Need ideas to eat more vegetables

murphysraven

I am having a hard time finding ways to eat and enjoy my vegetables. Typically our house will eat some sort of vegetable at dinner but breakfast, lunch and snacks I am having trouble making myself eat them.

I seem to prefer cooked or somewhat cooked veggies but they always seem to taste horrid as leftovers. There are only a few veggies I will enjoy raw and even then its an effort to make myself eat them without dressing.

I would greatly appreciate any and all ideas.

ak_in_ak

I eat baby carrots and half a bell pepper ( not sure how you feel about those) with a light dip. I use light sour cream mixed with powdered ranch. They have other flavors of powdered dressings as well. it is a little high in sodium but makes the veggies wonderful!

songbyrdsweet

I have filled 1/2 a red bell pepper with light tuna or chicken salad. Super yum! I also love the steamfresh bags of veggies...they cook in the microwave 3-5 minutes and sometimes have a nice light sauce.

adagolden

I love baby carrots with humus or wholly guacamole. Fat free ranch dressing is good too. I have also melted a wedge of laughing cow cheese on some broccoli, that was yummy. Or just dip veggies in laughing cow, they make various flavors. I just got some sugar snap peas and those are great in some spicy humus. Keep trying new things til you find what you like.

jell52

I buy a bag of raw baby spinach every week. I started mixing a handfull into almost any meal I was eating. (Like with spaghetti or even when I would eat a frozen lean cuisine I would chop it up and mix it in once the food was cooked.) It's really surprising how well it tastes in alot of things.

freakaleek1

There is lots of things you can try. For instance, you could juice some of your veggies in the morning and add in an apple. One of my favorite juicing mixtures is: Celery,apple,spinach and a cucumber. its so refreshing and really wakes you up in the morning. You can really play with them and see what mixture you like the most. You can try steaming some veggies and eat them with a home made garlic butter. My kids love it. You can home make some hummus or make a home made mango salsa or homemade regular salsa and then cut up some cucumber, carrots,celery and use them as your chips. You can home make some sweet potato chips by slicing the sweet potato really thin and adding your favorite herd mixture and then baking them. You can do the same and make fry's. I have a lot more ideas but i don't want to over whelm you.:)

OopsieDaisy2003

I buy some of the frozen veggie dishes by birdseye or green giant...and use them as a lunch. A fav of mine for lunch is the Birds Eye Tuscan Vegetable with some whole wheat bread (double fiber) - the whole container is 125 cal - then add bread and./or other sides like cheese, crackers. Green giant makes decent brocolli and cheese combos - some with roasted potatoes, or pasta (approx 300 cals a container). The only downfall I see to a lot of these can be sodium.

wanttogetskinny

I also am not a huge fan of raw veggies without dip. Though I've found that raw cucumbers with just a bit of garlic salt is good (and 0 cals for the garlic salt.....though I don't use much because I want to decrease my sodium intake). I also like celery with cream cheese, which is a lot lower cal than peanut butter.

wlddove

I second the sweet potato fries (chips)... just don't add a bunch of oil when baking them. I use butter-flavored cooking spray and some a little salt and seasonings (garlic and rosemary are delish).

Also, you could check out one of those cookbooks that shows you how to sneak veggies into your food, like this one:
http://www.amazon.com/Deceptively-Delicious-Simple-Secrets-Eating/dp/0061251348

Genomerio

Coming from Mexico, a popular flavoring for raw fruit and veggies is a classic salt, chili powder and lime juice. Adjust to your own liking, make a mix and use it to flavor the snack. I love the stuff with celery, carrots, corn (raw or cooked), oranges, apples, green mango, green papaya, etc. Just experiment.

minadeathclutch

my favorite way to eat them is in sandwiches. and omelets!

Sometimes I eat a small bagel in the morning, with cream cheese and tomatoes! so delicious.

if I feel like cooking, I will scramble two eggs, one yolk two eggwhites, put them in a pan, cut up peppers, tomatoes, onions!

also, when eating pasta, I cut up peppers and tomatoes and toss em in with my sauce.
if its mac and cheese ill cook some brocoli in with it.

Make some home made pizza, throw a ton of vegetables on it. I love peppers, tomatoes, onions, mushrooms, whateva!

I also love hummus wraps... I wrap up hummus, lettuce, spinach, pickles, onions, tomatoes, and mustard! and eat it with a side of potato salad.


also, I love my "hot sauce" soup.
what you need is a package of ramen, I use half of the noodles, I throw in a can of diced tomatoes, and brocoli, and carrots, and about half a cup of hot sauce, it makes my nose and eyes water lol but its delicious!

murphysraven

fantastic ideas everyone. I am inspired! Thank you so much.

dam1968

green giant makes single serve frozen veggies called just for one. I will eat one of these for a snack often.

kristinathenina

try adding salsa to scrambled eggs for breakfast- its my favorite.

suzooz

I agree with you -- cooked vegetables don't taste very good leftover, so I typically will eat the whole bag of vegetables at dinner. I figure I will probably have a tablespoon of butter regardless of whether I eat a cup of vege's or 4 cups of veges. And 3 cups of veges won't add that many more calories.

Also, have you tried using Cauliflower as a pizza crust? Or how about riced cauliflower (shredded cauliflower to substitute as rice). If you steam it and mash it just right, you can get it to mimic mashed potatoes.

shellybsn

Try roasting. My hubby got me a little toaster oven for my birthday (pretty cheap at WalMart). I put a little bit of olive oil and lite salt and pepper and broil till soft and a little browned. Baby carrots are REALLY GOOD this way!! Also bell pepper, onions, squash and potatos (not really a veggie but still yummy!)