For most families, dinner is the most important meal of the day. It is that only part of the day wherein all family members are present and everyone can catch up on all the important familial and school matters. Parents who are in charge of preparing dinner will also have more time to cook and won’t have to feel rushed about making the night’s meal, unlike during breakfast, when everyone has to hurry to go to work or school.
Since dinner is usually the only time during the day that everyone can be present at the table, you will certainly want to spend less time preparing the meal and more on conversing with the family. As such, it would be helpful to know some tips for preparing easy to make dinner meals that are healthy and delicious, too. Below are some of these tips you can follow for making easy to cook yet healthy dinner meals:
• Create a dinner meal plan. Set aside some time during the weekends (when you’re free) to come up with a dinner meal plan for the week. Make sure your meal plan has healthy recipes. As such, don’t forget to incorporate whole grains, greens, lean proteins, and other healthy and nutritious ingredients.
• Set aside time to make some prep works as well. When you have some free time, do the necessary food prep tasks, too. This means peeling and cutting vegetables and fruits and storing them properly in the refrigerator. You can also chop some additional fruits and vegetables so that you can have extra ones for everyone to snack on or to add to other meals.
• You can also make sure you will always incorporate healthy vegetables in your meals without spending too much time on prep work by buying pre-cut fresh vegetables such as broccoli, squash, and mushrooms.
• Always store and use healthy cooking staples. For easy, healthy food preparation, always keep your staples handy. These include extra-virgin olive oil, egg substitutes, and fat-free or light soymilk. Leading nutritionists recommend using extra-virgin olive oil in a spray bottle because this is a sure and an easier way to reduce the fat and calorie content of a dish.
• Modify your cooking methods. Lastly, by changing the usual way you cook, you can effectively reduce everyone’s fat and calorie intake. As such, if you’re always pan-frying chicken, consider baking or broiling it. You’ll spend less time watching what you cook while serving and eating healthier dishes. Grilling, broiling, or poaching fish is a healthier option as well. You can also avoid using too much oil by microwaving diced vegetables such as onions and greens instead of frying them.