Have you noticed you’re having the same thing for dinner almost every week? If you’re feeling uninspired in the kitchen you’re not alone. Most of us are creatures of habit and have a tendency to stick with the same staples week after week. While it’s easy and convenient to go with what you know, there may be significant health benefits to getting more variety in your diet. Research has shown that a diverse diet creates a rich and diverse microbiome, which is essential to your overall health. On the flip side, low microbial diversity could actually make you sick, as it’s associated with conditions like diabetes, inflammatory bowel disease, chronic fatigue, and colorectal cancer. 1,2 Try these tips to liven up your meals - your tastebuds and your microbiome will thank you.
No Need to Reinvent the Wheel
Restaurants pay chefs to develop delicious seasonable menu items, and you can benefit from this at home. Instead of scouring internet or leafing through cookbooks for hours, just scan the menus from your favorite places and recreate these dishes. Quick-casual spots like Sweetgreen, Panera, and Honeygrow offer a ton of healthy and unique options that are easy to throw together at home even if you have limited experience in the kitchen.
Spice It Up
Something as small as adding new spices to your staple dishes is a great way to get out of a food rut. Spices like tumeric, cumin, and chili powder can add a whole new flavor to your favorite foods, and also provide antioxidants. If you can’t handle the heat, herbs like rosemary, thyme, basil, and oregano add a more subtle flavor but can still perk up a dish and offer many health benefits.
Outsource It
If finding and creating new meals isn’t your jam, let someone else do it! Meal delivery services like Plated, Green Chef, and Hungry Root offer globally inspired dishes with the flexibility to skip shipments as often as you want. These services ensure you’ll have everything you need in your fridge to throw something delicious together, without ever having to meal plan or grocery shop.
1. Mosca A, Leclerc M, Hugot JP. Gut Microbiota Diversity and Human Diseases: Should We Reintroduce Key Predators in Our Ecosystem?. Front Microbiol. 2016;7:455. Published 2016 Mar 31. doi:10.3389/fmicb.2016.00455
2. Le Chatelier E, Nielsen T, Qin J, Prifti E et al. Richness of human gut microbiome correlates with metabolic markers. Nature. 2013 Aug 29;500(7464):541-6. doi: 10.1038/nature12506.