A balanced diet improves your well-being, preventing everything from obesity to heart disease. However, maintaining a diet rich in health foods can be challenging at first. Here are some easy tips to help you get started.

How to Cook Healthier Meals

1. Focus on Fruits & Vegetables

Fruits and vegetables contain essential vitamins and nutrients, so they make good sides and entrees. Eat around 28 ounces each day. 

Grill zucchini and fill it with grass finished beef or pastured ground turkey, onions, and peppers. Add vegetables to pasta, cook stews and soups loaded with vegetables, or load a spinach salad with your favorite veggies and dress with Olive Oil, Balsamic Vinegar and one of your favorite Rosebud’s Seasoning Mixes such as I Love Garlic. If you have a sweet tooth, replace desserts with mangos, plums, or for a lower carb / calorie count choose green apples or berries. When eating meat and carb-heavy dishes, choose grass finished beef and bison or pasture raised chicken and turkey, serve smaller portions and pair them with at least two fruit and vegetable sides.

2. Use Spices & Herbs

Spices can completely change a dish, adding flavor to vegetables and lean meats. Add crushed basil to a cauliflower-dough pizza and top with Rosebud’s Jane’s Italian or apply Rosebud’s Herb’n Kick! Creole like seasoning to make spicy asparagus spears. Sautee butternut squash in Rosebud’s Rustic Salt, or season grilled chicken with Sassy Salt. It’s also exciting to branch out and try flavors from other countries. Put a Middle Eastern spin on protein by cooking it with Rosebud’s Sami’s Curry or just a sprinkle of cumin. . 

3. Eat the Good Fats & Salts while cutting down the Sugar

Try lean meat like grass finished bison or wild caught fish in tacos. Use Coconut Oil, Avocado Oil, Butter and Pastured Pork Lard instead of Vegetable and Canola Oils.  Replace breakfast cereal with fresh strawberries and coconut yogurt or yogurt made from raw milk. When cooking, add a bit of lemon juice, garlic and onion for huge bursts of flavor. Choose an unrefined sea salt that is low in sodium and high in important minerals such as Baja Gold, the salt that Rosebud’s uses in all of their seasoning blends.  Choose sweeteners such as monk fruit, stevia, coconut palm sugar or dates to satisfy those sweet tooth cravings.

Residents of Miami County, OH and beyond, turn to Rosebud’s Real Food for their health food needs. This health food store carries a large selection of natural seasonings and food products, including honey sweetened fruit butters, herbs and spices. Their staff can share recipes and help you find new spices for your next meal. Call (937) 214-1801 to ask about their stock, get more tips by connecting on Facebook, and visit their website to explore their products.