How to Spice Up Lunches at Home

Envious of those who work in an office and meet at trendy, delicious restaurants for lunch every day? Unable to find the time to create a nutritious but inspiring lunch at home while you wade through paperwork? There’s no need to whip out cutting boards, heavy pots, pans and a bevy of ingredients in order to spice up your lunches from home. A little creativity and focus on what you love to eat (and what loves your body too) will help you mix up the humdrum mid-afternoon meal routine.

Steps

1. 1
   Examine what you’ve been eating. Find that you feel exhausted and in need of a nap after lunch or do your lunches leave you wanting, needing something else?

   • Identify foods that you love and make you feel good. Have that “go to” food you like to eat for lunch but find that it’s become a little too ordinary? You can still have your turkey (or spinach or lentils) for lunch but kick it up a notch. List everything you love to eat for lunch in order to enhance the menu.
   • Eliminate any food that make you feel sluggish or possibly interfere with your day. Perhaps you love a heavy pasta dish, but you find that it makes you want to nap after eating it.
   • Make a list of staple lunches that you can’t live without. Perhaps you love certain dishes just the way they are. Make a list of those special lunches you would love to devour at least once a week so you don't forget to incorporate them into your culinary repertoire.
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2. 2
   Consider ingredients or food you’ve always wanted to try (but were afraid to). Whether you’ve been thinking about using a little turmeric in your lentils or thought that having salmon in the afternoon might be a good idea, now is the time to try those offbeat ingredients/foods to spice up lunchtime.

   • Search recipes that blend your usual foods with the new ingredient. However only consider recipes that can be assembled and prepared within 15 minutes or less. If you work from home, you won’t want to spend your time cooking when you could be eating and/or working.
   • Investigate how the food/ingredient is typically prepared. If the new food requires a lot of prep-work, you may want to investigate ways to prepare the food the evening before or if possible, purchase it already prepared.
3. 3
   Remove the “ho hum” from typical salads, sandwiches and soups. Enhancing the typical lunch is easy and may only mean that you substitute one ingredient for another. Try different approaches and seasonings to design the ideal lunch.

   • Ditch plain old lettuce and create salads using canned black beans, olive oil, defrosted corn and quinoa.
   • Gazpacho soup can be made ahead of time and chilled for quick and easy access. In addition to its tangy goodness, gazpacho soup is packed with low calorie, highly potent nutrients which include garlic, red pepper, tomato and onion.
   • Wrap up your sandwiches. Reduce calories by using a low calorie wrap bread or lettuce leaves to engulf your sandwich. Instead of plain old PB&J, consider shrimp salad, pre-prepared hummus and taboleigh or fresh sliced turkey and Swiss.
4. 4
   Create lunches the night/week beforehand so you can grab and go. You may not have time to cook but crave something home cooked mid day. You can have your cooked lunch and eat it too with a little planning a few days ahead of time.

   • Cook on Sunday and freeze lunches for the week. You can have a gourmet lunch ready for consumption in minutes with a little planning ahead of time.
   • Make large quantities of one dish for easy access. A large pasta salad or even several grilled chicken breasts to top a spinach salad can help.
   • Design theme lunches. Mexican on Wednesday and Middle Eastern on Thursday. Don’t forget about having fun with food and celebrate other cultures by exploring different types of spices and sauces.