I need help. First some background:

COLD LUNCH IDEAS ~ I work full-time, but have the opportunity to take the whole summer off and stay home with the kids. (Every other week will be vacation time and unpaid time ~ I will break even, not paying for daycare or gas). I need some ideas for healthy cold lunches, since I want to make the most of our time home to play together and not spend a lot of time cooking. Neither of my kids are close to being obese, so I'm not as much worried about calories as I am about balancing their meals.

HEALTHY FROZEN DINNER IDEAS ~ While I'm home this summer I thought I would take a day each week and prepare meals ahead of time for dinner and freeze them. That way, once again, I'm not worrying about cooking during the nice weather. My challenge is that I want to get DH on a better road of health. His family has a lot of high cholesterol, heart disease and Type 2 diabetes. At 38 DH already has high cholesterol while taking medication, is pre-diabetic and is overweight. I don't feel like becoming a widow in my 40's. (His dad had his first heart attack in his 40's). FIL is still alive, but his quality of life is terrible between multiple heart attacks, triple bypass, diabetes (1 leg amputated and the other foot partially amputated), 3X weekly dialysis etc.

My big challenge is that I'm clueless in the kitchen!!!

This is what I have in my head for lunches:
Turkey dogs
sandwiches with wheat bread
peanut butter sandwiches
salads (my kids will eat salad) ~
carrot sticks with ranch dressing
celery with peanut butter & raisins
yogurt
whole fruit
string cheese
trail mix
pretzels
homemade chicken strips
homemade chicken noodle soup (courtesy of MIL)

Any other ideas for lunch?

I have no idea where to start with frozen healthy meals for dinner
I'm looking for main courses. I would serve salads / vegetables with all meals.

Thanks Everyone!!

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NatalieK
Mom to DS's AJ & Benny and DP (darling puppies) Cassie & Shadow

For dinner, how about marinating some meat and freezing it? Then you could grill it up when you needed it.

We use this marinade and it's awesome:

Rockin' Marinade

1/4 cup soy sauce
3T red wine vinegar
2T lemon juice
2T olive oil
3/4 t dried italian seasoning (I don't use)
1 clove garlic, crushed
1/4 t onion powder
pinch black pepper
1/4 cup italian dressing (I used fat free)

Mix together and marinate meat of choice for at least three hours. Grill as you normally would.

something else to think about is crockpot meals.. they are very easy to assemble in the morning or lunch time and then they are ready when you come back.

I have made many of the ones posted. It saves time, doesn't heat your kitchen up and you can provide balanced meals for your family.

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Kenny Chesney~
Everything gets hotter when the sun goes down!!
I think your tractor's Sexy!
Don't Blink!!

This is my new favorite cold recipe:
Dice one red, green, yellow, and orange pepper (or whatever colors you can find)
Dice one red onion
Dice one mango (optional but really good)
Chop up a bunch of cilantro
Mix it all together with one rinsed, drained can of black beans
Mix juice of 1 lime, s & p, 3 cloves minced garlic, and about 1/4 cup of olive oil, and pour it over the pepper and onion mixture.

It is so yummy and keeps for a few days!

My favorite cold lunch when I was a kid,,

gran put cottage cheese on the plate, and then 'decorated' it into a clown or animal of some sort using various produce


*like a cherry smile,, pear half ears*...

she did it so as not to burn up during the summer *no a/c then* but i loved those

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Think big! Change the world! One A.R.K at a time.

Thanks for the ideas and reminding me about grilling and my crockpot! I need to learn how to use the grill. that's DH's job, but I can prepare the meat ahead of time!

__________________
NatalieK
Mom to DS's AJ & Benny and DP (darling puppies) Cassie & Shadow