & Adding Flavor To Your Food

Tips For Meal Planning & Adding Flavor To Your Food

Planning meals can save you time, money, and helps prevent food waste. Simply put, meal planning is when you decide what meals you will eat ahead of time. Doing this can help you stay on track with your health goals. By prepping and planning your meals before it’s time to eat, you are able to portion the healthy amounts of protein, carbohydrates, and fats. Make a calendar for a week, or even one month in advance, and you’ll always know what healthy meals are going to eat. Here are three tips for meal planning, as well as some additional tips on how to make sure your meals are flavorful:

1. Follow a menu

Take advantage of our menu in these weekly magazines. Know what you can cook ahead of time. By knowing what you will eat beforehand, you can monitor your foods and ensure you are eating more nutritious foods. The menu should always cover a variety of nutrients through fruits, vegetables, grains, protein sources, etc. 

2. Meal prep

Make your meals ahead of time by making them in batches. When you have your most commonly used ingredients already prepped, you can cut corners on the cooking time! This is going to be essential for keeping healthy lifestyle choices that support reducing blood pressure during this study and beyond. 

3. Use a calendar

For those of you who are more visual, seeing your meals on a calendar may help you plan ahead. You can make the calendar yourself, find a simple one online, or purchase a new calendar. Write out your meals on the day. This lets you easily stay ahead of your healthy eating lifestyle. 

Adding Flavor To Your Foods

The key to making fruits and vegetables, along with any of your food dishes, taste good is all in the flavor. Here are 3 tips to add more flavor to your foods:

1. Use spices

Spices such as garlic powder and black pepper are essential for making your dishes pop. Whatever your go-to spices are, make sure to keep several of them on hand so you can make your meals taste better. 

2. Add more herbs

Fresh herbs including cilantro, parsley, and thyme are natural, low-calorie ways to increase the flavor in your foods. To make cooking with fresh herbs even easier, you can chop up your favorite blend of herbs, add a couple pinches into the slots of an ice tray, and cover them with water to freeze your herbs ahead of time. When it comes time to cook, simply add a “herb cube” to your dish! 

3. Marinate foods

Letting vegetables and meat sources soak in a sauce is one way to add lots of flavor to a dish. You can marinate foods for anywhere from 20 minutes to 8 hours or overnight. Great food options for marinating include bell peppers, mushrooms, squash, zucchini, chicken, fish, and tofu.

There you have it folks! We encourage you to plan your meals ahead of time and add natural flavors to make your FarmboxRx fruits and vegetables even tastier.