Our Healthy Meal Ideas

Yesterday I told you about the Live Healthy Iowa 10-Week Challenge I am particpating in with some teacher friends, and it's only fitting that I not just change the amount of physical activity I do, but the food I consume.

By now, you get that John and I like to eliminate as much processed food from out diets as possible. I even started making my own yogurt and am working on mozzarella cheese, too.

A while ago we made efforts to dine out as little as possible, and we've been pretty successful at that as well. Granted, we still eat out for dinner about twice a week, but we continue to pack our lunches, and eat breakfast at home before going to work. Dining out twice a week is a wash - I'm gonna order something delicious no matter what. But, we've done a great job creating healthy meals at home.

In the spirit of sharing, here are some of our fav's:

Breakfast items (we pick one)

• vanilla yogurt with frozen blueberries and a handful of homemade granola
• toast (from homemade flax-seed, wheat bread) and peanut butter
• an orange or banana
• fresh cut pineapple
• a whole wheat pancake (sometimes we make a large batch on the weekend and freeze the leftovers for weekday breakfasts)
• oatmeal with a small handful of fruit

Lunch items (we pick two and pack in our lunch boxes to take to work)

• chicken salad with a piece of homemade bread
• baby carrots or celery and Tastefully Simple Garlic Garlic dip (with low-fat mayo and sour cream)
• small salad with low-fat Caesar dressing and loads of veggies
• hard boiled eggs
• an orange
• fresh cut veggies with hummus
• crackers or pita chips and hummus
• anything left over from dinner (see below)

Dinner

• veggie stir-fry (sometimes we add a single chicken breast) and brown rice
• spinach or whole wheat pasta with home canned pasta sauce - no ground beef
• homemade veggie pizza (everything is homemade - the sauce, the crust, the fresh veggies, the mozz cheese, etc.)
• marinated or spiced chicken breast with frozen veggies (either grown in my garden last summer, or from a bag purchased on sale)
• a loaded baked potato (a little cheese, veggies, and some low-fat dressings)
• a Crock Pot of soup using leftover chicken (chicken tortilla, noodle, or wild rice)
• beef chili with home canned tomatoes and soaked beans (actually healthy if you drain and rinse 1/2 pound of ground beef!)
• veggie lasagna
• baked Walleye fillets (caught on our trip to Canada last summer) and frozen veggies
• cheese burger sans bun and marinated mushrooms
• corn soup (using sweet corn from my parents' farm that we froze from last summer) 

Snacks

• popcorn
• chips and home canned salsa
• home canned pickles
• a cup of hot chocolate, made with water (not milk)
• a 100-calorie snack from the Aldi's Fit and Active line (we don't have these in the house often)

I feel like my list is much shorter than in reality. Am I forgetting something? What healthy meals do you cook? What are some standby's that you always turn to?