As winter approaches, are you looking for some healthy meal ideas for cold weather? Since June, AnnMarie and I have shared lots of meal ideas with our What’s On My Plate feature. But since we live in North Carolina, a lot of those meals have been geared more for warm weather.
December broke some snow records here in North Carolina! We ended up with somewhere between 6 and 8 inches of snow where we live last weekend. When the weather turns cold like that, I’m eating comfort food. The great thing about Trim Healthy Mama is that comfort foods are totally on plan! [just dated myself there: I totally was a teen in the 80s…]
Let’s take a look at some of my favorites from a day last week for the last What’s On My Plate Wednesday of 2018!
Breakfast | THM-E
One of my favorite comfort foods this time of year is oatmeal. And last month I discovered Pearl’s Sweatpants Oatmeal. What on earth is “sweatpants oatmeal” you ask? Well, to me it’s comfort food at its finest.
She calls it “sweatpants oatmeal” because it’s comfortable and easy, just like a pair of sweatpants.
I call it delicious.
When my mom and one of my mothers-in-love were visiting for Thanksgiving I made it for them and they both fell in love with it too! It is so creamy and flavorful and delicious. It is NOT like the oatmeal recipe on the container of oats. Not even close.
Oatmeal doesn’t have a lot of protein in it. And I didn’t want to do anything to change up the recipe so I skipped the trick I shared for boosting protein in my Apple Pie Oatmeal recipe. Instead, I added a scoop of collagen to my tea.
Second Breakfast | THM – E
I finished breakfast at 7:15, so I was pretty hungry again by 10:30. I wasn’t really in the mood for “lunch” food yet, so I had a second “breakfast.”
The clementines just came out at our local grocery store so of course, I added them to my cart! They’re one of my family’s favorites.
This is one of my favorite quickie E meals/snacks. Toast your favorite sprouted bread. Spread each slice with half a wedge of Light Swiss Laughing Cow cheese and sprinkle with an on-plan sweetener. Then put some fruit on top. If you want, give it a sprinkle of cinnamon too.
It is so yummy and it’s easy to eat while I’m working at my computer. That’s a win/win.
Lunch | THM – S
There’s something about a grilled cheese sandwich this time of year! I love dipping it into tomato soup, but didn’t have time to make up a batch and didn’t have any in my freezer. Unfortunately, canned tomato soup has high fructose corn syrup as the second ingredient. ?
If you love tomato soup with your grilled cheese too, here’s a simple, on-plan recipe: Just Like Campbell’s Tomato Soup. If you have a little bacon on hand, toss some of that in to really kick it up a notch!
This grilled cheese sandwich is made with pimento cheese. Talk about comfort food! Good grief. I like to get the Palmetto Cheese brand jalapeno pimento cheese or make my own (recipe coming soon!).
You may be wondering about the bread. After all, this is an S meal, not a crossover! I made up a single serve batch of the White Wonder Blender Bread from the Trim Healthy Table cookbook. You cook it in the microwave! I don’t love it plain, but it is great for grilled cheese sandwiches.
A couple mini dill pickles and some red bell peppers rounded out this meal.
Dinner | THM-S
Fried rice may not be everybody’s idea of “comfort food,” but that’s what I made for dinner. It’s one of my family’s favorites.
I cook up the veggies, eggs, and cubed ham and then pull out a portion for myself before I add the brown rice to the big pot. I make 2 frozen bags of caulirice and add one bag to my family’s portion and use the other bag for mine.
My kids and husband regularly have crossover meals, so the brown rice is fine for their portion. But I like to use a healthy amount of coconut oil and sesame oil in this recipe (plus the whole eggs), so I keep my portion an S meal by only using caulirice.
Healthy Meal Ideas for Cold Weather
So there you have it. My day of comfort food (brought to you by the color orange! ?). To review, I had:
Breakfast (E): Sweatpants Oatmeal with collagen tea
Second Breakfast (E): sprouted toast with laughing cow cheese, sweetener, and 2 small clementines
Lunch (S): grilled pimento cheese sandwich using White Wonder Blender Bread, with dill pickles and red peppers
Dinner (S): fried rice using frozen riced cauliflower instead of rice
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