Healthy vs. easy..or both? by Maddie Widmer

*This post is written by my friend Maddie Widmer, I'm just posting it for her*

Being a small business owner who is married to someone who works in an office 45 minutes away, meal planning and prep is a constant struggle. We are constantly trying new apps to help us stay on track, but more often than we’d like to admit we would end up on the phone ordering food at 6:30 when we’ve both just gotten home for the day. For SO many reasons we hate this, but we keep telling ourselves that this is just temporary. When we found out we were expecting our first child, we realized we needed to do a much better job of planning and eating healthy meals. We signed up for a meal delivery kit, which provides us with the ingredients for 3 healthy home-cooked meals each week. We would sit down at our dual-monitored home office and look through the recipes and my Pinterest board, and use Google Calendars to plan out our meals. We would even link the recipe to the calendar event – talk about being TYPE A. We were feeling good, losing weight (me, not so much, but at least I was gaining a healthy amount for baby rather than overeating), and using some of the best produce in our meals. (here is one of our favorite recipes we tried https://dinnerly.com/menu/47292-sesame-ginger-beef-with-green-beans-rice) 

Then, along came our “friend” Quarantine who threw all of this out of whack. What was once a simple weekly trip to the grocery store to pick up fresh fruits and veggies became a matter of life and death, or so it seemed. We immediately went back to survival mode – take out, curbside pickup, and frozen pizzas were back in the weekly cycle. It wasn’t until mid-April that we realized what we were doing to ourselves – my husband gained a couple pounds back (and to a marathon runner, this is DEVASTATING), and I failed my first glucose test for gestational diabetes. Wow – talk about a wakeup call!

We decided to make some changes. Because our county is one of the hardest hit in Iowa by the pandemic, we realized that going out truly was not safe for either of us and it put our unborn child at risk. We started utilizing the pickup options at our local grocery store and Walmart, and we disinfect most of the products we received. This has helped in several ways: we don’t purchase nearly as many impulse items (Cosmic Brownies, I’m looking at you), we order fresh and frozen produce which forces us to use it creatively in recipes before it goes bad, and most importantly, it reduces our risk of contracting the virus and potentially exposing our baby.

One way we have gotten creative with our veggies has been to grill them more than we ever have before. Usually, we will create a foil pack and throw any vegetables that look like they could go bad any day in along with some olive oil and some spices – my favorite is from Cave Creek Olive Oils in Arizona, and is called the “Magic Dust” seasoning for a very good reason! Another idea my husband had was to simply make a smoothie with leftover uncooked vegetables once a week. While we don’t add things like onions or garlic, we do use a lot of green leafy veggies that we have left over from the week’s salads. Not only do we use the food we purchase and therefore reduce waste, we are also filling ourselves up with good nutritious food that tastes like a sweet treat. In just a few short weeks our long legged babe will enter the world and while this may seem like the craziest time to bring a new member of the family home, we are thankful that the Quarantine has forced us to evaluate our eating habits and create better habits for ourselves that we can hopefully pass down to our child someday.

Not used to grilling veggies? Don't worry, it's easy! 
1/2 cup broccoli florets, cut into 1-inch pieces 3 carrots, sliced into coins 1 onion, any color, diced 2 potatoes, any kind, diced 1/2 cup mushrooms, diced 1/2 cup peppers, any color, sliced 4 Tbsp olive oil seasoning of choice (I like Italian, Ranch, or Greek!)

(Really, you can do this with whatever veggies you have!)
Combine all vegetables in a medium bowl and toss with olive oil and seasoning. Use approximately 18-24" of aluminum foil and spread vegetables out over one half, staying away from the edges. Fold the empty half over top of the vegetable mixture, and then crimp the edges to create a packet. Place on grill over medium heat until all vegetables are tender, approximately 20-30 minutes. Toss to re-coat and serve.

And you're done! Healthy and easy!