A Healthy Dinner is Key to a Balanced Diet
When it comes to a healthy fitness regime, we all know that the essential factors are diet and exercise. If you’re doing regular workouts but eating an imbalanced diet or skipping dinner (for example), or eating healthily but rarely exercising, you’ll be missing out on the bulk of the wellbeing that comes with these two lifestyles.
There are many staples to healthy eating, including eating a balanced diet, not skipping meals, having healthy snacks, ensuring you’re getting your vitamin intake, and more.
What can be tricky, though, is finding the motivation to cook yourself healthy meals every evening. Dinner is often the first meal to be lost when your health goals go off track – after a long day at work, it is easy to get lazy with your cooking!
So, to help keep your healthy eating goals on track, we’ve compiled four delicious dinner recipes here, courtesy of BBC Good Food. These are also very quick and easy to make, so no excuses!
Recipe 1: Steak and Broccoli Protein Pots
For a protein-fuelled dinner idea, try these steak and broccoli protein pots! Not only delicious and easy to make, but they’re also filled with fibre.
Fibre is an important part of your diet, especially when you’re increasing the frequency of your workouts. It supplements your fitness by giving you better appetite control, boosting your immune system, and overall complementing your exercise performance.
Here is the recipe, courtesy of BBC Good Food.
Ingredients :
250g pack of wholegrain rice
2 tbsp chopped ginger
4 spring onions
160g broccoli florets
225g lean fat-trimmed fillet steak
Instructions :
Tip the rice into a bowl and stir in the ginger, chopped onion greens and 4 tbsp water. Add the broccoli and spring onion whites, but keep the onions together on top, as you will need them in the next step. Cover with clingfilm, pierce with a knife, and microwave for 5 minutes.
Meanwhile, heat a non-stick frying pan and sear the steak for 2 minutes on each side, then set aside. Take the onion whites from the bowl and add to the pan.
Tip the rice mixture onto a plate, slice the steak, pile the charred onions on top and enjoy!
Recipe 2: Chicken Skewers with Tzatziki
Another great protein-packed dinner option from BBC Good Food, these chicken skewers will leave you feeling full all evening. This will help you avoid late-night snacking, and the tzatziki is a healthy but tasty adffyedition!
Ingredients :
4 skinless chicken breasts
1 lemon
2 tsp oregano
1 garlic clove
1 yellow, 1 red pepper
Wholemeal tortilla, to serve
Baby spinach leaves, to serve
Flat-leaf parsley, to serve
For the tzatziki :
½ cucumber
¼ garlic clove
4 tbsp Greek yoghurt
1 tbsp extra virgin olive oil
Instructions :
Soak eight bamboo skewers in water. Using sharp kitchen scissors, chop the chicken into small pieces. Pop into a plastic box with a lid. Pare strips of lemon zest from the lemon using a vegetable peeler, then juice the lemon as well. Add both the peel and the juice to the chicken in the box along with the oregano and the garlic, crushed in. Season generously, mix and put in the fridge for 15 mins with the lid on. Deseed and chop the peppers into similar-sized pieces to those of the chicken.
Heat a griddle pan to high while you get the chicken out. Discard the lemon zest and thread the chicken onto the skewers, alternating every few bits of chicken with a piece of red pepper followed by a piece of yellow pepper. Griddle for 10 mins, turning halfway.
While the skewers are cooking, make the tzatziki. Get a box grater and a bowl. Cut the cucumber into long lengths, discarding the watery seedy core. Grate into the bowl, then grate the ¼ garlic clove. Season generously and stir in the Greek yoghurt. Drizzle with a little extra virgin olive oil.
Serve the skewers hot off the griddle with the dip, or take the chicken and peppers off the skewers, leave to cool and pack into wholemeal wraps spread with a little tzatziki and rolled up with baby spinach and a few picked leaves of parsley.
Recipe 3: Roasted Black Bean Burgers
For a vegetarian twist on a healthy dinner recipe, try Jamie Oliver’s roasted black bean burgers.
Ingredients :
1½ red onions
200 g mixed mushrooms
100 g rye bread
ground coriander
1 x 400 g tin of black beans
olive oil
40 g mature Cheddar cheese
4 soft rolls
100 g ripe cherry tomatoes
1 lime
chipotle Tabasco sauce
1 ripe mango
1 ripe avocado
4 tablespoons natural yoghurt
4 sprigs of fresh coriander
Instructions :
Preheat the oven to 200ºC. Peel 1 onion, place in a food processor with the mushrooms, rye bread and 1 teaspoon of ground coriander, and whiz until fine. Drain and pulse in the black beans, season lightly with sea salt and black pepper, then divide into 4 and shape into patties, roughly 2.5cm thick. Rub all over with oil and dust with ground coriander, then place on an oiled baking tray and roast for 25 minutes, or until dark and crispy, topping with the Cheddar and warming the rolls for the last few minutes.
Meanwhile, peel and very finely chop the remaining onion with the tomatoes and place in a bowl. Squeeze over the lime juice, add a few shakes of Tabasco and season to taste. Destone, peel and finely slice the mango and avocado.
Halve the warm rolls and divide the yoghurt between the bases, followed by half the salsa, the mango, avocado and coriander leaves. Top with the burgers, remaining salsa and extra Tabasco, pop the lids on and press down lightly.
Always nice with oven-roasted, skin-on chips.
Recipe 4: Rosemary Citrus Shrimp Tacos
If you prefer to have fish with dinner, these shrimp tacos are a delicious healthy option, and quick to make. As well as being full of protein, they are rich with minerals and vitamins. Find the recipe here, thanks to melaniemakes.com!
Ingredients :
2 tablespoons olive oil
1 pound shrimp peeled and deveined and tails removed
12.4 ounces Robert Rothschild Farm Rosemary Citrus & Pepper Sauce
8 flour tortillas
8-1/2 ounces fresh cole slaw mix
1 red and 1 yellow pepper cut into strips
Avocado sliced
Instructions :
In a large skillet, heat olive oil over medium heat. Add shrimp in a single layer and cook for two minutes until pink.
Flip shrimp and cook for an additional 2-3 minutes until shrimp is pink and flesh is opaque.
Stir in 1 cup of Rosemary Citrus & Pepper Sauce and warm through. Remove from heat.
Assemble tacos by topping a tortilla with coleslaw, pepper strips, avocado slices and shrimp.
Top with additional Rosemary Citrus & Pepper Sauce, if desired.
Eat Well and Stay Well
A healthy, balanced diet is key to staying healthy and achieving your fitness goals. It can be difficult to find the time in a busy schedule to prepare healthy meals.
With these four recipes, though, you’ll find time to fit healthy meals into your evenings. For some healthy snack ideas, check out our blog post here.
Don’t forget to complement your healthy diet with regular exercise at Beckwith Health Club. We look forward to seeing you here soon!
