This is one of my favorite ways to increase the vegetable quantity and overall nutrient density of my family’s favorite meals. It’s fast and easy to add a handful of baby spinach or some grated veggies to a sauce or ground meat, and I know my family is getting a nutrient boost—even if they don’t notice the change! Here are a couple ideas to try:

• Add a couple handfuls of prewashed baby spinach to spaghetti sauce.
• Add grated zucchini or carrot to ground beef for tacos, meatloaf, meatballs, or any casserole.
• Add a can of pureed pumpkin to chili.

Adding the amazing health supportive benefits of spices like turmeric, ginger, and cinnamon to your meals is a fast and delicious way to upgrade the nutrients in your diet. Spices are nutrient-packed and add antioxidants that help support immune system function, healthy levels of inflammation, and even healthy blood sugar balance. Try one of these tasty ideas with our bulk organic spice blends to spice up your life!

• To get turmeric, garlic, and ginger in your diet, try using a premade curry sauce with a quality protein, cooked vegetables or rice.
• Add pumpkin pie spice blend to oatmeal, baked goods, or even squash soup to get the immune system support of cinnamon, ginger, cloves and nutmeg. You might also try adding a dash to your morning coffee!
• Use poultry blend spices on chicken, pork or turkey to get antioxidant boosts from rosemary, thyme, and sage.
• Sprinkle immune supportive Italian blend spices (oregano, basil, rosemary, and thyme) on any protein, spaghetti squash, gluten-free noodles, or to spaghetti sauce for a spice boost!

Snacks have a tendency to be carbohydrate heavy and nutrient light. Making sure your snacks are protein-rich is a diet upgrade that can help support healthy blood sugar levels and decrease cravings for unhealthy foods. Try one of these ideas:

• Quick and tasty dips with gluten-free crackers or vegetables are a great healthy snack option that will leave you satisfied until your next meal.
• Hard-boiled eggs are a great source of protein and a wide variety of other nutrients, including lutein, vitamin E, vitamin A, and choline. It only takes about 10 minutes to hard boil an egg that can then serve as an on-the-go protein-rich breakfast or snack. Try our new Natural Grocers brand Organic and Pasture-raised eggs for even more nutrition! Note: Hard boiled eggs last about a week in the refrigerator.

The best way to upgrade the nutrients in your meals is to develop a meal plan for the week. By thinking out in advance the meals you will make, you can be sure to include lots of vegetables, a quality protein, healthy fats and additional carbohydrates to make a nutritionally balanced plate that the whole family can enjoy.

Writing out a grocery list from your meal plan helps to ensure you have on hand the ingredients to make healthy meals. This reduces excuses for choosing unhealthy foods or skipping meals altogether. Making a grocery list, and then sticking to it, can also reduce the quantity of unhealthy foods in your cupboard, limiting the chance that cravings will get the best of you!

Meal planning tips:

• Consider the time you will have available to cook each day when developing your meal plan.
• Schedule in time over the weekend to prepare what you can in advance.
• In addition to a nightly dinner, plan out two or three breakfast options and two or three lunch options you can reuse throughout the week.
• Get the family involved. Asking the kids what they would like to have for dinner can help limit mealtime arguments and get kids involved in making healthy food choices.
• Check out our webpages with breakfast, lunch and dinner meal ideas for inspiration!

I hope these tips help you upgrade your family’s favorite meals and make the best use of valuable cooking time to create healthy meals. Now we would love to hear from you. Share your favorite meal upgrading tips and tricks in the comments section below.

Stay tuned for the next post in this series with ideas for including fitness in your life in 10 minutes or less.

Wishing you and your family a happy and healthy New Year!