Sick of eating cereal and Ramen for lunch and dinner? Want to spend less money eating out and finally start cooking for yourself? Put down that frozen pizza, because HC’s Health Editor, Sammie Levin, is here to share her daily eats so you can get ideas for healthy, satisfying meals that are easy enough for any time-strapped collegiette to make. After you read Collegiette Eats, your taste buds, wallet and waistline will thank you.
Breakfast
I woke up yesterday craving eggs for breakfast, so I made a bowl of scrambled eggs (1 egg plus 1/4 cup egg whites) and topped it with a fried egg because I love the taste of runny yolk. I also added chopped tomato and avocado (about 1/4 of a large avocado) to the bowl and topped it all with some salt and pepper.
Eggs are a great source of protein, making it a good choice for breakfast to power you through the morning. One study found that women who started their day with eggs for breakfast loss twice as much as those who ate a carb-based breakfast. Eggcellent.
Lunch
Want to know what the easiest lunch to make is? A smoothie. What could be easier than throwing a bunch of ingredients in a blender? You don't have to have any cooking skills, just the ability to press a button - and based on how often we text, we're all experts at that. It's hard to get bored of smoothies because you can switch them up by experimenting with different flavor combinations. It's better to make your own as opposed to buying one at a chain, though, because those tend to be loaded with sugar. For example, Smoothie King's Activator Strawberry Smoothie has almost 500 calories and a whopping 89 grams of sugar. That's as much sugar as almost nine Krispy Kreme glazed donuts! So, avoid an unintentional sugar bomb by making your own.
The color of my smoothie may not be too appetizing, but blame that on the spinach I added. Adding spinach to smoothies is an easy way to sneak vegetables into your diet because it's mild enough that you can't taste it (even though it does make your smoothie a little ugly). My smoothie for lunch yesterday contained the following ingredients:
- 1/2 cup Fage 0% Greek yogurt
- 1 cup almond milk
- 1/2 cup frozen mango and pineapple chunks
- 1/2 cup frozen mixed berries
- 1 handful spinach
- 1 packet Splenda
- 1 tablespoon chia seeds
Dinner
For dinner, I made another chicken sausage sautee. I used the leftover lentils from my last one and added brown rice as a base for the bowl. I used Minute's Ready to Serve Brown Rice, which is perfect for time-strapped collegiettes because all you have to do to prepare it is microwave it for one minute. They come in single-serve containers, making it easy to control your portion sizes. Aside from the chopped chicken sausage, I added cherry tomatoes, mushrooms, kale and broccolini, all of which I sauteed in olive oil with minced garlic. I had some leftovers that I gave to one of my friends who confirmed that this was a tasty, filling meal, so you have our word. And it only took about 10 minutes total to prepare!