Healthy Lunch Recipes

Fiber rich fruits and vegetables
create healthy lunch recipes.

An elephant uses foods high in fiber for energy and digestion, and to build strong bones and muscles. So you know an elephant will choose only healthy fiber foods for lunch (and other meals, too).

People who want to be healthy can benefit from healthy fiber foods, too.

Plant-based foods with fiber have few calories, little fat, and low sodium. However, fiber rich fruits and vegetables also have great nutrition for your good health.

Ready-to-eat fiber foods make the perfect:

• Fast food lunch
• Weight loss food
• On-the-go meal to take along
• Diabetic diet recipes

Try These Simple Healthy Lunch Recipes

Lunch on a Leaf

My friend LucySu intended to use the remaining fennel, celery, and cucumbers in the co-op box to create a blended raw fennel soup. But when hunger struck, attention quickly changed to an immediate fast food lunch!

Two days before a new food co-op box, meant time to clear the refrigerator — so LucySu quickly gathered sliced beets, onion, carrot, tomato, kale, bell pepper, celery, and one beautiful chard leaf.

She saw a salad in-the-making… until that one large green leaf inspired a different healthy lunch recipe.

Having blended part of a fennel bulb with it's remaining leaf stalks and a rib or two of celery, that salad transformed into a very health-filled sandwich rolled into a chard leaf dressed with fennel spread — just right for a fast food lunch.

LucySu simply spread fennel "blend" on the large chard leaf, layered on slices of leftover vegetables, and then folded the leaf to hold it all together, much like an eggroll.

Z'chini Pasta

Now this healthy lunch recipe is simple… and delicious. And skinny zucchini pasta qualifies as a weight loss food.

Cut zucchini (or eggplant, squash, or carrot) into long ribbons to create a bowl of pasta. You strip away the starch and sugar you usually find in pasta. Fewer calories and more nutrition!

Use a spiral slicer to quickly shred the zucchini into angel hair or thin spaghetti ribbons. Or use a knife to cut thicker zucchini pasta shapes – spaghetti, linguini, lasanga… long or short, you decide.

To make this pasta perfect for a diabetic diet, top it with sliced or diced vegetables: broccoli, sweet red peppers (or any color), muchrooms, onions, tomatoes, kale. Try sliced or diced sweet potato or pumpkin for a treat, and fresh leafy spinach for extra nutrition.

In just one minute, you can cook thicker z'chini pasta strips in hot water (but have a cold water rinse ready to stop the cooking damage to enzymes or nutrients).

Super Easy Healthy Lunch Recipe:

Simply cover your vegetable pasta with a favorite flavored sauce… Or toss it with olive oil, basil, oregano, and small grape tomatoes. Simple

Not just for lunch! Vegetable pasta also creates fun dinner ideas your whole family can enjoy (you do not have to tell them about the fiber!).

Bag a Healthy Lunch Recipe

Fresh whole fruits make a smart lunch when you are on-the-go. Fruit easily fits into a tote bag or sack, and it needs little or no preparation.

Quickly assemble a variety of nutrition in very little time: a banana or two along with an apple and grapes fills a small lunch bag. And when you eat fruit, you energize your body for the day.

For a more satisfying healthy lunch recipe, add a ready-to-eat vegetable for variety and extra nutrition.

A carrot adds beta-carotene, along with calcium, potassium, vitamin C, and 1.7 grams of fiber. Celery is easy to carry, too, and it carries good nutrition.

Nuts and seeds pack very well and add flavor and fun. But be careful not to overindulge! One ounce of walnuts (14 halves) provides 1.9 grams of fiber and 4.3 grams of protein, but over 18 grams of fat. (You will not get healthy if you only eat nuts and seeds!)

Fiber Foods for Healthy Lunch Recipes

Ingredient	Fiber (grams)	Protein (grams)	Plus!	Calories (kcal)
Almonds, raw One ounce (23 nuts)	3.5	6.02	14,01 Fat grams	163
Apple One medium with skin	4.4	0.47	Vitamin K	95
Banana One medium sized fruit.	3.1	1.29	Potassium	105
Beets One (2" diameter)	2.3	1.32	Folate	35
Blueberries One cup	3.6	1.1	Antioxidants	84
Cantaloupe Large slice (1/8 of large melon)	0.9	0.86	Phosphorus	35
Cashew Nuts, raw One ounce.	0.9	5.17	12.43 Fat grams	157
Carrots Two medium carrots (makes about 1 cup strips)	3.4	1.13	Calcium and Vitamin A	50
Celery One cup, chopped	1.6	0.7	Lutein + zeaxanthin	16
Date (deglet noor) 6 dates, pitted	3.6	1.02	Potassium	120
Figs One large, fresh	1.9	0.48	Calcium	47
Grapes, red or green One cup grapes	1.4	1.09	Vitamins A and K	104
Grean Leaf Lettuce 1 cup (cut, shredded, or chopped)	0.5	0.49	Vitamins A, C, K	5
Orange One medium (2-5/8" diameter)	3.1	1.23	Calcium	62
Oregano One teaspoon leaves	3.1	1.23	Beta Carotene	62
Pumpkin Seeds, roasted One ounce.	5.2	5.26	5.50 Fat grams	166
Romaine Lettuce 1 cup (cut, shredded, or chopped)	1.0	0.58	Vitamins A, C, K	8
Sunflower Seeds, roasted One ounce.	3.1	5.48	14.12 Fat grams	165
Tomato One medium	1.5	1.08	Magnesium	22
Walnuts One ounce (14 halves)	1.9	4.32	18.49 Fat grams	185
Nutrition based on data assembled from United States Department of Agriculture (USDA), National Nutrient Database for Standard Reference.

Add more healthy fiber foods to your healthy lunch recipes. Look in the nutrition charts for vegetables, legumes, nuts, fruits, and grains.