One thing that many of us are learning firsthand these days is that buying food during a crisis can be more than a little complicated. Grocery shopping for healthy food on a budget is what I do, but if you’re like me and don’t usually keep a lot of extra food in the house, it’s clear that a different approach is needed.

To help with that, I went to a couple of experts and called on tactics that I’ve used in the past but had let go of along the way. Between us all, some pretty sound strategies emerged for buying food during a crisis that I have now implemented. I wanted to share them with you because they’ve already started making a difference for my family in keeping us as healthy as possible while lowering costs and stress.

Please Note: I earn from qualifying purchases made through some of the links included in this post. You can read my disclosure policy here.

Take an Inventory of What You Have

At this point, your pantry and freezer may be fairly full of certain types of food, but do you really know what you have? If your answer is anything less than a resounding “yes!” you need to take inventory. It’s one of the crucial first steps to buying food during a crisis.

Inventory Process

My husband and I did this recently, and it was eye-opening to say the least. We went through the pantry, the fridge, the freezer, the cleaning products and regularly-used household items (such as light bulbs). Literally everything in those categories was listed. How many of each item and whether we would need more to get us through the next month. This was definitely a helpful exercise because we found things that we forgot we had, and I realized that we had less of some things than I thought.

If you don’t have a spouse or partner to help, enlist an older child or send your starter list to a neighbor or friend. They can be on speaker phone calling things out to you. The whole process could take take several hours, but I guarantee it will be well worth it. See below in the resources section to access the free Food Inventory and Shopping List Template that we came up with.

Plan 30 Basic Dinners for the Next Month

This idea came from Elise New over at The Frugal Farm Wife. Because Elise lives on a farm, going to the grocery store many times a week isn’t convenient for her family. She’s such a great resource because her family already implements many strategies that would help during a crisis. She says that she likes to have a big list on hand of 30 potential dinners for the month. That way, she can stock those ingredients, draw from that list for her weekly meal plan, and it doesn’t take a lot of time or brain power.

Since you may have random ingredients around that you found during your inventory, this is also a chance to think about how you can incorporate what you already have into meals for the next month. Let’s face it, in preparing for our current situation, most of us have already spent much more than we usually do on groceries. Now, it’s time to pull it all together so that we can actually use what we have and not have to spend as much for a while. Since we’re now thinking in terms of meal planning for a month or at least two to three weeks instead of a week at a time, it’s okay to start using what we have on hand.

Registered Dietician Kim Barrier says that for some of her dinner options, she’s trying to double the recipes or choose dishes that make many servings so that there are leftovers to reheat for lunches. That’s important when planning out food for the next month – remember to include breakfasts, lunches and snacks as well as dinners.

Do One Larger Shopping Trip for the Month

This will include stocking up as much as possible on the food you’ll need for your meals, as well as any household or cleaning items that you’ll need for the month. When buying food during a crisis, it’s fine to buy fresh fruits and vegetables, but you’re just not going to be able to rely on them as much as you may normally. Buying more storable foods is going to be the way to go. That includes beans, nut butters or sunflower seed butter, brown rice, whole wheat and bean pastas, oats, nuts and seeds.

Keep Canned and Frozen Vegetables and Meat on Hand

Kim Barrier and Elise New both suggest keeping a good supply of canned tomatoes and frozen vegetables on hand as well. Kim reminds us that frozen and canned vegetables are just as nutritious if not more so in some situations than fresh. Fresh fruits and vegetables start losing some of their nutrients once picked, so the longer they’re in transport to the grocery and/or sit in the produce section the more they lose. Kim says that “frozen fruits and vegetables, on the other hand, are picked at peak season and immediately processed, which locks in the nutrients.” 

Canned vegetables are also picked at peak season and canned. “If you were to compare the amount of nutrients you would get from fresh, frozen or canned foods you would find the difference is only a matter of a few percentage points for most nutrients.” In fact, Kim adds, “Some things even increase with canning. For example, lycopene, the phytonutrient found in tomatoes that might help prevent some cancers, is only released when the tomatoes are cooked.”

Elise urges everyone not to forget about freezing meat or buying meat that’s already frozen, which is often cheaper than buying fresh. While you don’t want to hoard more than your family is going to eat in a month, buying meat and freezing it lets you take advantage of sales that are still going on. Elise says that holds true for other items on a whole foods diet as well. Vegetables like potatoes, sweet potatoes, winter squash, garlic and onions store well for a while and make a good base for a number of soups, stews, casseroles and other dishes. So, if you find these items and they’re on sale, stock up. 

Do Smaller Shopping Trips Once Every 1-2 Weeks When Buying Food During a Crisis

The main goal with buying food during a crisis (or any time for that matter) is to reduce your shopping trips to once every 1-2 weeks. This will reduce the stress of feeling like you should constantly be looking for food, and it will ease the strain on your pocketbook since every time you go in the store, you’ll usually pick up more than what you went in for. Since you will have done the bulk of your shopping in your larger trip, this trip is just to get any milk or fresh foods that you can’t do without.

Money-Saving Tip

To save money, Elise suggests keeping an eye out for produce that has been taken out of the regular displays and marked down because it’s about to go bad. If you also notice employees removing produce from the displays, ask them what they’re going to do with it or if you can just have it. Many stores are happy to deeply discount or giveaway food that they were going to have to throw out anyway. You won’t know unless you ask.

During regular times, Elise recommends getting to know your stores and when they tend to have sales and mark down produce and meat on a regular basis. While many of the stores still honor their sales during a crisis, stocking routines and procedures are probably different than they usually are so this may be difficult to do until things get back to normal.

Online Shopping and Curbside Delivery

Elise is a strong believer in online shopping and curbside delivery with your grocery store because it limits everyone’s exposure to germs. I highly recommend that before you sign up and pay the initial fee for one of these services, be sure to call the store and find out if pickups will be able to start immediately or if there’s a delay because of the current situation. If there is, you may still want to try it anyway, but it’s important to know what you can and cannot count on before you sign up.

More of Elise’s Tips for Buying Food During a Crisis

• Learn how to use what’s left in the produce section or on the shelves. This will help you to stick with your one large and limited smaller shopping trips a month. If you’re looking for canned beans and you can only find dry, learn how to cook dry beans.
• Look outside the grocery store. Take eggs for example – if egg prices at the store are getting high, check with your local farmers. Chances are that if you buy eggs from pasture-raised chickens, you’ll probably get the eggs from the farmer cheaper than you will from the store.
• Keep looking at weekly sales flyers because many stores still honor them for the items that they have in stock.
• Use your planned meals as a guide but be flexible in the way that you fix them if an ingredient isn’t available or if something comparable is on sale. If a recipe calls for zucchini, can yellow squash be substituted instead?
• Make your own condiments. It’s almost always cheaper to buy the ingredients to make healthier versions of condiments than it is to buy them.

** My note based on my experience and discussion with Elise – Make desserts and “treat” foods from scratch as much as possible. Doing this limits the amount in the house at any one time, and it’s also a lot less expensive!

Resources

• Elise’s Grocery Budget Mastery (affiliate link) is a fantastic resource that walks you through the six essential steps to slashing your grocery budget. It’s served as a valuable reminder of some of the strategies I used to use but let go along the way. I’m definitely using it to tweak some of the less than ideal habits we’ve gotten into.
• Feel free to access my free Food Inventory and Shopping List template here or through the box at the side of your screen. My husband made the first version of this as a standard spreadsheet years ago, but I’ve found that it’s more useful as a Google sheet so that it’s a live document that I can easily access while I’m shopping.
• The U.S. Department of Agriculture’s Choose My Plate program’s resource for food planning during the coronavirus pandemic.

Lean on Your Community

If you try any or all of these steps, feel free to let us know how it’s working for you in the comments below. Also, if you have other strategies that you’re trying, let us know that as well. Whether we’re veteran frugal meal planners or fly-by-the-seat-of-our-pants food buyers, we all have something to learn from each other.

The post Buying Food During a Crisis appeared first on Peppermint Tea.

Grabbing something to eat, running through the drive-thru and throwing something together. All phrases that certainly reflect our lifestyles and all too often, our approach to food. While doing any of these every now and then is fine and can even be done in a healthy way, letting these phrases describe our overall attitude toward food means that we could be missing out on some of the huge benefits of what the food we eat can really do for us.

Transformational and Energy Medicine Specialist Jean Atman works with people on aligning their energy in every facet of their lives, including through the food they eat. In this Q&A, she explains how eating with intention can change your entire relationship with food and how its energy can fuel you.

Peppermint Tea & Me: What does eating with intention mean?

Jean Atman:I think it’s a mindfulness practice, you know. To really think about what foods you’re putting in your body and how they affect you as you’re consuming them. Basically, we get kind of caught up in the busyness of things, and so we don’t take time to even think about what we eat. We just sort of go to our defaults. I think eating with intention is increasing the mindfulness practice of thinking about “What do I feel like I want, what do I feel like I need, and then how do I feel after eating this?”

PTM: Why is it important that we eat with intention?

JA: We’re all made of energy. So, what we’re eating is either going to increase or decrease how we feel, how our body functions, and how our life works. If we’re congesting our energy field with a lot of processed foods, we’re going to feel more stagnant in our lives, and we’re going to be less able to proceed forward in achieving our goals and desires and dreams. We don’t have that free flow of movement and momentum that we can build as easily. So, it’s really vital to consider what we’re putting in our bodies and how we’re feeling based on it. If we’re eating something that makes us feel bad, we’re not going to be as inspired to do anything else in our lives. It really does start with what we’re putting in our bodies.

PTM: What is the role of energy overall in our bodies and in our lives?

JA: We’re all just millions of particles of energy that put together creates this form. We feel solid, we look solid, but in reality, we’re really not, we’re just a lot of moving parts. That’s why it’s really vital to focus on what we’re creating within our energy. If we’re eating something processed without a lot of life force energy, we’re putting that in our bodies and that becomes part of us. So, it’s not a real efficient product that we’re creating.

It’s everything that we put into our body, all the experiences that we have, how we respond to those experiences, and then we kind of have a set vibration based on all those moving parts. Whatever vibration we’re at, we’re going to automatically attract other things of that vibration. If our vibration is of a lower scale, you know we’re going to attract experiences that reflect that. Lower vibrational experiences mean more struggle, more hardships and more hard work to accomplish anything. Kind of trudging through mud knee deep to get to where you’re going, as opposed to skirting on top of it.

PTM: What do you mean when you talk about our vibrational scale?

JA: To test people’s energy, we use the Hawkins Scale of Consciousness. Based on that, anything under 500, you’re dealing with jealousy, hate, envy and other lower vibrations. So, if you’re eating foods of a lower vibrational scale, they’re vibrating within that same frequency.

PTM: Where does processed food fall on the scale, and how does that make us feel?

JA: Foods that have a life force of their own, like fruits and vegetables, grow from the earth, they’re nursed from the earth, and they’re nourished from the sun and water that’s created within the earth. It’s all this beautiful synergistic creation which is grown from life force, and that gives us life force. Lower vibrational foods, like processed foods, are stripped. Anything that’s put in these processed foods is stripped down so far that it has no life force of its own.

While these foods might fill us, you know, physically, they’re not nourishing our energy, our bodies, our spirits, our minds. We’re not gaining any energy to uplift our vibration from eating those foods. They really can cause depression. When people are depressed, it is actually just energy that is depressing the field, so they carry a lot of heaviness within their energy which makes them feel heavy mentally, physically and emotionally. When you start to recognize that “When I’m eating this food, I feel a little bit lighter and a little bit better,” you actually clear through some of that depression energy by eating something that’s more nourishing, that’s more life giving, that increases the feeling of being lighter.

So those things are really, really important to choose wisely, especially if you suffer from something that just feels chronic that you can’t seem to break free from, and you’re wanting some relief. A lot of times when people are sad or depressed, they’ll reach for the comfort foods: the donuts, the ice creams, the cakes and the cookies. But again, with the law of attraction, like attracts like. If you’re already feeling that way, you’re going to be more drawn to those types of things, because they vibrate there. But if you know that, and you can make a conscious decision and say, “I’m feeling kind of low today. I want to uplift my energy and I’m having a little bit of a struggle doing it emotionally right now, so I’m going to reach for something that’ll help support that movement. I’m going to eat a salad. I’m going to eat an apple.” Things like that. It can help.

PTM: Which foods give us the most energy?

JA: Anything that’s made from the earth, that’s nourished from the earth’s elements will give us a lot more energy. Even if you’re going to eat an orange versus orange juice, even things like that. Foods in their most complete form are made specifically to nourish us in the best possible ways. So even by keeping an orange fully intact and eating it that way can offer more energy than an orange juice could. That’s not to say that you can’t eat cooked whole foods. You can because your body knows what to do with that and how to break it down.

PTM: How do we gauge what types of foods we need or energy we need from our food?

JA: They say that if you’re craving something sweet, that you’re actually craving more sweetness in your life. And if you’re craving something salty, you’re searching for something more grounded. You’re wanting to be more grounded within your life. So, our cravings will give us a lot of information about what we’re actually needing energetically and emotionally. It’s learning to translate what the body is saying into giving us a direction of where we can go with it.

 PTM: If someone is just starting to connect with the energy of their food, what are some ways that they can do that?

JA: What works for one person is not going to work for the next person. It really is coming back to the mindfulness practice of how foods make you feel. There are a couple of ways that you can do that including approaching it from a beginner’s mind and taking a week to eat clean and cut out dairy, gluten and processed foods and see how you feel. Then add things back one at a time and make a note of how you feel then. You can also journal each day, or if you really want to learn about yourself, journal each meal. Think about “What did I eat? How did I feel after this? How was my energy after that meal?” Really tune in to how you feel. Also, if you’re trying to lose weight, ask yourself before you reach for anything, “Is this really serving my highest good?” Think about the kind of energy that you want to have and whether that particular food would serve as fuel for that energy.

Additional Resource

Jean is happy to offer you a copy of her free e-book called How to Energize Your Life. Through it, she shares information, insights, and “Mindfulness Practices” to better assist you in creating not only what you want in life, but to release what that you don’t.

The post Eating with Intention appeared first on Peppermint Tea.

Growing your own food is about as intentional as it gets when it comes to connecting your mind, body and nutrition. There’s just something about planting a seed or a starter plant, caring for it, watching the vegetables, fruit or herbs emerge from what you planted, harvesting and then eating it that’s about as fulfilling as anything you can imagine. I grew up with a Dad who only knew how to garden the Texas way, which meant that we always had a HUGE garden that could feed us plus our neighbors if needed. While I can’t say I appreciated picking beans out in the hot summer sun as much as I probably should have, as an adult, I’ve certainly gotten back to my roots and truly understand the value of what he was doing for us and teaching us to do for ourselves – even in my little slice of suburbia as compared to the farm I grew up on.

While my entire property isn’t as large as my dad’s garden was, I have learned that it is possible to grow food in whatever space you have – whether it’s a backyard, a patio, a deck or a screened-in porch. That’s where container gardens come in. They make it so that growing our own food – at least to some extent – is something we can all do no matter our income or space limitations. Because Bountiful Backyards specializes in edible landscaping, I went to Operations Manager Keith Shaljian to find out how we can fuel our health with container gardens and to get some tips on how to get started.

Please Note that as an Amazon Associate, I earn from qualifying purchases made through some of the links included on this page. You can read my disclosure policy here.

Peppermint Tea & Me:  What are container gardens?

Keith Shaljian: Container gardens are a distinct environment for plants to live in where you can manipulate the conditions according to what they like the most. They’re versatile and particularly good in small spaces.

PTM: Why is growing our own food good for our health?

KS: Food grown in home gardens is much more nutrient-dense, vitamin-packed and fresh than even organic food that we buy at the grocery store. When it comes to vegetables, freshness is key because they lose a lot of energy very quickly. The further they are from their source, the more nutrient energy they lose.

PTM: How is growing our own food one of the best ways to truly connect all aspects of our lives as far as our mind, our body, and our nutrition?

KS: There aren’t too many other avenues that hit on all three of those things. I think it goes back to the Chinese saying, “The best fertilizer is the gardener’s footsteps.” The more you interact with the growing of your food, the more it steadies your mind, connects you to nature and all things, while providing a lot of value for your health and your home economics.

PTM:  What kind of space is needed for a container garden? Can these really be done anywhere to some extent?

KS: Yes, you can do a container garden pretty much anywhere. Certain plants are going to like different conditions, so if you want to put a fig in a container, you want to have it in full sun. But if you put, let’s say a blueberry in a container, you might not want that in full, blasting sun on a patio. Culinary herbs work particularly well in containers.

PTM: What are some of the best vegetables and fruits to start growing in containers, if this is someone’s first time doing it?

KS: I would say for fruits a dwarf fig. There’s one called Violette de Bordeaux. It’s very compact and doesn’t have a huge root system. Russian Pomegranates are also very easy and like containers. Pretty much any vegetable, if you create the right conditions, will grow fine in a container. And then, culinary herbs. They love container gardening, especially if you create the right drainage, which you have to do with containers.

PTM: What types of containers should we be looking for?

KS: There’s a lot of different types that you can use. Aged wood of one sort or another is good. We use a lot of stainless steel – stuff you can get at an agricultural supply store. Those are really good and pretty inexpensive. Then there are all kinds of other ones. There’s one for vegetables that a couple of our clients have had a lot of success with called EarthBoxes. But we mostly use the stainless steel.

PTM: You mentioned drainage. Is that key for container gardens?

KS: It is very important. I’ll just walk you through our four-step process for creating a container. 1) First thing is to pick a container that’s the appropriate size for what you’re trying to grow. 2) You would drill holes about three or four inches apart in the bottom of the container with just a regular home drill, otherwise that water just sits there at the bottom. 3) Depending on the size of the container, anywhere from one-fifth to one-quarter of the bottom fill would be gravel, a small pea gravel, followed by two inches of sand. 4) Then top it off with compost topsoil mix.

PTM: When you say topsoil, what kind of soil should be used? Especially if the grower wants to keep it organic.

KS: Any soil that’s sold in a garden center that says it’s organic should be fine. Black Kow is a good one that can be found in just about any garden center. If you’re going for organic, you definitely want to stay away from Miracle Grow Soil Mix and things like that. Those are not organic.

PTM: Are there any fertilizers that are safe to use if the grower wants to keep it organic?

KS: Oh, there’s tons. Harmony Organics is a really good one that’s OMRI-certified (Organic Materials Review Institute), and any of the Espoma products. They have all different products for different types of plants. That’s like Holly-tone, Garden-tone, Plant-tone. They have a huge selection.

PTM: When it comes to location for container gardens, what are the most important things to keep in mind?

KS: The most important thing to consider is how much sunlight the plants that you’re putting in there need and want. Providing some afternoon shade can be helpful, so if you have a spot where you can put the container that is protected a bit from the most intense part of the day, that’s always good.

PTM: Are there any surfaces or conditions where there’s too much heat or sunlight that should be a consideration?

KS: Any area that has full sun and is on an impervious surface is going to be more water-needy. It’s going to need to be watched. Plants don’t photosynthesize 14 hours a day. They don’t need 14 hours of sun every day, so I would say keep it to like, if possible, five to eight hours of sun. Definitely an impervious surface can act as a heat-sink and make things even hotter than they already are. If you have those types of conditions, you may need to water more or pick plants that love full sun. That’s one of the main things to remember. Always pick plants that are going to enjoy the conditions that you’re providing.

PTM: Is there any specific advice that you would give about watering?

KS: Don’t over water your plants. That’s the main cause of people’s plants dying is over-watering them, babying them. You’ve got to achieve the right balance with watering by observing the plants and being connected to them. That’s the surest way of success.

PTM: What are your top three tips for someone just starting out with container gardening?

KS: 1) Dream big but start small so that you can become familiar with the process. 2) Grow vegetables, fruits and herbs that you’re interested in eating. 3) Learn about the vegetables or fruits that you want to grow by finding out what type of sun exposure, space and support systems they need.

Keith also adds that container gardens are wonderful options for people that may have health issues or are in some kind of environmental situation, such as a backyard that floods, where a garden that takes up a lot of space simply isn’t an option. Whatever your situation, and whether you decide to be elaborate with your container garden or go small, growing your own food is truly one of the most satisfying and rewarding things that you can do for your health and your overall wellbeing.

Additional Resources

• Container Gardening Complete: Creative Projects for Growing Vegetables and Flowers in Small Spaces (Affiliate Link) by Jessica Walliser.
• Grow Your Own Vegetables (Affiliate Link) (great resource for regular or container gardening)

The post Container Gardens for Healthy Living appeared first on Peppermint Tea.

I’ve had quite a few people say to me that they want to adopt a healthier lifestyle, but they just don’t have time right now to figure out how to do it or what exactly that looks like for them. I completely get it, but if you think about it, when we’re at our busiest, craziest and stretched to the limit, that’s when we need to be our healthiest and sanest or something’s going to give. We’re simply going to fall apart. So, I get not having time, but on the flip side, can you really afford not to spend the time getting started on a healthier lifestyle?

Getting Started on a Healthier Lifestyle

It doesn’t have to be all or nothing. Even baby steps toward getting started on a healthier lifestyle can make all the difference in the world and put you well on your way to feeling better, having more energy and simply being able to cope with life a little easier than might be happening now. That’s why I wanted to share the things I consider to be the easiest steps you can take that will make the most difference. I dig deeper into why these things help so much in other posts, but here, we’re just keeping it simple. Feel free to click on the links to the more in-depth posts once you have more time.

1. Begin to change how you eat.

I did this very gradually as I was getting started on a healthier lifestyle, and then, once I noticed how good I was feeling, I wanted to do more. I started by adding more dark green leafy vegetables and other brightly colored vegetables, which simply didn’t leave as much room for unhealthy stuff. While prepping vegetables does take a little more time than opening a box or can of something, if you set aside a few minutes on the weekend or while you’re waiting for something else to cook at night, you can have what you need ready so that it’s as easy as the processed and packaged alternatives.

I also started taking out simple carbs – again, replacing them with more vegetables. What made the most difference was reducing the amount of white bread and pasta I was eating. In doing that, I realized that I was addressing part of what was making me feel so bad in the first place. I fairly quickly stopped feeling so heavy and weighted down even before the pounds started coming off, and it definitely helped to regulate my blood sugar.

My morning green smoothie. I wanted to share the recipe for the basic green smoothie that was one of the first things I used to replace other not as healthy breakfast foods and that’s still one of my favorites. This is a powerhouse of nutrition as your day is just getting started. By the way, I also use the cheapest blender possible, so while it’s great if you have a really nice one, it’s not necessary. The recipe I use as my standby is a combination of other recipes I’ve picked up along the way. You can easily add other ingredients as you like. It makes 1 serving.

½ to ¾ cups almond milk

½ to ¾ cups kale

4 slices cucumber

½ banana

2-3 tablespoons frozen blueberries

2 tablespoons hemp seeds

½ cup of ice cubes (to add some thickness)

2 tablespoons of almond butter (natural – no sugar or oils added) **If I’m going to exercise afterward. If not, I don’t add the almond butter.

2. Get your mind ready for the day.

Instead of checking your phone the second you wake up, wake up 20 minutes early and let yourself lay there for a minute and just be. Then do 15-20 min of meditation, a gratitude exercise or whatever else helps you to set your brain for the day ahead. I’ve always jumped out of bed immediately when the alarm clock rang – sometimes in a “I can’t wait to start the day” way, but more often in an “I need to do this and this and this” way. My mind naturally starts racing the second I become even somewhat aware that it’s time to get up – even before I fully open my eyes. That’s why this has been a day changer for me. I let myself just be, reel my thoughts back in and take several deep breaths. Then, ideally, I’ll get up and do 15-20 minutes of meditation, list three to five things I’m grateful for or just sit and be quiet. The main thing is that I don’t let my scattered thoughts or “to do” list take over.

I fully admit this is a little difficult for me because I am usually awake some during the night. By the time I get back to sleep, it’s hard to then wake up 20 minutes earlier than I absolutely have to. But, this made such a difference when I was getting started on a healthier lifestyle that it’s well worth being a little groggier at first than I might be otherwise.

3. Move.

Even if you’re having trouble adding regular exercise into your daily routine, find a way to add in some movement. Dr. Heidi Hanna reminds us in her book Relax Your Fat Off that “As human beings, we were built to move.” But many of us now sit behind a computer at a desk for much of the day, and we’re simply not moving nearly as much as we could or should be. While getting in a good workout of some type every day is ideal, even general activity boosts your metabolism. Dr. Hanna suggests setting a timer to alert you every hour and then get up and move for three to five minutes. Here are some of her recommended ways for doing that:

• Just walk around – down the block and back or simply to another part of the building.
• Do a few squats next to your chair
• Climb the stairs
• Use a standing desk for a while and do some calf raises
• Make a few calls using a headset and walk while talking

You don’t have to make a choice between turning your life upside down in getting started on a healthy lifestyle or doing nothing. That’s what real health is all about. Anything you do is connected to everything else. There are steps that you can take no matter how busy you are that will have a dramatic effect on how you feel and toward your overall outlook on life.

Lean on Your Community

What are three seemingly little healthy steps that you can take this week that maybe you’ve been putting off because you didn’t think you had enough time or energy to put into them? Let us know in the comments below or over on Facebook. We’re here to support each other!

The post 3 Tips to Getting Started on a Healthier Lifestyle appeared first on Peppermint Tea.

Does the idea of meal planning make you break out in cold sweats or cause your shoulders to tense up? If so, you’re definitely not alone. This is one of those tasks that can cause even the most seemingly together women (or men) to crumble. It doesn’t have to be that way though, and I’m talking to you about it because I strongly believe meal planning is one of the first steps to good nutrition, good health and overall wellness. Real health does at the very least, include a shopping list (made so much simpler these days by some very easy-to-use meal planning tools).

How Can Meal Planning Change my Life?

I’m not promising a major miracle, but it will make a profound difference in how healthy you and your family are able to eat, and it will save you time and money.

If you plan your meals and snacks in advance, you’re taking control of what you eat. You know (or are learning) what fuels you and what makes you feel your best. My bet is that’s not something that comes out of a vending machine when the 3pm energy slump hits, and it’s not something that’s handed to you through a drive-thru window because you’re too tired to even think about what you want to eat, let alone make it. This practice will take what may seem like lofty goals and help turn them into your healthy reality.

Key to Successful Meal Planning

The key to successful meal planning is that you actually plan out every meal that you and your family are going to have during the week. That may sound tedious and mundane, but it’s the critical first step. Luckily, if you have a smart phone, there are a number of tools out there that can help make this part of the process a lot easier.

5 Best Meal Planning Tools

As an experienced meal planner, I’ve done a lot of the legwork for you while keeping in mind that not everyone has the same needs.

I tested over a dozen meal planning tools, and here are the top five, listed in no particular order, that I found the most helpful. They fill everything from the most basic needs to fairly advanced.

Out of Milk

This one speaks to my very frugal soul! It’s purely a grocery list program, but it’s free and will help keep your budget in check.

Helpful features:

• It lets you put the price in and totals up what your entire shopping list should cost. It can also include tax rate in the settings and then includes tax in the total price of your list. Unless you add a bunch of stuff to your shopping cart that’s not on the list, you should have a pretty good idea of what your shopping trip will cost before you set foot in the store.
• If you’re on a fairly strict budget, this is a great tool. Simply go through once with your template and pantry lists and enter average prices so that you have a good idea of costs. You can adjust within individual weekly lists for sales.
• You can share lists with your entire family, so anyone can add to a list when they notice you’re running low on something (if you don’t want to see cookies magically appearing on your list every week, I suggest that you not share access with your 5-year-old).
• You can have a template grocery list of things you buy every week and then easily copy them into a new list each week. This one is a must in my book. If you have to write down and manually enter the same things week after week, inevitably something critical is forgotten.
• You can add to the list through Alexa.
• It’s browser-based but also has an app.

Cooksmarts

If you’re stuck in a rut and need some inspiration, this meal plan and recipe service may be exactly what you’re looking for. It’s browser-based but very user-friendly. A subscription costs $6-$8 per month depending on whether you do annual, quarterly or monthly, but a trial offer is available that includes three free meal plans.

Helpful features:

• It includes an extensive recipe library.
• It lets you tailor recipes you’re searching for to different dietary needs (paleo, vegetarian, gluten-free and original).
• It includes suggested meal plans that can also be tailored to different dietary needs.
• It automatically adds the ingredients from your recipes to your shopping list. **Note, you will still need to have another shopping list for items not included in recipes found through Cooksmarts.
• You can create a file of favorite recipes that can easily be called on again and again.
• It tracks which meals you’ve made.
• You can send recipes straight to MyFitnessPal.
• It includes many ideas about how to cook on a budget, eat healthier, create a functional kitchen, etc.
• The option to turn on metric measurements is available.
• You can send your shopping order through to Instacart.

Emeals

This is another meal plan service that’s very helpful if you need some variety and don’t have time to go looking for new recipes yourself. It provides suggested recipes for seven dinners based on the preference you indicate. It’s browser-based, but there is an app that goes with it. The service costs $29.99 for 3 months ($9.99 per month) or $59.99 for a year ($4.99 per month) for one specific type of meal plan (such as quick and healthy). Breakfast, lunch and dessert menus can be added to your plan for an additional cost. You can try it out with their free 2-week trial.

Helpful features:

• A variety of options for meal plans including low calorie, low carb, budget friendly, paleo, vegan, kid friendly, etc. are available. You can easily switch meal plans at any time.
• Ingredients for the recipes that you indicate you want to try are automatically added to your categorized shopping list.
• You can also add other ingredients to your shopping list so that everything’s in one place.
• It lets you keep track of your favorite recipes.
• You can link to online grocery shopping.

Plan to Eat

If you want a way to organize your recipes, plan your meals and build your shopping list all in one place, this is it. It’s browser-based but there is an app that goes with it. I liked that I can do the bulk of the work on my computer and then take it with me in an easy to use format on my phone. It costs $4.59 a month or $39 a year, and a 30-day free trial is available.

Helpful features:

• You can check off items as you go, and they don’t disappear. They just show up as a strikethrough.
• You can designate your favorite stores and build your list for those stores (it even let me add the farmers market).
• It has a meal planning calendar that you can easily drag recipes into. This is helpful because it lets you map out the week. You can also go back and see the last time you made something.
• Once a recipe is in your meal planning calendar, the ingredients automatically go into your shopping list. You can easily move items in the shopping list to their corresponding stores.
• It has a staples list that can be categorized by store and easily copied to your shopping list. One of my favorite things about this feature is that even if you copy an item to your shopping list, it keeps it on your staples list, so you’re not having to rebuild your staples list every week.
• You can add your own recipes or import them from the web.
• Hundreds of recipe suggestions are provided that you can filter into categories such as allergen-friendly, gluten-free, easy, cheap, casseroles, breakfast, side dishes, etc.

Chefling

This recipe and shopping list app is fairly basic, very easy to use and has a lot of great features. It’s also free!

Helpful features:

• You can scan in your receipt, and it will suggest recipes based on the ingredients you have on hand.
• It has a large recipe collection, which you can search to match different dietary needs.
• You can easily add the ingredients from any of your recipes to your shopping list.
• It lets you add items from your pantry list to your shopping list.
• You can add to your shopping list through the Alexa and Google home feature.
• It keeps track of how fresh your ingredients are.
• You can sync your pantry and shopping lists across family member’s devices.
• If you’ve scanned in your grocery receipts and then at a later time can’t remember whether you have an ingredient, it will remember for you.

Dollars and Cents

I know that paying a subscription fee for a service like some of these may not be possible for everyone, but one thing to keep in mind is that in most of these cases, we’re talking about what could be the cost of one to two spur of the moment dinners out because you simply didn’t have what you needed at home to be able to pull something together. If you get yourself organized with one of these tools and are able to save money because you’re prepared, you’re easily going to make up your cost.

There are other recommended tools out there, but free trial versions weren’t available at the time when I was writing this (I will continue to check and update as needed). As far as I’m concerned, meal planning and grocery shopping tools are like bathing suits, you have to try them on to know whether they fit you or not. What may work great for someone else, may not fit you at all. You won’t know that unless you try them first, so a free trial is a must.

Lean on Your Community

If you use and love a meal planning tool that isn’t listed here, please include it in the comments section below. While I tried many, I’m sure there are some that were missed. Of course, new ones are also coming out every day. If there’s one you’ve heard about but haven’t had a chance to try, share that as well. I’ll be happy to run it through my paces and share what I find.

The post Meal Planning Tips and Tools for Healthy Living appeared first on Peppermint Tea.

Do you want to be healthy? I mean down to your core healthy? If so, I’m here to let you in on a not-so-little secret. Your key to success for a healthy lifestyle doesn’t necessarily start with how many miles you run or walk, how much salad you eat for lunch every day or how many minutes you meditate in the morning. These and many more components all play important roles in a healthy lifestyle, but there’s one thing needed to bring it all together so that you can live your most vibrant and healthy life. Planning.

That’s right, planning. It may not sound very sexy, but it’s where we all have to start and the place we sometimes have to come back to. That can be true even if you have a regular exercise routine in place but still aren’t feeling your best; you eat the healthiest of diets but still don’t have enough energy or you’re a master at mindfulness but can’t quite manage to get movement into your schedule. If any of this is true for you, these tips for achieving a healthy lifestyle will help you come up with a blueprint for the healthiest you possible – and it all starts with planning.

Jessica Martin-Brassington from over at Unprocessed Jess is a health and wellness blogger, health coach and busy mom. She also speaks from experience after having lost herself in trying to be all things to everyone. Fortunately for us, she reclaimed her health, found herself and her voice and is now helping other women find the healthiest versions of themselves.

She says, “whole health is way more than the food on your plate and looking great naked (even though it helps). It’s so much more than that. It’s addressing all the areas of our life – physical, our relationships, our work life purpose and our spirituality – because they’re all connected, and they affect the other in a negative or positive way.” I call this Integrated Living, she calls it Whole Health. Either way, we’re talking about the same thing and all of these factors are what a healthy lifestyle is all about. But planning is key.

“Health should be something that doesn’t wax or wane with the seasons of life. It should be something that’s integrated into your life regardless.” – Jessica Martin-Brassington

Prioritize Your Healthy Lifestyle

So where do you start? You have to prioritize. You have to put yourself first. This isn’t selfish or self-centered. It’s what’s going to take you beyond just surviving and skyrocket you to thriving. As Jessica cautions, “if you’re not okay, you can’t be the best version of yourself for your relationships or the roles that you serve.”  I’ll admit, this is a tough one for me too, and I am completely a work in progress. But the minute you make the commitment to putting as much thought into how you’re going to make some time to exercise as you do into getting little Jimmy to soccer practice, you’re on your way.

Jessica recommends asking yourself why you’re doing the things that you’re doing that are taking away from yourself. Make a list of everything you’re doing in a day, from getting the kids up and out the door, to driving to and from work, to sitting and waiting for someone to finish an activity. This “where am I spending my time list” will help you see where your time is going and where you can or cannot add things in.

Big Picture – What’s Important to You?

You have to know where you are before you can know where you’re going. To help figure this out, Jessica, who received her health coach certification from the Institute for Integrative Nutrition (IIN) has her clients do an exercise where they rate how satisfied they are in different areas of their life. This Circle of Life exercise was developed by IIN and covers a wide range of areas including spirituality, career, health, physical activity, home cooking and relationships.

I encourage you to finish reading this, do the exercise, then come back and go through the steps. There are no wrong or right answers, it’s simply a matter of trying to get you to start where you are.

This gives you a visual depiction of areas you most need to work on or that are out of alignment. Are you skipping meals then going through the drive-thru because you’re too hungry and cooking will take too long? Are you not getting enough sleep? Are you sitting all day and not moving? These are the questions you need to ask yourself.

See which areas you’re doing okay in and which areas are lacking. The areas that are lacking are the ones that you need to focus on adding more room for in your day. These should be included in a big picture priority list.

Time to be Realistic for a Healthy Lifestyle

The next step in planning for your healthy lifestyle is to make a list of all the things that have to be done each day. You can do this by going back to the list of how you’re spending your time and highlighting the things that absolutely have to be done. This probably includes but is not limited to kids, eating, work, errands, homework, etc.

These shouldn’t be the things that you have to do because you signed up or volunteered for something. These are the things that you have no choice in. Jessica says this list should only include the things that are already “have tos” in your day, not what you think should be added. If you already consider exercising or cooking at home or other things like that as non-negotiable items, those should be highlighted on your list. The items you highlighted are going to be considered your “have tos.”

Scheduling Time for a Healthy Lifestyle – Crowding Out the Undesirable

Next, you’re going to look at everything that’s not highlighted on the list of how you’re spending your time. Are there things on there that you don’t really enjoy, that you find yourself complaining about, and that are taking away from your time to be healthy and that you truly don’t have to do?

Instead of serving on four PTA committees, can you cut back and serve on one? Instead of always being the first to take on extra projects at work, can you cut back and take on one every now and then? Jessica says one of the main things she has learned about being able to get healthy and stay healthy is how to say no.

She learned this the hard way but now puts herself and her health first. She talks about her daughter writing a paper for school where she described her mom as happy. Jessica says that certainly wouldn’t have been the case three or four years earlier. Would your children or spouse describe you as happy? Which is the better choice – to be an involved parent and role model for good health or to be someone who signs up for everything but is then miserable and complaining every step of the way?

Keep your answer in mind as you begin Jessica’s process of figuring out how you’re going to start crowding out the undesirable stuff with the components of a healthy lifestyle. This isn’t about being perfect, this is about starting where you are with realistic expectations.

Begin with a planner or blank online calendar. Then decide whether you’re going to start with two or three days or an entire week. Fill the items from your “have to” list into the planner or calendar. Then, figure out where you freed up some minutes from your list of how you’re currently spending your time, and look at your big picture list of items you want to be doing to feel good and healthy. Focus on the first one or two priorities at the top of your list. Whatever is most realistic for you. If your goal is to exercise five days a week, but you’re currently not doing anything, then figure out when you can exercise one to three times a week to begin with. If exercising for an hour seems unrealistic, start with 20 or 30 minutes. Once that becomes part of your routine, you’ll probably be able to find where you can fit in another one or two days or more time each day.

It’s the same with meditating or any kind of spiritual practice. If your goal is to work in something like that with your morning routine, start by waking up 15 minutes earlier. Or instead of spending 15 minutes on your phone first thing, use that time to get yourself ready for the day mentally.

Put these kinds of things into your calendar at the beginning of the week (many people find that Sunday is best for this) and plan for and around them. As you’re able to start fitting in one or two things each week, you’ll see how they are possible. You can then either build on them the following week or continue down your big picture list of priorities and keep adding in.

Once you’ve seen how this could actually work for a couple of days, Jessica recommends using Google Calendar to keep track of everything. This is a useful tool because it can be kept for just one person or shared with your spouse or entire family.

Whatever tool you use, this is how you’re going to crowd out the undesirable stuff and add in the things that are going to make you healthier, more engaged, more focused and better able to show up for the things that really matter. When it comes to your health, a little planning can go a long way – in fact, it can change your life.

Lean on Your Community

What are your health goals, and what two steps can you take to achieve them? You can reply in the comments section below or head over to the Peppermint Tea and Me Facebook page and leave your answers there. We’re all here to support each other, so let us help you. Also, let us know how you’ve identified ways that you can free up time for yourself so others can get ideas too.

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