My 2014 Health Goal: Incorporating More Meatless Meals!

It's January...the time for New Year's Resolutions. That said, I don't do resolutions. For some reason, they always seem to end in frustration before the calendar even flips to February. Instead, Michael and I have chosen a realistic health goal that we want to focus on in 2014: incorporating more meatless meals. While we'll never be 100% vegetarian, we want to focus on incorporating more fresh veggies and fruit into our daily diet. After doing some research the past few months, we now realize that eating more plant-based meals will reap great health rewards for us. So...how to do two meat lovers accomplish this goal? Not just for a month or year...but for a lifetime. We knew that if we tried to make the switch too abrupt or drastic, we'd become overwhelmed and decrease our chances of sticking with it for the long term.

We decided our first step would be to start taking part in Meatless Monday. We started this week, and it was really easy. I had protein-packed Greek yogurt with berries and granola for breakfast, a vegetarian bean burrito for lunch, and a veggie oven pancake and sides for dinner. The food tasted so great that I really didn't miss having meat. I still have a lot to learn about cooking tasty vegetarian recipes, but I plan to check out some vegetarian blogs and consult some cookbooks to come up with ideas that are both filling and tasty. If you have any recommendations, make sure to leave a comment below. We've decided to start with one meatless day each week for January, then we'll incorporate one more day starting in February...most likely Thursday. Who knows...we may even get daring and add a third day to the mix later in the year if it feels right! 

What exactly do we hope to accomplish with this change? Better health for one thing. Vegetables and fruit are a great source of fiber and essential nutrients, and they're naturally low in fat and calories. We also wanted to challenge ourselves to try new veggies and fruits by incorporating them into our daily diet. If we lose a little weight in the process? Well, that's a great bonus too! Have you added more meatless meals to your weekly meal plans? If so, tell me how it's working for you...and feel free to share any tips that you have. I may share a bit of our journey along the way in here over the coming months, along with any fabulous meatless recipes I come up with.