Tips on Cooking and eating healthy

by Cindy Owens

Instead, start your mornings with a healthy and filling breakfast, so that you can kick off your day with energy, and you’ll be less likely to do unhealthy snacking later on.

Balance out your meals with the healthy and good-for-you carbs – veggies! Reducing the amount that you eat can be unfilling, so rather than going for a second serving of pasta or meat, add more veggies to your dish. You’ll still be able to enjoy your grains and meat, but you’ll also be able to eat your fill

If you have a little extra time on your hands, pick one day a week to make a few dishes that you can eat throughout the week. Having a few pre-made lunches and dinners to choose from throughout the week will help you avoid the morning rush of making a PB&J lunch or the temptation of swinging by for take-out on the way home. You don’t have to make actual recipes either. Cooking up things that can be used for multiple recipes, like chicken, beans, grains, or a few boiled eggs, can help you quickly throw together meals without having too much repetition

Embrace Leftovers – This doesn’t mean cook a recipe for 12 and eat it for two weeks, but don’t shy away from those that produce 4 servings. Some leftovers can actually be better and have fuller developed flavors the next day. Think about trying chili, curry, meatloaf (for sandwiches), lasagna, or protein-based salads (chicken, egg, chickpea).

Most of us at Cooking Light have lived alone at one point in our lives. So we rounded up the best ways our editors have combatted the single-serving woes:

Americans eat a lot of food they didn’t cook themselves. While three-quarters of us eat most dinners at home, less than 60% of us prepare them in our own kitchens. In 2005, the trend of combining the convenience of take-out food with the comforts of home found each American buying an average of 57 restaurant meals to eat elsewhere, up from 33 meals 20 years ago. And when we do cook, we seldom cook from scratch. Last year, less than half of main meals prepared at home included even one fresh product, according to research from the NPD Group.