5 top tips to get more veggies into your day
We asked Chanel Relf, City of Greater Bendigo Food Systems Officer and qualified dietician for her top five tips on how to get more veggies into your day.
First up, make them delicious!
Add extra flavours and textures with herbs, spices, nuts, seeds, feta cheese and other such delicious things. No Money No Time has some great budget friendly recipes.
And for something a little different I love:
Grow your own
Growing your own veggies is a great way to get more in – the satisfaction of having grown something makes it taste so much better! Greens like lettuce, spinach, and bok choi are great to start with if you’ve never grown anything before as they are quick growing and can be added to lots of dishes. Tomatoes and zucchini are also great summer growers. Not sure where to start? Grow it Local (www.growitlocal.com) has tips, how to videos and more to help you become a master veggie grower!
Don't save all your veggies for dinner
Add them to your lunch or breakfast too. And they make great snacks – veggies and dip, cheese and tomato on crackers, savoury muffins (pumpkin, spinach and feta is one of my fav combos), roast chickpeas, avocado toast.
Add legumes
Legumes make great additions to boost the veg in meals. I like adding chickpeas to curries, kidney beans or lentils to Bolognese and black beans to tacos and burritos.
Frozen and canned is just as good as fresh
They’re super convenient to have stashed away in the freezer or cupboard to add to meals. I always have a bag of frozen peas in the freezer and some cans of tomatoes and legumes in the cupboard. One of my favourite cupboard meals is Mexican spiced beans – a can each of black beans, corn and crushed tomatoes with Mexican spice mix. Add some grated carrot and zucchini if you have some. Served with rice and grated cheese.
