dr. neale’s blog: My kitchen, A Video Tour
I often get asked, “well, what do you eat?” or, “what does your kitchen have in its cupboards?” I get why. I recommend a dietary change to most everyone seeking better health.
So here is my own personal approach to healthy eating on the regular.
I do walk the walk… In fact, I hired my brand manager to surprise me at my home to record an impromptu kitchen tour. That is why I am in my bang around clothes with no make up on my face!
Weekday eats differ from weekend eats. Weekday eats need to be pretty easy and healthy. Weekend eats can be more complex and mostly healthy.
Breakfast needs to be fast with a quick clean up and packed full of nutrition. I have had to standardize weekday breakfast for simplicity and reproducibility.
Yes, it gets a little tiresome and sometimes it doesn’t taste that great, but the pros out weigh the cons so I just deal with it.
A quick smoothie…
Here’s my recipe:
- A handful of greens. I buy these in bulk. I buy organic, baby, power greens in a tub. I toss the tub in the freezer and it then won’t go bad waiting for me to use it up!
- A splash of frozen organic berries, strawberry or blueberry, or cherries.
- A handful of frozen nuts (organic and raw), i.e. cashew, hazelnut, almond.
- A handful of frozen seeds (organic and raw), i.e. pumpkin, sesame, flax.
- A scoop of raw cacao powder.
- A scoop of vitamin C powder.
- A scoop of collagen (Great Lakes – Green Bottle).
- A quarter of an avocado.
- Water to cover.
One tip. I always drink it through a straw. It makes it go down easier!
Lunch is the easiest meal to prepare! It is just left overs from dinner. Now there are some meals that I don’t want to re-heat and eat next day, like fish meals.
- On those occasions, depending on the week I have a roasted bird, egg salad, chicken salad or tuna
salad with a green salad.
- Salad greens and fixin’s are always washed and pre-cut ready to quick packI pre-cut before storing them in the fridge, just after I have unpacked them from the market).
Dinner is the best meal of the day. We have the most time to prepare it and it is a family affair. It is a time to connect, relax and enjoy food together. We work hard to bring home the bacon, it means a lot to prepare and enjoy together. I recommend kissing as often as possible while cooking together!
We choose from a few animal proteins, chicken, fish, beef, eggs. We buy grass fed, free range or wild caught, family and locally farmed animal protein. Organic when feasible.
Protein is either cooked stove top or baked with olive or avocado oil and spices (fresh when we’ve got them). Summer time we grill out on occasion.
We add vegetables. We have five go-to vegetable sides we rotate through:
- Roasted vegetables (parsnips/carrots/mushrooms/onions/beets).
- A fresh salad.
- Broccolini or fresh and crispy green beans.
- Squash (winter/butternut).
- Mushrooms. Our neighbor is a mushroom hunter.
Flavor? Sauce?
Yup, we often make our own sauce or dressings or marinades with these ingredients:
Oil, Olive or Avocado (or sometimes organic butter)
Garlic
Lemon or Lime
Spices, Salt, Pepper
Mayonnaise (we make our own when we have the motivation)
Capers
Pickles
Hot sauce
Vinegar, Wine
Snacks? Sweets? Drinks?
Chocolate! So many healthy dark chocolate options.- Popcorn cooked in coconut oil with sea salt stove top.
- Cashew butter. Just off the spoon.
- Tea with honey and cacao.
- Baby food. Peter Rabbit Organics. Mostly vegetable version!
- Sparkling water with splash of 100% juice added.
- Occasional red wine. Not more than two 4 oz pours per sitting.