One of the most popular questions I get asked is: “What can I have for a healthy lunch which is easy and quick to prepare in advance and low in calories?”.
Now although I very much don’t promote counting calories, it is good to have an idea of what the food you’re eating contains, so that you are feeding your body with what it needs and not substantially more. That can be quite hard to do with healthy foods because healthy is healthy and therefore if we just eat healthy food, we won’t ever put on fat, right? Unfortunately it’s not always quite so straight forward…let me give an example. Take an egg, on average around 80 calories. One of the best sources of animal protein you could give yourself and something I eat most days. It’s paleo, it’s dairy-free, it’s sugar-free, gluten-free, rich in good fats and of course protein, so it’s pretty much one of the best options out there and certainly would be considered ‘healthy’. However, eat 50 eggs a day which totals 4000 calories and the chances are, you will put on fat because your body simply doesn’t need that amount of energy. That is of course unless you are professionally training/a body builder/sportswoman who most likely do need an excess of 4000 calories a day!
So to do a full circle, the first thing is to make sure you are living a clean-eating and balanced lifestyle but it is also good to be aware of calories – which brings us to my tuna and bean salad! This salad ticks all the boxes to the question up top and it is why it’s number 1 on my easy lunch list!
It’s packed full of protein, good fats, its crunchy, sweet and flavourful! I would say I have this for lunch on average twice a week and it’s normally the days when i’m rushing around the most and don’t have too much time. And somehow it just never gets boring! It’s got so many different components to the dish that you are hit with different tastes and textures that all blend together very well. You can make it the day before and keep in the fridge and the whole dish comes to less than 340 calories, including the lemon dressing!
I hope it helps for anyone who’s asked me or others the above question and you find the salad as delicious as I do! If you are a cheese lover like myself then you can add in a good square of feta as well as some pumpkin seeds as pictured!
