The Vine: May 4, 2012
I have a question about a topic I know is near and dear to you — snacks! Well, snacks and other food, and I’m hoping the TN readers can help with some suggestions.
I’m fat, and while I’d like to lose some weight, my main concern is not gaining any more weight this semester or going broke buying fast food. I’ve gone back to school, and part of my program basically involves picking up a math degree. I work for my college running our Math Center, and all of my friends are in either math or engineering classes. We’re all crazy, obsessive high-achievers, so we generally spend every hour during the day that we aren’t in class working together on homework in the Center, so even when I’m not working, I’m in there.
Bottom line, I leave my house at 7:45 AM, work until I have class at 11:00, have 30 minutes off for lunch, then either work or have class in the afternoon for a few hours. I’m usually in the Math Center until 7:00 working with my classmates if I’m not on the clock, then I head home, except for Wednesdays when I have a 6:00-9:00 night class. All of this takes place in the same building, and we’re at a small commuter school with a terrible dining hall. We have some decent coffee carts/kiosks, but they’re expensive.
I can’t afford to keep eating subs and pizza with the guys every day (for the sake of my wallet and my waistbands), and those are the only options close to campus. I also try not to leave and come back during the day, both because I don’t have a lot of time between shifts, classes, and getting my own work done, and because after 9:00 AM parking is impossible. In short, I’m out of the house and in one building roughly 12 hours a day.
I’m looking for ideas for food that either comes pre-packaged or that I can portion and package myself. I have a little space in the Math Center to keep food, but we don’t have a refrigerator or a sink on our floor. Everything needs to be shelf-stable, essentially. There is a microwave and a water fountain, so I can do things like oatmeal cups and soup.
I don’t want to deal with washing and reusing plates, cups, or bowls since I’m there all day and there’s no convenient place to wash them. I also would like some food that can keep me going all day that is better for me than the chips and candy bars in the vending machine.
Last semester, I kept a supply of:
- Instant oatmeal in single serving cups — they’re more expensive than packets, but so convenient; I plan to keep using those
- Easy Mac — easy, but gross
- Peanut-butter crackers
- Granola bars
- Clif bars
I plan to keep bringing the last three, and adding nuts, but I need some variety and I need something more substantial most days. If I had a fridge and a sink, I’d be fine, but without those, I’m a little stuck. I’m looking for high-protein, portable, reasonably healthy food that I can eat while walking around the room working, walking between classes, or while trying to figure out differential equations and triple integrals at a table full of always-hungry college boys.
Suggestions?
Hungry for more than knowledge
Tags: Ask The Readers food health and beauty
I’m currently obsessed with Popcorn, Indiana popcorn. Whole grain, all-natural, gluten-free (if that’s an issue), and lots of flavors.
Maybe try bringing some fruit? Apples, oranges, bananas, and grapes might all be good options. I recommend making a dip from peanut butter with a bit of honey mixed in and bringing an apple to slice up when you’re ready for a snack.
My husband is a teacher and he likes to bring trail mix and fruit for those days when he doesn’t really get a solid lunch break for whatever reason.
I also wonder, though, if you can’t get a really good little insulated lunchbox so you’re not stuck eating only shelf-stable food? That’s really tough to do well. But a good lunchbox with an icepack should be able to get some fresh or frozen food through at least until lunchtime, no? If that would work, on the weekends you could make a big pot of something, like say bean/corn/pasta salad that can just be scooped into a tupperware and eaten cold but is healthy, filling, and tasty. And in the winter, what about soup in a thermos?
If you’re looking to eat healthy and lose weight, packaged shelf stable food is just not going to cut it, really. Unless you’re content with eating room-temp raw fruits, veggies and nuts, you’re going to be eating a lot of extra sugar and salt at minimum, even if you buy expensive “healthy” brands of that stuff. Find ways to work around the no-fridge situation, and you’ll open up a world of eating possibilities!
The popcorn idea is also a good one for snack food, though :)
A few options that work for me:
1. Peanut butter and jelly on 100% whole grain bread – fine for the day out of the fridge, filling, good for you (just measure the PB so you don’t go overboard [1 1/2-2 T max] and get no sugar added jelly if you can find it.
2. Hard boiled eggs. I boil a bunch on the weekend and grab them from the fridge in the mornings.
3. Ditto on fruit, I find apples and bananas most filling (without dipping it in anything). Also think veggies carrot sticks, pepper sticks, etc. You can bring hummus to dip if you like.
I second the fruit option, as well as (unsweetened) applesauce cups. Hardboiled eggs will keep throughout the day, too. Could you bring one of those small insulated bags with an ice pack and then pack stuff like yogurt, string cheese and lean turkey slices? This would also allow you to do something like pre-cut veggies with hummus.
Celery with peanut butter is a healthier option to peanut butter crackers. Also, if you bring one of those frozen meals in the morning (Lean Cuisine, Smart Ones, Healthy Choice), they generally take several hours to actually thaw out, so they would be perfect for microwaving for lunch and then tossing the box in the trash.
I would definitely look into buying a small cooler. That would keep things like yogurt fresh until at least lunchtime. (Mine will last until mid-afternoon, especially if I put an ice pack in it.). Hummus will work well in a cooler too, and it will also allow you to keep celery and carrots on hand. The latter can be portioned out in snack baggies, and Sabra makes single serve hummus packs.
It’s a scientific fact that apples taste better when they’re sliced. Bring a paring knife with you (wrapped in a double paper towel so you don’t get stabbed when you reach in your lunchbag), and I think you’ll enjoy it much more. Also works for pears, stone fruit, etc. You can always rinse the acid off the knife in the ladies room, even if there isn’t a kitchen sink.
Does anyone in the Nation know whether hummus comes in shelf-stable single-servings? That could work, too, but I just don’t know about refrigeration. How long does an ice pack last in an insulated lunch bag?
Is there anywhere you can put a small refrigerator? Under your desk? I live in a college town, and at the end of the school year (like, now, just before students are graduating or moving), you can go on Craigslist and find a dozen mini fridges selling in the $20-$50 range. That would really open up your options.
Even if you just got a mini cooler or a good insulated bag, you could start bringing yogurts, cheeses, leftovers… even frozen meals would make it ’til lunchtime (although probably not dinner).
I’ll second the fruit suggestion, as well. Also, you can make a big batch of a pasta salad, or a bean salad on the weekend, and bring it for lunches for days. If you don’t make it mayo based, refrigeration isn’t important.
You might consider making your own bars to take with you. Clif and other power bars tend to have a lot of sugar in them which makes them a bad choice if you want to sustain energy over the day and avoid the vending machine. Search Allrecipes.com for power bars and you’ll turn up some simple recipes that you could make on the weekend to have over the week.
Also, if you don’t have an insulated lunch bag, try to get one because it will open your options up tremendously. Veggies with hummus, fruit and yogurt dip (you could even freeze the dip so it will thaw out during the day and be ready for lunch or snack time), trail mix or plain nuts, or burritos that you make and freeze on the weekends.
Do you have room on your shelf for an insulated lunch bag with a cold pack? I work in similar conditions, but with fridge access, and have been living all semester on hummus + Triscuits, Chobani, and apples in addition to the items you mentioned.
Failing that, I’d be shaking down the math dept., the student life office, and anyone else who would listen about getting a mini-fridge in your Math Center. It’s damn difficult to eat healthy if you can’t keep anything cold.
Second the suggestion for peanut/other nut butter and fruit. You can buy packets of peanut butter and almond butter, or you can just scoop some into a small container.
I don’t like room temp string cheese, but you may not have an objection to it, in which case I strongly recommend string cheese as the most portable snack ever.
Make your own trail mix on weekends to control what goes in and how high in fat/sugar it is.
Most sandwiches travel reasonably well. You might pack mustard and mayo separately if you don’t like soggy bread.
Last, get an insulated bag and a decent ice pack. You can bring food that needs to be kept cold that way and microwave it if you want. So you could bring yogurt and deli turkey for cold things, or leftovers from dinner the night before and reheat it.
Canned fruit salad and bean salads are nice and healthy too, and don’t need to be kept cold.
One trick I used to use in grad school was I would put some still-frozen peas (or other frozen veggies) in a tupperware container and by lunch time, they would be thawed enough that you can heat them up in the microwave real fast. I found that was a really good way to get some vegetables into my diet when I was mad busy.
Can you scramble yourself some eggs before you leave in the morning? A breakfast of protein will take you far.
Apples and peanut butter are great, and if you use one of those corers it’s even easier to slice. Be careful, they’re sharp.
Oranges are another fruit that is wonderfully stable.
I would go with PBJ sandwiches; they are so easy to make up at home and bring in. When I worked at a soup kitchen they would make a loaf’s worth, wrap the sandwiches, and freeze them for later handout to somebody who needed food to go. You could make a batch on a Sunday for the week. Use a really great whole grain bread.
Another thing that travels well is steel cut oats, the super hearty kind. Cook your batch on Sunday and sweeten to taste, portion into ziploc bags, and nuke in a paper bowl or plate. Plastic spoons.
Water bottle and Mio flavorings. Seriously! Hydration is sooo important when you are trying to lose weight, and the flavoring really helps a lot.
Cucumber can be sliced into disks and keep for a day in a ziploc bag with a blue ice for chilliness. It’s finger food. If you want a little zip, keep a bottle of salad dressing in the fridge for a dipping sauce. IMO it’s worth choosing a lower sodium one when trying to lose weight.
Another great snack if you can make it up the night before: grilled chicken breasts, sliced into strips. They will keep you going.
I think if you can try to keep yourself to more of a fresh/whole food plan and avoid the jars and cans of sodium-laced convenience foods, you will see some pounds fall off with no effort.
I second the recommendation of bringing fruit and veggies from home and snacking on them (possibly with peanut butter) during the day.
I also recommend the little Laughing Cow cheeses – they should last until lunch, and you can eat them on crackers that you keep at school or on veggies that you’ve brought from home. (The low fat ones taste remarkably good and are pretty good for you too, while being filling). Both of those options will be much healthier than prepackaged peanut butter crackers.
You can keep nuts (pistachios, almonds) at school, and as long as they’re just roasted without sugar or anything added, they are very good for you.
In terms of losing weight, I’m not sure that Clif Bars are the best option if you’re mostly sitting around and doing school work. I love them, but I try not to eat them unless I’m exercising. A really tasty similar option that has a better mix of fiber and stuff are Kashi Dark Mocha Almond bars. They taste like candy, but they’re really quite good for you and very filling.
Lastly, I don’t see why you can’t bring little containers of leftovers that don’t include meat or dairy (and can thus make it safely to lunch), and just eat out of the container, close it up, and take it home at night to wash it up. I do that all the time at work, because I’m too lazy to walk over to the other office where there is a sink.
First, invest in a Pack-It cooler. I can’t say enough good things about mine. I send my son to school with his lunches, and when he comes home with the Pack-It smooshed in his backpack, it’s still cold. (Also, it’s durable: it stands up to a preschooler’s abuse.)
Next, here are my typical snacks/small meals (and I’ve lost 38 pounds since May, although to be fair, 20 pounds of that was baby and baby by-product):
– string cheese (sometimes eaten with grapes)
– vanilla or plain Greek yogurt (wonderful with berries – you can get individual cups of frozen berries in the freezer case of the grocery store)
– hummus and carrots
– tofu spread (make this one night in advance, using silken tofu, some lemon juice, dill, parsley, so everything has a chance to set), with whole wheat crackers and/or vegetables
– bananas
– Campbell’s Soup at Hand or the individual soup cups. Get a supply of plastic soup spoons to keep in your desk. They’re fairly cheap.
Sandwiches/wraps:
– almond butter and jelly sandwiches on whole-grain bread
– turkey and low-fat swiss on whole grain, with romaine lettuce and sliced tomatoes
– whole grain wrap with hummus and a big handful of salad mix
There’s some Tupperware involved, but it really is worth it in the long run to have healthy snacks with you.
Blue Diamond and Emerald Nuts have some flavoured almonds are delightful. Lime ‘n Chili and the Cocoa Roast & Cinnamon Roast are my favourites.
Definitely stick to things that are high fat/high protein to keep you going all day. Cut out the sugar; it’ll make you hungrier. If you do have a coffee, get heavy cream and no sugar, it’ll fill you up.
LL Bean and Land’s End both have some lovely insulated lunchboxes, in several sizes, that might help you – I can’t be trusted to feed myself healthily if I eat out during the day, I’ve learnt, so I bring a Chobani yogurt cup which I eat with a piece of fruit (apple or banana, usually – bananas seem to work better if you bring the bunch in on, like, Monday, and eat through them, rather than tossing one in your bag every day) and keep things like granola, dried fruit, and nuts in my desk. Also saltines and peanut butter. I’ve recently gotten addicted to Emerald Nuts, particularly the cocoa roasted almonds, but I’ve also kept gorp around, and walnuts are another tasty option. Mini Babybel cheeses are also good (but not cheap), and they can be kept outside the fridge, though that makes them tougher to get out of the wax.
They also make tupperwares with built-in ice packs for things like salads, dips, etc… that I’ve found very handy. I have a salad one that came with a knife and fork AND a little container for the dressing. It was an earlier version of this; it doesn’t look like they make it any more, but Fit-n-Fresh has a range of purpose-designed things and they do seem to hold up well, though they’re not cheap. I know you’re not looking for dishes to wash, but at least with the lid you can cover it back up and take it home to do that.
I think unfortunately to do what you want is going to require some effort and prep at home. I know that’s really hard to do when you’ve got a demanding schedule, though, but it’s worth it. Good luck!
Hmm, could you keep a small cooler at work? It might expand your options if you could bring perishables in any old bag with a cold pack, and then transfer them to a cooler.
Seconding the suggestion above for apples. Carrots are also pretty tough and last fine for three or four days without refrigeration. (I’m a weirdo who doesn’t bother scraping them, just washing them.) I am also a huge fan of fantastic foods brand chili cups – you heat up water in the microwave, add it to the cup, and in a few you’ve got a delicious hearty entree. Add some whole wheat crackers and and an apple and you have a healthy meal. You might be able to buy similar mixes in bulk to save money and use it with thick paper cups in the microwave. If you’re a fish eater you could also do canned tuna. (Although your students might not love you for it.) Roasted and seasoned seaweed packets also last forever and are a great low-cal snack if you want something savory. if you’re bringing nuts, almonds are probably the best nutrition-wise.
Teabags and a mug! I find it also helps if I’m making a meal of snack-like foods to make a cup of herbal tea to drink with it. No calories, warming and comforting, and helps me eat slower. You can rinse the mug in the bathroom sink or water fountain, no big deal.
Good luck!
My soft-sided, insulated lunchbox has been worth far more than the $3 it cost. Some ice packs from Wal-mart and I’ve had smoked salmon roll-ups for lunch!
Cheese and yogurt are good snacks/meal components.
If you don’t want a lunchbox, then I second the fruit and nut suggestions. Mixing your own trail mix is good too. You can get exactly what you want and it’s often cheaper.
Jerky is good, but be careful if you are sensitive to MSG, a lot of brands use it.
As a teacher, I understand the whole trying to eat healthily on a hectic schedule. I want to ditto the suggestion of a small cooler or insulated lunch bag — that will open up a lot of options for you. Fruits and veggies are also great snack suggestions.
You don’t mention breakfast, but for me anyway, making sure I eat a real breakfast every morning has helped a lot with energy, cutting down on snacking and losing weight.
Good luck!
Make a big lasagna on a weekend, and put a piece each day into a small microwaveable tupperware. Not too much dishes – you can eat out of the tupperware and wash it at home before packing the next day’s slice.
I may just be obsessed with lasagna.
When I was a kid with a working mom, we used to do assembly-line lunch set-up after the weekly grocery run. We’d make up a loaf’s worth of sandwiches (coldcuts with and without cheese, pbj, any leftover dinner meats), put ’em in sandwich baggies and freeze them. Then, each morning, grab a baggie from the freezer, pop it in the brown bag and go. It would thaw by lunchtime, no spoilage.
We also made box-mix cupcakes, frosted them and decorated them, and put two into a baggie and then into the freezer. Same deal; they thawed by lunch, and the butter cream frosting was still stable. And I was the envy of my twinkie/ho-ho/ring-ding/ding-dong eating cohort, let me tell you. Which is not to suggest that such a dessert is slimming, but the technique is certainly applicable to other, less sugary choices.
It takes a bit of planning and a chunk of time on the weekend, but it can also be done in front of the teevee, and it’s a real cost-saver.
If you have a friend or relative with a Costco card, you can either go with them or give them the cash to pick you up a gift card. You don’t need to be a member to use a gift card. We buy all our snack-y type food there and were able to get a huge variety of not terrible for you, shelf stable food there the last time my partner was deployed without breaking the bank.
As a student, you are also eligible for a free Amazon Prime account, and if there is a kind of snack food you like, but is hard and/or expensive to get from the store, you may find a decent price there if you are willing to commit to volume.
My personal favorite stand in for real food is a Larabar.
I use a cheapo Old Navy insulated lunch bag and a $1.99 Rubbermaid “blue freeze” pack to keep snacks cool at work. Greek yogurt is great. Also Babybel Lite cheeses are grab and go and low cal. Someone upthread mentioned unsweetened applesauce, which is a stable of my diet. It’s still plenty sweet tasting. Mandarin oranges packed in juice are good. Some of these things I get at my local warehouse club (BJ’s) to save money and time. I find FiberOne granola bars to be pretty filling, the fiber helps there. Much more filling than Quaker.
Also, and this might sound weird, but I’ve recently gotten into eating frozen veggies for snacks. I discovered this when making veggie purees and freezing them for my infant son, but a new favorite snack is frozen butternut squash (generic store brand, comes in chunks), microwaved and lightly seasoned (I like a touch of cinnamon, but lots of things could be good). Cheap, too.
I have a similar situation. I’m in my office 12 hours a day, and I can’t afford to eat out. We have a fridge, but it’s gross so I don’t use it much! I’m trying to eat under a “health at every size” (HAES) model where I’m more focused on eating ok and feeling ok that weight loss, and it seems to be working ok!
Healthy Choice and Barilla both make shelf-stable pasta meals that come with sauce. They nuke up pretty well! I like the Barilla ones better because they have options with whole wheat pasta and they’re tastier. The only difference that I see is the sodium content. These average about $2-$2.50, so it’s economical.
Sabra makes individual tubs of hummus that should keep ok until lunch. I like to eat them with baby carrots or sliced bell peppers or pretzels. I buy them at Coatco.
Try to mix in protein with every snack/meal. You don’t have to go nuts, but try not to eat something that’s pure carbs. That way you won’t crash.
Last, I also love the water with Mio suggestion. I bring a liter bottle to work and just keep refilling that, and being hydrated has made a world of difference!
I hate spending time on food prep, hate hate. I keep a sharp knife, a cheap salt shaker, and napkins in my drawer, and I eat pears, almonds (bulk foods places will often have flavored almonds for sale, awesome), hard boiled eggs, and last night’s leftovers.
Make a point of fixing yourself an uncomplicated dinner of meat and veggies when you don’t have class, and save some of it for the next day/two in the tupperware and insulated thingy everyone has already said you should get. Substitute your own fav. fruit and nuts for what I said up there. I’ve lost 80 lbs in the last 2 years. Running had a lot to do with it, but this food change vs. eating out is the only other change I made.
Not to be “that person,” but if you eat a good portion of protein and fat with some veggies in the morning (a nice omelet is my staple breakfast), you won’t need snacks all day – just lunch. As someone who has struggled with EDs and sometimes an overwhelming feeling of hunger that possessed me within two hours of breakfast, this was a revelation to me. Once I dumped the starchy, sugary carbs, I could comfortably go 6-9 hours at a stretch between meals.
Lunch could be celery with almond butter (peanuts aren’t nuts, they’re legumes, and won’t help curb appetite), or a can of sardines in tomato sauce (not to everyone’s taste, but I like them) with some full-fat cheese. If you can get comfy with eating non-breakfast foods in the morning, have a nice piece of meat or fish then, and bring a crustless quiche for your lunch (whisk eggs with veggies and cheese, bake until firm and golden; can be safely eaten hot, cold, or at room temp).
If you get a cooler (which I kinda think you’ve got to), I’d recommend cottage cheese with fruit. You can buy it pre-mixed or add your choice.
Any kind of fruit or unsalted nuts would be good. For protein that will last, I highly recommend beans or lentils (beans are super easy to add to anything — throw some black beans on your salad, toss some chickpeas into your pasta). An avocado in a salad, or on its own with a little lemon juice is filling, and has good fat.
If refrigeration is not an option, I suggest cooking vegetarian meals at home that you can heat up (no meat means no real chance of spoiling, though dairy should probably be omitted, too).
It sounds like the consensus is that you’d be best served by some form of refrigeration (and I agree if you feel it is possible for you), but I did want to mention that they do sell little individual packets of hummus that are shelf-stable. A friend of mine used to get them from Sam’s or Cosco. They are Sabra brand and it is really good hummus (I work from home so I just get the regular sized containers at Lowes Foods.) Good luck with your math and your meals!
Hard-boiled eggs, if you like them (I don’t, but they’re a great option, nutrition-wise), will keep fine for a few hours without refrigeration.
If you cook, bean salads are fine out of the fridge for a few hours and very healthful. Another good, filling and healthful option would be grain-based salads, such as whole-wheat couscous, bulgur, rice, barley, wheat berry, etc. Throw in chopped veggies (celery, carrots, peppers, etc.), chopped nuts and some feta or goat cheese for protein, and dress with a vinaigrette. These keep great for days in the fridge and are fine for hours outside it, so you could make one up on the weekend and take a container with you each day.
As a nursing student, I feel your pain on being out of the house for over 12 hours with no fridge access, so the number one recommendation I have is what almost everyone else has said–get a small insulated cooler and ice pack so you can bring real food. I like to make big batches of stew, chili, or soup (a crock pot comes in handy…you can put it in before leaving and come home to a great meal plus leftovers). I then store the food in wide-mouth pint jars, put these in the freezer, and then take them with me to school/hospital. You can microwave right in the jar, put it back in your lunchbox, and then right into the dishwasher when you get home. Only one dish for storage, reheating, and eating! Can you tell I hate doing dishes?
This way you control what you are eating, and get good protein and fat at lunch to keep you going and keep you away from the vending machine temptations later on. Any of the snacks listed above sound great to me. I go for fruit, homemade bars, veggies and hummus and cheese, or beef jerky myself. Also second the recommendation for drinking more water in a quest for weight-loss and improved general health. The last thing I would say is to agree with the poster who suggested to make sure you are eating a good breakfast before you leave…I do yogurt with grape nuts, raisins (or other fruit), and walnuts/pecans more days than not, and this keeps me sane until lunch. Good luck!
Yep, fruit and a cooler. I think an investment in a minifridge or coldpack will repay you a thousand times.
As for other suggestions: Rice. It cooks up well and can be flavored in many healthful and yummy ways. You can invest in a cookbook from a second hand store or just look up simple recipes on the internet. It’s a good way to get veggies, too: cook up the rice, dice and add the veggies you like, and ta-da! It’s perfect to cook in the evenings and tupperware up ready to grab in the morning.
I’d avoid the prepackaged rice boxes, they are FULL of sodium and cost a lot more.
Oh, and on those occasions you do go out for pizza or subs–light to no cheese, lots of vegetables. Avoid the meats if you can–again, highly processed and lots of sodium. A fresh veggie with extra light mozz can actually make a decent lunch if you stick to two moderate slices or so.
Snapea Crisps! A little salty but not obscenely so… and surprisingly delicious. I get them at Trader Joe’s, but I’m pretty sure they’re available at lots of grocery stores.
http://www.snacksalad.com/products.html
I bring leftovers to work almost every day in my insulated lunchbox. I put the whole packed lunch box in the fridge the night before. I don’t usually bother with an icepack. And the leftovers are still cold by lunch when I go to heat them up. I’ve been doing this for 15 years, and I’ve never gotten food poisoning or had any other issue.
Also–and I can’t emphasize this enough–make sure you are eating a real breakfast that includes protein and some good fats, even if it’s just a peanut butter sandwich. You will not make it to lunch without junk if you don’t do this.
The biggest issue is going to be cutting out sodium–the last time I was trying to lose weight, I was fanatical about my sodium intake and lost several pounds almost immediately. Canned soups and such are sodium bombs, so be careful with those.
I portion out fruit like berries into Mason jars so that they don’t get squished. I also throw a handful of Cuties into my bag, since they’re so portable and easy to peel. As far as bars go, I prefer Lara bars because they’re made with fruit and nuts, but no added sugar and they taste amazing.
I definitely encourage an insulated bag. I make this chickpea salad from time to time and it’s tasty and filling: http://www.bonappetit.com/recipes/2011/04/chickpea_salad_with_lemon_parmesan_and_fresh_herbs
I was going to be “that person” if Jackie D hadn’t beat me to it!
I live/eat Primal Blueprint (see Mark’s Daily Apple if you’re unfamiliar with the concept). Have been since January. I haven’t lost much weight (yet), but I haven’t gained at all. (I joined Weight Watchers this week to help me get more control over portion sizes.)
I like to start my day with 2 eggs and some sort of veggie leftover from dinner the night before, along with 1/4 – 1/2 an avocado. I’m not hungry again until lunch. And lunch can be something as simple as an apple with almond butter, or a salad with hard boiled eggs and a little olive oil and vinegar (which I keep in bottles at my desk), or a reasonably sized potato with some homemade pesto and chopped up chicken.
I can’t personally make it a whole day without eating lunch, so that’s key for me. But it can be small and still satisfy me until dinner, which is nice. It’s a rather shocking turn-around for someone like myself that’s always had issues with getting hungry between meals, and getting unbearably unhappy if I didn’t eat at very specific times of the day.
LOVE cuties–I came here to suggest them.
I eat a big breakfast every day. I’m weird, so I eat the same thing every day (and have for years). 1 container of Trader Joe’s vanilla yogurt, spoon it out of the container and into a bowl. Add a teaspoon of cinnamon, a heaping tablespoon of ground flaxseeds, 1/4 c. walnuts, 1/2 c. grape nuts, and 1/4 c. fresh blueberries. Mix it all up and eat. Have some coffee or black tea with it. You will feel full and energetic, at least I do. Drink lots of water for the next few hours. When you get hungry, have some hot tea–I like green chai with a little honey. Then see if you’re still hungry an hour later. If you are, have some grapes/an apple/a pear and a couple of slices of cheese (or some cashews) and some sugar-snap peas or sliced cucumber and some whole-wheat crackers. Then keep drinking water and you won’t be hungry again for few more hours. In very late afternoon/early evening, I usually have a cutie or two and some more hot green tea.
On the subject of eating a good breakfast, I second the steel-cut oats. They take a long time to cook (about a half hour), but reheat beautifully (not slimy like instant) – so make a big batch on the weekend, and you’ve got a yummy, hearty breakfast in minutes. I add nuts,fresh berries, dried fruit, coconut (not usually all at once), etc. to keep it interesting. It keeps me feeling full for hours.
General tip on coolers: if you want to keep food cool for a longer time, instead of a soft bag-type cooler, get a styrofoam box with a handle for carrying. They come in various sizes, I have one that would be about right for one-person lunch. Even catering companies use super large, thick styrofoam boxes to keep food cool/hot enough during transport.
I can attest that frozen meat kept in a styrofoam box packed with iced water bottles and cool packs thaws so slowly, it’s still edible after five days (in summer heat, no less). Milk products keep for about 3 days. Of course, the original poster probably isn’t camping on an island without electricity for a week :)
I second the suggestion to eat a good breakfast. I never leave house without breakfast, not even if I have to leave for the airport at 4.30 or something. Without it I get so hungry I feel physically sick before lunchtime and grab anything I can get my hands on. If you can’t stomach porridge or a sandwich that early on try natural yogurt (definitely NOT fat-free) with some muesli/granola fruits etc. if you like.
I want to also emphasize the importance of eating actual meals, with protein and fiber, to help you feel and be full.
Breakfast in the morning is super important, though it doesn’t necessarily need to be before you leave the house (I, personally, can’t eat for a few hours after getting up or I’ll feel sick). But I make sure when I do eat to have protein and fruit and I’m full for hours upon hours (I’m a huge fan of fruit and yogurt parfaits with an egg white hard boiled on the side). Be sure that your lunch includes all necessary components (fruit and/or veg, protein, carb, fiber) so that you can continue to feel full.
If you really just like to eat at smaller intervals, then be sure you plan ahead of time-1/2 cup snack of xyz at 10 am, lunch, 1/4 cup sweet snack at 2 pm, etc. Otherwise it’s much more likely that you will gain weight because when we snack, we’re often not conscious of what we’re putting in our mouths, even when we think we are.
I worked for the past 3 years in a job that meant I was in my car the whole day from visit to visit in the desert heat of Las Vegas. I kept a small soft sided cooler in my car with my lunch and it was always fine-even in the 104 degree heat. Get one for yourself, plan your meals on the weekend, and enjoy some homemade, better for you, tasty food instead of prepackaged foods. This also means you can take and bring home bowls and other items to throw in the dishwasher instead of spending more on foods with their own containers. It can be hard work at first, but trust me, it’s worth it.
If you want to put a paring knife in your lunch box to cut up fruit when you’re ready to eat it, you can put it in a toothbrush case to keep from stabbing yourself.
I eat the single-serving hummus for lunch almost every day. They can make it until a late lunch without refrigeration, no problem whatsoever.
Another thing I keep at work for emergency meals is baby food. Some people might find this weird, but I have a lot of food allergies so it’s hard for me to find things I can eat on the go. The Happy Baby brand organic food comes in handy pouches, doesn’t have any weird, non-nutritious additives, and actually tastes good.
There’s a brand of vacuum-packed Indian food at Whole Foods called Tasty Bite. It’s quite good and all-natural AND shelf stable. The cheapest are the pouches w just the saag pander or whatever, but they also make meal packs w rice. They heat in 90 seconds but you would need a bowl. Better than pizza, at least?
(Paneer, iPhone! I caught you changing saag to shelf but you snuck by w pander.)
Check out bento boxes. They are designed to be eaten at room temperature, so most of the food is good until lunchtime.
I love the site http://justbento.com/ Though there is some prep work involved, she’s also got a lot of recipes that whip up in batches and then freeze for later. Calorie conscious and heavy on the veggies.
Even better is this article about keeping food safe when it’s been packed for the day.
http://justbento.com/handbook/bento-basics/keeping-your-bento-lunch-safe
The information might be helpful even if you’re not packing it into a cute little box with Hello Kitty on the cover :)
Home made trail mix works great, keeps almost forever in a drawer, gives you protein while letting you control sugar and tastes good. My husband is allergic to nuts and peanuts, so I make a mix that is seeds including(raw and roasted)sunflower seeds, sesame seeds, pumpkin seed, and golden currants. If you buy those ingredients at a store like Whole Foods you can get no salt or sodium added.
Oh yeah…I ate those vacuum packed indian meals every day for lunch for so long that now I can’t even look at them…they are good if you use them as part of a well-rounded eating strategy, though ;)
I don’t think a cooler is super neccessary. Make a sandwich in the morning it will last till lunch. Chuck in a couple of pieces of fruit and you’re done.
My husband doesn’t like to use the fridge at his work (grazers are known to eat others food). I send him in with a sandwich (marmite and cheese or ham and cheese usually) a couple of pieces of fruit, and a piece of cake or a couple of biscuits (home baked). They are always fine for lunch, or afternoon tea. On occasion lunch is supplied at work and if it’s cheese and marmite day and the sandwich is well sealed off from the air it lasts till the next day.
All you really need to do is give yourself a little bit more time in the morning to prepare.
Or – packet soups in a mug, rinse out the mug immediately in your water fountain and no washing up is required. Just don’t be that person who leaves soup lumps in the fountain. I worked with one of them once. It wasn’t nice.
I second all the recommendations of trail mix. In addition to being a reasonably healthy snack, I’ve found that it is a great snack for keeping me awake through a boring day of training at work – tea or lollies only works briefly and then I crash, but nuts keep me going.
I eat breakfast at work – I keep a box of muesli there, and in the morning I put some frozen blueberries in a little container, add plain joghurt. The frozen berries keep the joghurt fresh until I eat it an hour or so later. Although you really need to be able to clean out the bowl afterwards.
I keep a tupperware box on my desk with dates, almonds and some dark chocolate melts (the cheap kind for cooking). Almonds are good for you in all sorts of way, dates are a good sugar hit when needed and full of fibre, and the chocolate is strongly flavoured and tasty but not quite nice enough to make me want to binge on it. Stops me buying junk food in the mid-afternoon slump.
If you’re okay with tuna (I know not everyone is), Bumble Bee makes a great to-go pack in a few different flavors (Thai Chili, Lemon Pepper, Sundried Tomato). It’s a single can that you don’t have to drain and is packaged with some crackers and a little spork thing. High in protein and low in fat. Kind of similarly, Jif or another peanut butter brand makes great single-serve portions of peanut butter. I’m one that eats peanut butter with celery and raisins (never grew out of the ants-on-a-log deal), and those have been great when I’m on the run.
Also, low-fat string cheese should hold to lunchtime without refrigeration, and those Laughing Cow wedges are pretty much shelf-stable.