What did you make for dinner?

I find planning ahead is key. There are easy to make quick meals but they take a little effort once a week. It's all about prep! Precook chicken and turkey breasts for easy salads, soups and wraps. Make a huge pot of broth based soups full of veggies and freeze for later.. I also like to make 100 calorie portions of nuts or cheese to take to work for a morning and afternoon snack.

saralthrash wrote: »

I find planning ahead is key. There are easy to make quick meals but they take a little effort once a week. It's all about prep! Precook chicken and turkey breasts for easy salads, soups and wraps. Make a huge pot of broth based soups full of veggies and freeze for later.. I also like to make 100 calorie portions of nuts or cheese to take to work for a morning and afternoon snack.

This. Prepping takes time at first, but it gets faster and becomes second nature. I roasted chicken breasts and froze them two Sundays ago, and made a crock pot soup this past Sunday, and I will eat well for the rest of the week.

Also add some roughage to that dinner to make it more filling. I often have a protein and a sweet potato, but I'll have broccoli with them. I use a little butter on both the sweet potato and the brocc, and don't go over in calories. Fat is filling as well.

I also make beef stew a lot.

1 lb of stew meat
1 onion, chopped
2 cups carrots
2 cups celery
1 cup frozen corn
1 cup frozen peas
2 cups of red potatoes
2 Tbsp of corn starch
2 Tbsp Worcestershire sauce
1 packet of beef stew seasoning
36 oz of Beef Broth
6 oz tomato paste
1 small can of tomato paste

I usually weigh everything out instead of relying on measuring cups, but you don't have to
For flavor, I brown the meat with half of the beef stew seasoning packet, half of the onion, and some olive oil. Then throw everything into a crockpot and set on low for about 10 hours. Makes about 5 servings and comes out to around 340 calories.


I know crockpots aren't quick, but It's nice to set it and forget it. I also usually double recipes, portion them out, and freeze for a quick pop-in-the-oven meal.

I've been using a lot of Skinnytaste.com's recipes lately. She focuses on lower calorie meals, most seem to be under 400 cals per serving. I also meal plan before I go grocery shopping for the week, and try to make at least 1 pot of soup or a casserole so that I have easy leftovers for lunch/dinners. Here are a few I've liked lately:

http://www.skinnytaste.com/2014/10/quinoa-fiesta-enchilada-bake.html
http://www.skinnytaste.com/2009/11/crock-pot-minestrone-soup.html
http://www.skinnytaste.com/2015/01/buffalo-chicken-meatballs.html

I try to follow the guideline of 1/4 of my plate is protein, 1/4 carbs, 1/2 veg. Something like a steak, a baked potato, and roasted broccoli (that's a staple meal in my house). This also works for pasta or stirfry... 1/4 meat (or tofu), 1/4 rice or noodles, 1/2 vegetables (a bag of frozen stirfry veg is easy, or chop up some cabbage and peppers).

Escarole and white bean soup

I've been playing with my new slow cooker.

On Monday night, I browned some chicken mince and onions, and while doing that I cut up a couple potatoes, 1 sweet potato, half a cauliflower, and a couple carrots and tossed them into the slow cooker. Then I added the chicken mince and onions. I have packets of McCormick's Slow Cooker recipe bases, so I mixed the Mild Chicken Curry one with light coconut milk and stirred it into the mix.

http://www.mccormick.com.au/Products/Recipe-Bases/Slow-Cookers/McCormick-Slow-Cookers-Mild-Chicken-Curry

It wasn't quite as done as I would have liked it when we served up the first helping of it on Tuesday. I had left it simmering for about 3 hours Monday evening and another couple hours on Tuesday after work and it probably needed another hour. But it was all right.

Last night, however, it was excellent!

Both nights we served it over brown rice.

I got a wok recently and have been making big stir fries - tons of veggies, two eggs scrambled in the wok for protein, served on rice if I have the calories for it. I'm not usually a fan of frozen veggies in anything but soup but have been enjoying frozen stir fry mixes, which cuts down on prep time. Stir fries are great because you can really just toss in whatever and tweak it to meet your calorie goals - more or less (or no!) oil, rice or not, some kind of sauce or just a few shakes of soy sauce and red pepper flakes, etc.

Tonight though was leftover slow cooker chicken chili served on a huge salad. I eat a lot of things on a bed of greens and veggies - chili, stew, basically anything that's not soup, since that gets a bit runny