Healthy & quick meal ideas for Coronavirus lockdown

If you are now in quarantine and looking for a variety of fast and healthy meal ideas and recommendations, look no further.

As some may say, you are what you eat. Now that we have to adopt a new lifestyle to fight against the pandemic spread, it is a good opportunity to put an extra effort into healthier eating habits. In this post you can find how easy it can be to eat a balanced diet, as well as to entertain yourself by doing something that is good for you. These meal and prep ideas work for people that are doing quarantine by themselves as well as for medium and big groups or families, as you can choose the size of the portion that you want to prepare.

Breakfast: Oats

For a balanced breakfast, oats are known to be one of the best options to obtain a lot of essential ingredients in one go. Oats are one of the healthiest types of grain and they are a good source of nutrients including protein, fibre, vitamins and minerals. There are many ways in which oats can be prepared, and an infinite amount of ingredients to add that you can never get bored of it!

Eating oats also has a bunch of benefits for you. Firstly, they help with digestive health, as it is recommended that one should ingest an average of 25 to 30 grams of fibre, and one cup of oats contains 16.5 grams of dietary fibre. Secondly, oats help weight management by keeping you full for a longer period of time. This avoids unnecessary snacking and sweet cravings. Thirdly, foods that are high in fibre like oats, slow down the digestion of food in the intestine, causing a controlled release level of sugars into the bloodstream.

Below there are four ways to prepare oatmeal, with links to inspiring recipes:

• Stovetop oatmeal

• Instant pot oatmeal

• Overnight oatmeal

• Baked oatmeal

Lunch: "One Pot Recipes"

One pot recipes are all about throwing lots of ingredients and spices into one saucepan, so it makes it easy to have a balanced meal that contains protein from meat, fish, sea food or beans; carbohydrates from rice, pasta or potato; fibre and vitamins from vegetables or fruit.

Weather you are working, studying, chilling or teaching during your quarantine, you can always try and take 1h break at noon to cook and eat a One Pot Recipe. These type of recipes can come in very handy as they are not time consuming. Also, since you cook everything in one pot, you can clean up the mess afterwards in less than 2 minutes. Not to mention, they are very delicious and rich in nutrients.

• The 31 one-pot-recipes link

• The 32 vegan one-pot-recipes link

Dinner: Soups

Soup may sound boring, but it doesn't have to be. Eating a big meal for dinner may not be a good idea during lockdown, since most of us are not moving much. You also probably don't need those extra calories before you go to bed.

There are two main reasons that will convince you to eat soup more often, or even every night. One of them is that they are packed with nutrients and are an effective way to add the required vegetables to your daily intake. The other reason is that they are very affordable to make and just a few ingredients stretch out a long way.

To feel inspired and make delicious soups for dinner, you can start by looking at these soup recipes below, they are easy to make and full of those good-for-you ingredients.

• 10 minute soup recipes

• 25 vegan soup recipes