Incorporating More Veggies
From: Mary Dixon, Benefits Coordinator
Sep 14, 2021
Including vegetables in your meals is extremely important. Veggies are rich in nutrients and antioxidants, which boost your health and help fight off disease. Additionally, they’re beneficial for weight management due to their low-calorie content. Below are a few unique ways you can incorporate vegetables into your eating plan, so that you never get sick of eating them.
EXPERIMENT WITH VEGGIE NOODLES
Veggie noodles are easy to make, and a great way to get more veggies in your eating plan. They’re also an excellent low-carb substitute for high-carb foods, such as pasta. You can use a spiralizer for almost any type of vegetable. They’re commonly used for zucchini, carrots, spaghetti squash, and sweet potatoes, all of which come packed with extra nutrients. Once the “noodles” are made, they can be consumed just like pasta and combined with sauces, other vegetables, or meat.
ADD VEGGIES TO SAUCES
Adding extra vegetables to your sauces and dressings is a sneaky way to increase your veggie intake, especially if you have picky kids. While you’re cooking sauces, such as marinara sauce, simply add some veggies and herbs of your choice to the mix, such as chopped onions, carrots, bell peppers, and leafy greens like spinach.
BLEND INTO SMOOTHIES
Smoothies make for a refreshing breakfast or snack. Green smoothies in particular are very popular for hiding loads of leafy greens in fruity packages. Typically, a smoothie is made by combining fruit with ice, milk, or water in a blender. However, you can also add veggies to them without compromising the flavor. Fresh, leafy greens are common smoothie additions, such as combining kale with blueberries, bananas, and cucumber.
TRY A LETTUCE WRAP OR VEGGIE BUN
Using lettuce as a wrap or certain veggies as buns in place of tortillas and bread is an easy way to eat more veggies. Lettuce wraps can be a part of several types of dishes and are often used to make low carb sandwiches and bunless burgers. Additionally, many types of veggies, such as Portobello mushroom caps, sliced sweet potatoes, halved red or yellow peppers, tomato halves, and sliced eggplant make excellent buns. Lettuce wraps and veggie buns are an easy way to reduce your calorie intake, as one lettuce leaf contains only one calorie. Refined bread is much higher in calories.
GRILL VEGGIE KEBABS
Veggie kebabs pack lots of flavor onto a party-ready stick. To make them, place chopped vegetables of your choice on a skewer and cook on a grill or barbecue. Bell peppers, onions, mushrooms, zucchini, and tomatoes work well for kebabs. Try Cajun-style shrimp and bell pepper kebabs and layer in all the veggies you want.
BENEFITS QUESTIONS?
Our benefits and incentives demonstrate to our assignment employees and officers that a long-term working relationship with Lofton can be fulfilling as well as financially satisfying. Contact Lofton Benefits Coordinator if you have any questions or concerns regarding benefits at: benefits@loftonstaffing.com
or 225.924.0200.
About Lofton: Founded in 1979, Lofton Services offers clients the best of all worlds. We provide the responsive, personal service and flexibility of a small local firm while having the technology, resources, and infrastructure to deliver the benefits of the biggest players in our industry. Lofton Staffing can deliver the right people, with the right skills, right when you need them. Contact us today.