In this video, the presenter shares some simple and healthy meal ideas to kickstart your year. She emphasizes the importance of eating real whole foods and limiting processed ingredients. The first meal idea is a sheet pan dinner, where she demonstrates how to make a garlic herb chicken with vegetables. The next meal is a meat and vegetable stir fry, made with grass-fed ribeye steak. She also shows how to make a lemony lettuce and feta salad using romaine lettuce and Greek feta. Lastly, she prepares a creamy lemon and chicken brown rice soup with a unique thickening technique using eggs. These recipes aim to make healthy cooking easy and accessible.
Key Insights:
- Eating healthy doesn’t have to be overwhelming or challenging.
- Eating real whole foods and limiting processed foods is always beneficial.
- Sheet pan dinners are an easy and delicious way to make a healthy meal.
- A garlic herb butter can add a delicious flavor to chicken and vegetables.
- Stir-fries are a quick and healthy option for a meal.
- Homemade stir-fry sauce can be made with coconut aminos, chicken broth, vinegar, honey, and a thickener.
- Salads are a great way to incorporate leafy greens into your diet.
- A simple lemony lettuce and feta salad can be made with romaine lettuce, green onions, olive oil, salt, pepper, lemon juice, and feta cheese.
- Soups are a versatile and filling option for healthy meals.
- A creamy lemon and chicken brown rice soup can be made with vegetables, chicken thighs, chicken broth, soaked brown rice, eggs, lemon juice, and optional heavy cream for extra creaminess.
- Tempering eggs with soup before adding them ensures they don’t scramble when added to the pot.
Transcript
I know this time of year is when a lot of us get really MOTed to start eating healthy and it can quickly become an overwhelming feeling so I’m all for using the new year to kind of help boost you and put you in the right direction and give you some motivation I think it’s great for that but I know that there’s so much noise out there especially when it comes to healthy eating so I just want to help you guys focus on keeping things simple so it doesn’t feel overwhelming or really challenging or like you need everything under the sun in your house to cook some healthy good quality real food for your family there’s tons of different diets out there and yes they can be beneficial but what is always beneficial in those diets is just eating real Whole Foods and kind of limiting the processed stuff so it’s pretty simple so this week I’m going to take you guys through different kinds of meals that I like to make on a weekly basis that make healthy eating really easy they’re kind of like formulas for healthy meals so the first meal idea I have for you is a sheet pan dinner and this is something that I make all the time it’s so easy just to put a little bit of protein and whatever veggies you want and then just season it up and cook it on a sheet pan it is of my favorite healthy meals so this first one I’m making today is a sheet pan garlic herb chicken and vegetables and to dress up the sheet pan chicken I’m going to use a fresh garlicky herb butter and it’s actually really simple I’m just going to use a little bit bit of chicken broth some melted good quality grass-fed butter garlic cloves that I’m just going to mince up until they kind of melt into the sauce and then some fresh parsley and fresh thyme and then I’ll just season it with some salt and pepper and this is going to make this really delicious garlicky herb sauce that we can drizzle all over the chicken and vegetables and then it also works as kind of a pan sauce once everything’s done now that my herb butter is together and ready to go I’m going to go ahead and get my vegetables prepared so today I’m using a 20 oz bag of baby red potatoes and you can easily swap these for yellow potatoes or Dutch potatoes basically any sort of bite-sized potato works really well so if you have some on hand these will work great but if you don’t you could even use just a russet potato just cut it up into nice little chunks so they’re bite size and I’m also going to be using one pound of fresh green beans and I’ll cut those in half and put them on and they’ll cook later but I like to go ahead and get my chicken and potatoes cooking so I don’t overcook the green beans so now on the sheet pan I left some room in the middle for the chicken and then I’m just going to drizzle that with a little bit of avocado oil and season it with a little bit of salt and pepper and that just makes sure that everything has flavor and is moist and then later we’ll add the drizzle of the sauce and that’ll just amplify that and you can do this on both sides too I always like to flip my chicken over and do whatever I did on the first side on the second side that way everything’s really well seasoned now I’m just giving that garlic or butter one last mix because as that melted butter cools in the chicken broth and everything it kind of starts to solidify it which is totally fine but it helps to distribute it if you just stir it one more time so now I’m going to just drizzle that over the chicken breast I’m using I’m using four chicken breasts today that are pasture raised and then I’m also going to drizzle a little bit of our sauce over the red potatoes and then I’m going to put this in the oven at 4:25 cuz we want everything to get nice and roasted and we’re going to let that cook for about 15 minutes and then I’ll turn everything over now while my chicken and potatoes are in the oven roasting I’m going to go ahead and start on the green beans so for this all I’m doing is taking a package of organic green beans and they don’t have a bunch of little strings on the end I know some of I think the French style green beans tend to have those little strings on the end so if you have those just go ahead and cut that off and trim the little ends off then I’ll just take the green beans and cut them in half and this just makes it really easy to eat later especially for the kids but it also helps to keep everything a similar size with the potatoes so it’s easy to eat so after 15 minutes is up I’m going to go ahead and take the sheet pan out of the oven and I’m going to turn over the chicken and kind of toss the potatoes in that garlic garlicky herb sauce and now we can go ahead and top everything with our green beans that we prepared and I’m just going to put this back in the oven for another 10 to 12 minutes or until the chicken has reached 165° you definitely don’t want to undercook your chicken and a little thing I love to do to get everything really Brown and crusty and just have lots of flavor is the last few minutes of cooking a sheet pan meal I’ll just turn on my Broiler and get everything nice and golden brown so once everything was done and I broiled it for a few minutes I just went ahead and let the sheet pan rest on the counter for about 5 minutes or so just so that the chicken can absorb all of those cooking liquids and everything can cool down a bit and then I slice into the chicken and serve this and I love to drizzle it with a little bit of the cooking juices over the top you can also sprinkle it with a little extra parsley just for some added Greenery and health benefits and I love this meal it’s so simple you don’t need a ton of ingredients it’s super rich and buttery and it’s just going to keep you full and I love that it’s just a simple Whole Food meal that you could recreate in so many different ways the next kind of meal I love to make when I just don’t know what to make or I still want to eat something healthy but I don’t want to feel overwhelmed by having to cook it right now is a meat and vegetable stir fry so today I’m making one with steak I’m using a grass-fed ribeye and just one of them and then lots of veggies to make this meal go further so I love making homemade versions of my favorite takeout meals because that way it has no soy no gluten none of the MSG and it leaves you feeling totally different so for my stir fry sauce I’m going to make it myself so I’m not going to buy a sauce from the store I’m just going to make it homemade and it’s really easy so I’m just going to use a little bit of coconut aminos which is almost like a soy sauce but it’s made from coconuts so it’s really good for you and then chicken broth a little bit of vinegar like rice wine vinegar or white vinegar any type of vinegar will work here pretty much as long as it’s nice and neutral and then a little bit of Honey to kind of sweeten it up and make it a little bit sticky and then to thicken it I’m going to use a mix of water and arrowroot powder which is similar to corn starch but just a healthier version and that’s going to be our stir fry sauce the vegetables I’m using tonight Are broccoli and red bell pepper so these are some of of my favorite stir fried veggies and you could just go ahead and get those fettes off the stem and slice up your bell peppers and I like to make sure that everything’s a little bit chunky so I don’t want it to be too soggy I kind of want it to hold up so I like to leave it chunky just like you would get at a restaurant there’s so many different veggies you could use in this and if you want to grab something really practical you could even just grab a bag of stir fry veggies I know grocery stores always have those little prepackaged bags of veggies so you could use that too but I love just using either what in season what I have growing in the garden or what I can find for a really good price because this is a really good budget meal you don’t have to use steak you could use chicken you could use just veggies and that makes it even more inexpensive but I love using a nice good red meat it’s actually one of my favorite things to eat and to feed my family I’m a huge believer in good quality grass-fed red meat it’s amazing for your body it has so many amino acids and it’s great for a whole host of different reasons anemia to autoimmune diseases there’s so many reasons red meat is amazing for you and for your gut so I’m going to take my grass-fed ribeye and I’m going to use some kitchen scissors and I just cut it up into really thin pieces because I just want it to quickly stir fry so it stays nice and tender and doesn’t get tough on us before I get the steak searing on the stove I’m going to go ahead and sprinkle that with a little bit of salt and pepper and drizzle it with avocado oil and give that a toss so it’s ready to go in so to sear the steak I’m going to preheat my Skillet over medium high heat and I’m going to go ahead and throw in those steak pieces that we seasoned and cut up and I’m just going to cook them for about 3 to 4 minutes until they’re nicely browned you want to make sure that you’re careful not to overcook it or it’s going to get tough so I like to do about 2 minutes on one side and once they have a nice golden brown crust then I’ll go ahead and flip them over and you want to make sure that you don’t crowd the pan too much but if you’re just using one steak you should be just fine if you’re using shrimp or chicken then your cooking time is going to vary a little bit so just kind of play around with that and make sure everything is cooked through and golden and once it is just go ahead and remove it from the skillet and we’ll get our veggie sautéing after I remove the meat from the skillet I go ahead and add my veggies and I’m just going to have them sauté with a splash of avocado oil for about 5 minutes until they’re tender and I add in a little bit of minced garlic and I cut in a few slices of scallions or green onions let that all cook together for a few minutes and then I’ll add my meat back in mix in that Arrow root slurry into the sauce that I made and then drizzle that all over the meat and veggies I want to let that cook just for a few more minutes and kind of simmer until the sauce is thickened just how I like it once everything’s done cooking and the sauce is nice and thick I like to go ahead and serve that in a bowl and I like to top mine with some mild chili crisp it just adds like that nice Sriracha type taste just a little kick and a little heat definitely not on the kids but I love this on mine it adds a little more flavor and I just adore it now for the family I’ll serve this with like brown rice or soba noodles but for me I love it just like this with a little bit of sesame seeds on top something that’s an absolute necessity for me is having plenty of salads throughout the week I love my leafy greens and I love finding new ways to make them just delicious but still very doable on a daily basis and this is what I call my everyday lemony lettuce and feta salad so it’s kind of similar to a Greek lettuce salad or something like that because it has feta but all I do is I start with about two hearts of organic romaine lettuce and I chop those up nice and thinly almost like a shredded lettuce and then I’ll put that in a large salad bowl then I thinly slice some green onions and this kind of gives it that Green Goddess flavor I love that kind of salad dressing so this is like an easy version of that I’ll drizzle it with a little bit of olive oil and then sprinkle it with salt and pepper and then I’ll massage that into the greens and then after that once everything’s nice and flavored with the salt and olive oil then I’ll drizzle over a little bit of fresh lemon juice and this just adds the most amazing tang and brightness not to mention it’s incredibly healthy but it’s also really delicious then I just take a chunk of Greek feta and I’ll break that up with my fingers or you can even cut it with a knife and make it chunky I love that just as much and that’s it you top it and mix it all together and I’m telling you this has the best flavor it’s super bright and it’s easy to put together any day of the week learning how to make really simple side salads like this is so beneficial to your health and it’s just all about adding the good oils massaging it in with salt and pepper to give it flavor something as simple as cheese like parmesan or feta just will make the salad today I’m making a big pot of soup and that is something I love to make because all you need is meat veggies broth maybe a little something creamy and you have soup so for this one I’m starting out with just basic soup ingredients I have some whole carrots which are so inexpensive and some celery and I like to just run my knife down the Celery Stock before I start dicing it that way I get a nice fine dice that’s just going to melt into the soup next I’m going to chop a sweet yellow onion and some garlic and these are things I always have on hand in the house because anytime I have onions garlic celery and carrots I’m halfway to having a soup so anytime I know that I have the ingredients to throw something together so I’m just going to go ahead and dice up this onion I like to things nice and small when I’m making soups because I like it to melt together it really gives you that restaurant feel where everything is just Blended really well and it’s not super chunky it just kind of goes together so now I’m going to go ahead and break up my garlic cloves and get those nice and minced now I’m getting my large cast iron Soup pot heated up over medium high heat and I added in avocado oil and I also added in ghee ghee has a pretty strong flavor so I like to cut it with the avocado oil just to make it more neutral so I’m going to get that heating up in my pot and then I’m going to go ahead and bring over my onions and my carrots and my celery and then later I’ll add in the garlic just so it doesn’t burn anytime I’m cooking vegetables for soup I I always get those started first and let them cook until they’re nice and softened and even have a little color on them it adds more flavor then I season them with my salt and any spices and let that cook for a few more minutes just to get everything nice and toasted up for this creamy lemon and chicken brown rice soup I’m just using a little bit of oregano and then I’m also going to be adding in lemon juice later which is going to be a lot of our flavor here and I also have a little trick that I’m going to show you guys that you’ve probably never seen to thicken soup before and it’s also really nutrient Dent so make sure you watch out for that so now I just added in that garlic and then I wanted to show you guys how I started soaking my rice earlier so for this recipe I’m just using about 1 cup of brown organic jasmine brown rice and I’m going to go ahead and put that in this measuring cup just up to the 1 cup Mark and then I cover it with water and just let that sit there for about half an hour and then it’s ready to use in the soup so once those veggies are nice and soft I’m going to put in about 1 and 1/2 lbs of boneless skinless chicken thighs and I’m going to add around four cups of chicken broth now I love to make homemade chicken broth but if I don’t have it on hand I usually keep a box in the pantry so this is a good organic chicken broth and it only has has normal soup ingredients in it it doesn’t have any caramel color which is really surprising that you can find organic stocks that still contain caramel color so I like to make sure I find one that has clean ingredients or make it myself so now I’m just going to take those chicken thighs out they’ve cooked for a while and I’m going to go ahead and shred those up with a fork I’m going to drain the water off of my rice and then we can go ahead and add in that rice into the soup after I give it a quick rinse I’ll just add the soaked brown rice into the Soup pot give it a stir and I’ll simmer it for another 15 to 20 minutes minutes making sure it’s still Al Dente and kind of firm because that Rice will still continue cooking even after I turn off the heat so we don’t want it to overcook I usually err on the side of a little too firm because it always softens up after it sits on the stove for a few minutes next I’m just separating two eggs and you’re not going to believe it but this is how we’re going to thicken our soup this is a cool little trick I learned lately and it’s so much healthier than adding flowers to soup it has protein and amino acids in it and it’s a great way to use up eggs if you have chicken so I’m going to go ahead and take two eggs and then I’m going to squeeze in some lemon juice and we’re going to mix this together and then we’ll temper it before we add it into the soup but it’s going to thicken our soup up and it doesn’t taste weird at all there’s no weird texture or anything it’s just a really interesting way to thicken a soup so I’m going to be doing this a lot more often I think it’s fantastic so just whisk that together with that lemon juice really well and that’s going to add our zingy Tang to our soup and give it more flavor and then I’m just going to carefully Ladle in a couple ladlefuls of our soup that’s still hot to warm up those eggs so that they don’t scramble when we add it into the big Soup pot so I’m just adding in my chicken and I added in the tempered egg mixture and then I’m going to add in a little bit of heavy cream this is completely optional but if you love a really creamy soup go ahead and add in some cream and it also helps to feed your hungry crowd and keep them a little more satisfied so so I love to throw in cream right at the end when it’s nice and simmered and everything’s come together I’ll give it a little taste test and check it for salt and it’s perfect ready to go I hope my family’s recipes gave you some good ideas for meals this week and to show you that cooking healthy food does not have to be overwhelming get some basic healthy ingredients on hand and you can put together almost any meal and if you’re looking for the written recipe you can find them on my website healthy elizabeth.com they’re usually Linked In the description as well thank you so much for watching and for all of your lovely kind comments and I’ll see you guys in the next video
