Appliances to Help You Prepare Quick and Healthy Meals
One of the keys to quick and healthy meals is the proper appliances. These appliances not only help you prepare the meals quicker, but they also ensure that you’ll always have healthy meals on hand.
#1: Slow Cooker
Now I know what you thinking, “A slow cooker? This article is supposed to help me make quick meals, not slow ones.” Just give me a moment to explain. You see a slow cooker allows you to prepare a meal in mere minutes, right before you leave for the day. All you need to do is throw everything into the appliance and turn it on low or high depending on the recipe. When you get home your meal will be ready. As a college student, who works full-time, I use my slow cooker at least once a week. There is something wonderful about coming home and your meal already being done. This is also a perfect appliance because it allows you to cook lean meats so that they are still juicy, allowing you to serve healthier meats that won’t be dried out.
#2: Microwave
Microwaves may not be good for much, but they do help you out a lot when it comes to preparing a quick and healthy meal. You may be too busy to stop at the store on the way home and all the meat at your home is in the freezer. Simply grab a healthy choice from your freezer, such as boneless skinless chicken breast, and throw it in the microwave and defrost it. This saves you the trip to the store and allows you to avoid bringing home fast food, which is far from healthy.
#3: Food Saver
There are TV dinners that are really quick and healthy, but honestly, how tasty are they? This appliance is wonderful for fixing your own healthy TV dinners. To make this even quicker, simply prepare more portions than you need one night, then prepare the TV dinners on a freezer/microwave safe plate, seal the meal with the food saver appliance, and pop it in the freezer. This ensures that you will always have a quick and healthy meal when you want one.
#4: Pizza Stone
Pizza’s aren’t healthy at all or are they? While picking up a pizza on your way home is an unhealthy choice, a pizza made at home can be a very quick and healthy meal. Simply pick up a pizza crust at the grocery store (preferably a whole wheat crust) and some healthy ingredients. Prepare the ingredients once you get home and then build your pizza. The pizza stone will provide a wonderful, crispy crust that is actually better than what you get at your favorite pizza place. But wait, this appliance is also great for other foods. For example, you may not have time to make a loaf of bread, but you can pick up a take and bake loaf at your grocery stores bakery. Simply place the bread on the pizza stone and bake according to the directions. The bread will turn out crispy on the outside and soft in the middle, just like you baked it yourself.
#5: Mini Chopper
Chopping vegetables is one of the reasons healthy meals take so long. To ensure quick and healthy meals, you should invest in one of these choppers. These choppers will quickly chop onions, garlic, etc. I don’t encourage people to buy manual choppers, what I do suggest is a mini chopper that is like a food processor, which can be bought for around $5-10.
#6: Stand Freezer
If you always want to have healthy foods on hand, you should certainly invest in a stand freezer. A stand freezer will allow you to stock up on meats when they are on sale. Also a stand freezer will give you a shelf for your homemade TV dinners.
#7: Stand Mixer
We all know that it’s healthier to make bread from scratch rather than buying sliced bread at the store, but who has the time? You may think that it takes forever to knead bread dough and that you just don’t have that kind of time. A stand mixer is wonderful for this and so much more. A stand mixer quickly kneads bread dough, allowing you to serve fresh bread whenever you’d like. You can also buy attachments that will allow you to make homemade pasta, sorbets, and even fresh ground meat.