Any recipes/ideas for meals or snacks with large portions but don't kill your calories?

If you like big meals, you can do IF where you might only eat two meals a day. If you skip snacks, you almost have to work hard to fit in enough calories and protein into two meals. -- maybe do that on days when you want more food.

Small meals or snacks throughout the day (every 3 hours or so) and a bottle of water will help keep you feeling satisfied. If you make those snacks healthy and low and calories, you can dig in a dinner time. I start off with my morning cup of tea (I'm not a breakfast person) and fill in with fruits and proteins (apples & peanut butter) throughout the day or cheese and nuts and then have a large salad (packed with, greens, fruits to satisfy my sweet tooth, other veggies, sunflower seeds or nuts for the healthy oil, chicken, fish, tuna, or shrimp for the protein and so on. By the time I'm done putting the salad together, its huge and only about 300 and something calories. Another healthy snack before I leave work and snack on my ride home. Then I "go in" at dinner time because I have so many calories to spare.

I make mason jar salads on Sunday night and grab one each morning as I'm heading out the door. The salads keep for a bout 7 to 8 days and it removes all the tough decision making struggles when deciding, on the spot, what to have for lunch.

Good luck!

I've been really loving coleslaw mix as a base for meals lately. Like coleslaw mix topped with tuna, salsa, and guacamole, or in place of rice or pasta, or mixed up and lightly cooked with eggs and sausage. Just the preshredded cabbage and carrots in the salad section of the grocery store, not the stuff mixed with mayo and stuff (I actually don't like actual coleslaw!).

Cauliflower can be added to calorie dense dishes to bump up the volume. Pasta + cauliflower + sauce / Mashed potatoes & mashed cauliflower / "Riced" cauliflower mixed with regular rice.

Zucchini is also very low in calories. This is also good in pasta dishes.

Peeled cucumbers can be mixed in with fruit salad. 4 cups fruit + 1 cup cucumber.....for 4 servings, you've increase the serving size by 25%.

An 8oz boneless skinless chicken breast is usually around 250 calories, and 52g of protein. That's a half pound of meat! Add in some baked (not fried) veggies or broiled, or even steamed and you have a wonderful meal with very little calories. Granted, I would want some sort of sauce on the chicken but seasoned well it wouldn't be an issue. I eat a ton of chicken for this very reason, very high protein, very low calories. As long as you don't fry it in oil, or baste it in oil it's very good for you. As far as pasta, try Zoodles.. which is basically zucchini noodles made with a spiralizer, or use spaghetti squash. Pair that with a low calorie sauce and the chicken and you still have a great and filling meal. It's all about what you eat, there are many things out there better for you. Simply try and get away from fried food and any food that is prepared in/with oil and you'll be full and be under your calories. I learned to love veggies steamed and baked with very little or no oil. One of my favorite sides with any meal is baked cauliflower. 50 calories per 200grams, 200 grams is a very large side, and that's only 50 calories. If you add very little olive oil or one of the low/no calorie olive oil sprays (they all have some calories) just to lightly coat, then salt and pepper then bake at 375 until it's getting brown on the outside. Good stuff.

Try cauliflower fried rice sometime, it's wonderful if done right!

Soup. That is my go to when I am super hungry but don't have a lot of calories left for dinner. You can use whatever you have on hand. My mom was great at throwing together a soup. She would use leftover meatloaf to make a killer beef and vegetable soup. Basically all you need is liquid, starch, and protein.

Liquid: chicken stock or broth, beef broth, water, vegetable stock

Starch: potato, rice, pasta

Protein: chicken, tofu, any leftover meat that you cooked plainly. I use canned chicken if I don't have any left over. Maybe even egg, if you know what you're doing. (I don't. lol)

Just cook the starch in the liquid, then add the protein. If your protein is raw, add it sooner and be sure to bring it up to boiling. I always use a ton of veggies as well, since I like a rich soup, and it helps me keep down on the starches. Most grocery stores sell a "soup mix" of frozen veggies, and I loooove to use that. I always try to have it on hand.

I made a soup the other night with chicken broth, soup mix veggies (it had potatoes in it already), and a can of chicken. It was done in about fifteen minutes, and the whole pot, probably three or four bowls of soup, was 328 calories, 34 g protein. You can't beat that with a stick.

vivmom2014 wrote: »

Start by eating more than 1200 calories!!

This^

A very small % of women "have to" eat 1200 calories. Instead, most choose this for fast(er) weight loss.