Stephanie

Simple Vegetable Soup.

It’s that time again! Soup time!

I was craving soup this week so I went through the fridge and threw together a very simple and nourishing vegetable soup that you can make with random veggies in your crisper!

Here’s what I did:

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Simple Veggie Soup.

A great soup recipe to use up the veggies in your fridge!

Prep Time5 mins

Cook Time15 mins

Course: dinner, lunch, Soup

Keyword: easy soup, fallsoup, soup

Servings: 4 people

Author: Stephanie

Ingredients

1-2 tbsp extra virgin olive oil
1-2 cloves garlic minced
1 tsp dried basil
1 tsp dried oregano
1-2 tsp sea salt
1/4 cauliflower chopped into small pieces
1/2 onion diced
1 carrot diced
1 sweet potato diced
2 cups chickpeas
4 cups chicken or vegetable broth
3-4 leaves fresh basil

Instructions

Heat a pot and add olive oil.
Add onion and saute until translucent. About three minutes.
Add garlic, sweet potatoes, carrot and cauliflower and cook to soften. About five minutes
Add chickpeas, broth, spices, and salt. Simmer for about 15 minutes until vegetables are soft.
Serve topped with sliced basil

This soup would also be fantastic with leftover shredded chicken.

Try it out and let me know if you make it!

Get more simple recipes here and meal plan ideas here.

Recently I read a stat that made me a bit sad: Eating meals at the dinner table is on the decline.

It honestly makes so much sense. Who has time to eat at the table anymore?

We’re rushing home from work, to get our kids out the door for practice or a game or a dance recital.

So where (and when) do people eat?

The car
At half-time at the game on the sidelines
In the stands
On the bus

According to the report, many people eat on the couch in front of the TV or in their bedrooms. This is the case even when everyone from the family is home.

Let’s bring back eating at the dinner table if only once a week.

First, why is eating at the table so important?

It brings everyone together in one spot, at one time.
It forces people to sit down to eat which helps with proper digestion.
It creates a family hub for everyone to sit and talk about their day and have meaningful conversations.
It gets family members to try new foods because they see others trying them.
It provides consistency to our schedules.
It gives us something to look forward to.

Ok so sitting at the table isn’t all fun and games. If you have young kids you know what I mean.

Kids are up and down. They can’t sit still. They have to go to the bathroom. They hate the food you made. They take forever to eat (like forever).

But when we sit at the table as a family from a young age we’re helping kids to build a base for communicating with others as they get older.

Perhaps sitting at the table from a young age will make it easier for our kids to approach us with a problem they have when they’re teens.

But how do we eat together when we don’t have any time to eat together?

Number 1: Look at all the things you’re doing and decide if they are in fact necessary to do.

What are your true priorities?

Can you get rid of an activity or change the time of an activity so that you can sit down to have a meal together as a family even if it’s just once a week?

This goes for freeing up time in general. Overall we are doing way too much. We can’t do everything. I’m a big fan of the saying: ‘If it’s not a hell yes, then it’s a hell no.’

Something has to give. I don’t want you to give up the wellness of you and your family over other things that may not really be a priority.

If you are home, make a habit to eat your meals at a table. Not the couch, and not the bedroom. Even if the kids are eating together at a table it’s a step forward.

If you can’t be home for meals during the week, try to eat together somewhere else. Can you have a picnic together on a blanket at the park after the game?

Bring back the Sunday (or Saturday) Night Dinner: If you can’t eat together during the week, pick one day on the weekend when you can sit together as a family.

It doesn’t have to be a fancy dinner, but make it something you can make and eat together.

Finally, please I beg you, please turn off the technology during dinner. Put your phones away. Get the computers off the table. Turn off the TV.

Make dinner (or lunch or breakfast!) time a sacred time for you and your family.

Does Grocery Shopping Stress You Out? Read This!

by Stephanie Leave a Comment

Does grocery shopping stress you out?

I’ve heard time and again that people have a love/hate relationship with shopping for food.

I totally get it. You walk into the store and you’re inundated with bright colours, boxes of food making a million claims, and shelves upon shelves of products.

Why does it have to be so complicated!?

Below, I share a few tips on how to navigate the grocery store so it is less stressful.

…

First, it helps to understand how the grocery store is laid out.

Grocery stores are designed to make you want to buy more food.

Have you ever noticed that the milk is in the back right corner of the store? If you have to ‘run in for milk’ you have to go through everything else to get to the dairy case and you’re more apt to buy something else. Sneaky!

This is the basic layout of a larger grocery store like Loblaws:

Fresh food is typically found around the perimeter of the store. Think of it like a rectangle: first produce, bakery, meat and seafood, then dairy.

The health food or natural foods area takes up the first few aisles. Drug store items come next, followed by cleaning supplies, and then rows and rows of canned and boxed goods.

The freezer aisles are usually the last couple of aisles.

Oh and don’t forget the beer and wine aisles!

If you shop at Loblaws, Joe Fresh is closer to the front beside the cash area.

So how the heck do you navigate the store without feeling overwhelmed?

Here are some tips:

1. Make a plan.

Part of the plan is to create a meal plan for the week and then generate a grocery list from the meal plan.

If you find creating a plan overwhelming in and of itself, start with three meals your family likes to eat on a regular basis. Then create a grocery list based on the ingredients you need for those meals.

Make sure you check your fridge and cupboards for ingredients first! You don’t want to buy more than what you actually need at the store.

2. Make a grocery list and organize it based on the grocery store departments.

Instead of writing everything you need in one big list, separate the list into the following categories:

Produce
Bakery
Meat
Seafood
Dairy
Frozen
Pantry items

Separating the list this way will help you stay on track as you walk through the store. It’s not going to be helpful to have a list like this:

yogurt
broccoli
almond milk
ground beef
rice
celery
apples
canned chickpeas

Instead try it this way:

Produce:
broccoli
celery
apples

Meat:
ground beef

Dairy:
almond milk
yogurt

Pantry:
canned
chickpeas
rice

Once your list is written, bring a pen to cross off each item as you get it or check it off if you made the list on your phone. That way you can keep track of what you bought as you put an item into your cart.

3. Eat at home before you shop.

This should really be the number one tip because shopping while you’re hungry may mean disaster for your grocery list, bank account and possibly health.

When we shop while we’re hungry, we’re also more apt to reach for the cookies in the bakery that have a million ingredients.

My recommendation is to shop on the weekend after breakfast or after lunch.

If you can’t get to the store at those times, bring a container of almonds and raisins with you so you can have a snack before you go into the store.

4. Don’t aimlessly walk up and down the aisles.

When we walk up and down the aisles, we’re more apt to a) get overwhelmed, and b) buy something that wasn’t on the list and that you wanted to avoid buying in the first place.

Many people walk up and down the aisles waiting for meal inspiration to hit.

What I find happens instead is that people end up buying a bunch of random ingredients that don’t work well together, or they’ll end up buying food that just isn’t going to serve them well from a health standpoint.

The middle aisles are where you’ll find 80-90% of the processed foods.

That’s why it’s so important to have a plan before you go to the store. A plan will help you stay on budget, stay on track from a health perspective and will save you time (we could also use a bit more time am I right?).

I try to plan my meals around fresh foods consisting of vegetables, fish, meat or beans and legumes which means for the most part that I can stick to the outside ring of the store.

There will be times when I need to get rice or beans as I mentioned which are found in the middle of the store, but because I always have a list I know where to go.

I go in to a certain aisle to get one or two items and leave.

Wherever you shop in the store, I encourage you to always read the ingredients.

Contrary to what I just wrote above, just because an item is around the perimetre of the store does not automatically make it nutritious.

I have found many ‘freshly baked breads’ that contain a list of ingredients that is three inches long.

5. Breathe.

After reading these tips, you still may find grocery shopping to be overwhelming.

Try to breathe as you walk through the store
Listen to some calming music or a podcast on your phone
Hum a tune as you walk around (I do this all the time, I don’t care what I look like!)
Lift your head up and smile at other people (smiling helps to bring stress levels down, I swear!)
Don’t lean on your cart and drag your feet—walk with purpose!
Try to make it fun (I love grocery shopping! You can too!)

Other shopping options:

Change up your shopping routine! Farmers’ market season is upon us and these days you can get everything from meat, eggs, milk, cheese, sourdough bread and produce at most markets.
Shop online! Here are my favourite go-to online sites.

I hope these tips help you with making grocery shopping a little less stressful.

If you ever need help in person, I offer grocery store tours. I’ll walk around the store with you to get you familiarized with the layout and where to find the food that will make you feel your best.

Snack Attack Energy Bites

by Stephanie Leave a Comment

I talk to a lot of mammas (and dads too!) and many of them are rushing from place to place without thinking of what they’re going to eat during the day.

We are busier than ever and it’s so (so!) important to make sure that we have time to eat nutrient-dense meals throughout the day so we avoid getting ‘hangry’.

It’s when we’re hangry that we’re more apt to stop at Timmy’s for a glazed donut.

If you want that for a treat, go for it, but if possible we don’t want to be relying on that donut to keep our levels balanced throughout the day.

I’m always thinking about food of course, so I always try to have a snack ready just in case I need it.

Most days I just carry a little glass container with nuts and seeds, but sometimes I manage to make a few of these energy bites to take along with me.

I find one or two helps to stave off the hunger for a bit because they have a good whack of fibre, fat and protein to make it the perfect little snack.

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