37: Healthy Meals for Summer (Summer Success #2)

Welcome back to our Summer Success Series! Last week we tackled realistic planning, and this week, we're diving into one of the best parts of summer: FOOD!

But how do we keep ourselves and our families on track with healthy, anti-inflammatory meals when schedules go haywire and the heat is on?

Summer should be about fun, not endless kitchen duty. That's why I'm sharing a fantastic roadmap for easy and delicious anti-inflammatory eating all summer long, whether you're road-tripping, vacationing, or just trying to keep cool at home. Get ready to ditch the takeout temptation and embrace flavorful, feel-good food that supports your energy and confidence!

Here's your guide to effortless summer eating:

Travel Like a Healthy Pro: Discover simple and portable anti-inflammatory snack ideas for road trips and airplanes, ensuring you stay energized and avoid those sugary convenience store traps.
Vacation Vibes, Healthy Habits: Learn how to navigate restaurant menus, stock your hotel fridge like a pro, and even leverage rental properties for easy and healthy meal options without being stuck in the kitchen.
Creative & Fun Summer Meals at Home: Get inspired with easy and exciting ideas for grilling, backyard picnics, and kid-friendly presentations that make healthy eating feel like a summer celebration!

This episode is packed with practical, family-friendly tips to make healthy eating a breeze all summer long. Say goodbye to feeling bloated and sluggish and hello to fueling your adventures with delicious, anti-inflammatory foods that everyone will enjoy!

Let's make this summer your most delicious and energized one yet!

More support just for YOU

🥗 Cook just 3 nights a week, and serve dinner all summer long with easy recipes in the Supper Club
💪 Workouts that work with your crazy summer schedule can be found here (ask me to help you get started with the right program!)
🙋‍♀️ Want help building a custom plan for your summer? Get started here!

Transcript

Welcome back to our Summer Success Series. So this series of The Family Fork is really designed to help you have your best summer ever. Now, like I said in the last episode, if you want to have the best summer ever, you really do need to make a plan for that. But I am going to help you in this series to make sure that you can build that plan without a lot of time or effort so that you could really truly have

a summer that is filled with confidence and energy and focus and of course lots of fun.

So for today's episode, we are talking about one of my favorite things, food. It's one thing to try and cook anti-inflammatory meals when you are at home and your schedules are predictable and you know exactly what's going on. It's easier in that moment in time to really make those anti-inflammatory meals. But when the...

But when the summer rolls around, I don't know about your house, but in our house, dinnertime pretty much goes out the window. All of a sudden, there are these crazy schedules. I mean, like, raise your hand if you're already signing your kids up for activities and your family for different things, that you're planning vacations. Like, everyone's schedule looks completely different.

And

And in Colorado, anyway, during the summer, there are so many nights where it is way too hot to cook. Like when it is 95 degrees outside, the last thing we want to do is turn on the stove or the oven. How in the world then are you supposed to keep yourself and your family on track with healthy anti-inflammatory foods this summer, even though your schedules are crazy and you're busy and you're on vacation?

Today, I'm gonna answer all of those questions for you. You are going to get the exact roadmap for being able to eat healthy meals all summer long. Pretty great, right?

But I hear, I hear you, I know what you might be thinking. You might be thinking, you know what, it's summertime. I just wanna kick back and relax and not worry about it so much. Like, we'll just order some more takeout or we'll figure it out as we go. I wanna address why it is actually very important, why you should even bother with healthy food during the summer months.

So when my brain goes to summer, honestly, I think about barbecues, beer, and brownies. I just feel like those are the elements that make up summer. know, barbecues, whether you're grilling a lot of things or you're going to a barbecue and beer, I don't really drink, you know, maybe the occasional Corona, but sometimes it hits the spot on a hot summer day. And brownies?

you can pretty much find brownies at every barbecue and potluck that you go to. So I get it. I'm right there with you. Summer should be easier in terms of cooking and not feel so stuffy or structured. But I want you to do that in a way that is really going to support you with your goals for the summer. Anti-inflammatory food, it's going to help you have more energy and

in the summer, you need that energy. Depending on where you live, you are probably already making plans for camping or hiking, maybe you're water skiing and wherever you are, you're definitely swimming over the summer. And, of course, there's like always yard work to be done too, right? So if you are eating healthy anti-inflammatory meals, you are going to have the energy to do all of those things.

Plus eating anti-inflammatory over the summer means that you can continue to maintain that health that you've already been working on. I know you have already been putting in the work. You've been listening to this podcast and you're putting in more anti-inflammatory foods into your meals. And maybe you've even been working through some of those recipes in the perimenopause weight loss guide that I have for you. You're probably trying to add more fresh vegetables.

So I see you, I know that you are doing this work already to add things to and create those healthy meals. So don't let summer be the thing that messes up and stops all of your progress. You can keep going. And today I'm gonna show you exactly how easy it is to do that.

If you're gonna take time to eat anti-inflammatory over the summer, it's really as easy as just building a bank of healthy recipes and healthy approaches to food so that everything feels just as fun and easy as the real thing.

I think there's often this belief when people think, ⁓ it's healthy food. Like you're probably talking about kale salads and zucchini. No, there are ways to have delicious barbecue chicken with cheese and brownies and popsicles. We can make all of these choices. They're just anti-inflammatory. And that's going to help us feel just as good even if we were just eating the real thing.

We can make all of these choices that are anti-inflammatory, but we're going to feel better than if we were eating kind of the conventional option. So let's pull back. We're going to take a look at a couple of different ways that you can keep anti-inflammatory nutrition front and center for you and your family in easy and practical ways.

All right, if you have any travel plans this summer, I'm thinking about everything like road trips, airplane travel, it is really easy to leave your travel snacks to the very last minute or worse yet to grab something really quick at the airport or at a convenience store on the way because you completely forgot in all of that hustle and bustle of getting ready for your trip. You just didn't think to bring snacks for that travel portion of your trip.

But the reality is that when you are traveling, that is exactly the time that you need that optimal nutrition the most. You need those high quality foods that will give you lots of energy and to help keep you focused. And honestly, if you're anything like me, you probably need an extra dose of patience when you're traveling with your spouse, your partner, or your family. So if you're eating the right foods and you're not filling up on foods that create inflammation,

or you're staying away from foods that are full of sugar and those weird processed ingredients, you are going to feel so much better and you are easily going to be able to handle that travel day or two in a much better way.

So when it comes to those travel days, I want you to think really easy snacks.

One of my favorite things to bring anytime I travel is dry roasted nuts. And I usually will make even like a little trail mix for myself. I'll add some dried fruit, usually dried cherries, ⁓ some Hu kitchen chocolate chips, because those are dairy free, refined sugar free, and then maybe some sliced coconut too.

Those dried roasted nuts are so easy to make at home. Just pick any of your favorite nuts, pistachios, cashews, almonds, and just roast them. I put mine in the oven for about 12 to 18 minutes at 350 degrees. I just toss them once mid-baking cycle, and then you have perfectly dry roasted nuts. The trick here is that when you buy the nuts, you want to be sure that you're buying nuts that are raw.

and unsalted and preferably organic whenever possible. So you have your nuts and adding a few extra goodies, you can make this really healthy trail mix that's gonna give you healthy fats. It's gonna be low in sugar and you'll get that mix of protein, healthy fats and carbs. It's all just gonna give you a lot of good energy. Now, one of the things that I never travel without is my Hu Kitchen chocolate bars.

So I have mentioned this probably in a lot of episodes because I really do eat two pieces of this chocolate every single day. It's Hu, H-U Kitchen, and they have a lot of different flavors, but to stay really anti-inflammatory, I want you to stick with the dark chocolate flavors. So my preference is the salty dark, and there's just a few ingredients. Again, it has no refined sugars and...

These chocolates are gonna be such a good treat for you.

it's really going to help you to skip the, like, I don't know. My favorites used to be three musketeers or a Milky way to skip those chocolate bars and grab a huge chocolate bar instead so that you can feel really good about actually eating candy on the day or two that you travel.

If you are on an airplane or a quick road trip, I want you to bring some grilled chicken. You can grill that chicken ahead of time. And personally, I never pack it on ice packs, but you can if you're concerned about that chicken spoiling. But I usually have grilled chicken in my bag, and then you can add on some things like Simple Mills crackers and a really sharp cheddar cheese. know, with sharp cheese, the harder the cheese, the less lactose it has.

And so it's not as likely to cause as much inflammation. So this makes a really good combination, just grilled chicken, simple mills crackers. ⁓ They have like a rosemary flavored one that's so good. And then a little bit of cheese.

So all of these snacks, the dry roasted nuts, the Hugh chocolate, grilled chicken, crackers, cheese, these are going to help you feel so much better while you're traveling compared to an energy drink and a bag of smart popcorn that you just get at the convenience store or the airport. Just don't do that, okay? I want you to take a few minutes, get your snacks ready to go so that when you are ready to travel, it's really easy to just pick those up, toss them in your bag.

All of the things that I've mentioned can go through TSA on an airplane, with you in the car. They just travel so easily and you will thank yourself because you will feel so good and you are going to have energy and feel great for your days of travel.

All right, now this summer when you are on vacation, depending on where you're going, I don't know about you, but I cannot imagine anything worse than feeling super bloated on the beach when you are supposed to be enjoying your vacation. You know, there you are in a bathing suit and you're feeling puffy and bloated because you have been eating all the foods at the hotel or the resort or the town that you're in that aren't anti-inflammatory and they're not making you feel very good.

Not only are these foods going to leave you feeling really bloated, but they're also going to leave you feeling really sluggish. You're not going to be as excited or have as much energy to do those activities where you are for vacation. Whether that's on a beach or hiking in the mountains, swimming at the lake, whatever it is, you want to fuel yourself with the healthiest foods possible while you're on vacation.

And please note, this does not mean that you need to deprive yourself or feel like your foods are boring. No. Take these tips and tactics so that you can really find meals that are going to serve you best while you're on vacation. So to do that, to start, I want you to look for restaurants that offer gluten-free and dairy-free options. By clicking

By picking gluten-free and dairy-free, you're going to reduce a lot of the inflammatory ingredients that might otherwise leave you feeling really bloated in your bathing suit. Now, you do have to be mindful that just because it's gluten-free doesn't mean that it's super healthy. Gluten-free breads, for example, they still have a lot of additives and that kind of thing. So gluten-free, dairy-free, it will get you closer to the foods that will fuel you up.

so that you can still have good energy and not feel so tired and sluggish on your vacation.

Now, when you've selected some restaurants and you go to some of those, I want you to skip the bread that they offer at the beginning and ask instead for some fresh cut veggies and maybe even some hummus or guacamole on the side. Those veggies, they're gonna taste so good. That fiber is gonna fill you up, but they're going to taste so fresh and crisp. And then having like a hummus or a guacamole or something to dip the veggies in.

you're not feeling deprived at all. You're actually gonna love what you're eating and I bet you'll be surprised. Your family will probably look at your plate.

your family will probably look at your delicious plate of fresh cut veggies and guacamole and they're probably going to ask to dig in too. So don't be afraid to skip the bread and just ask them not to even bring it and then dive into those fresh cut veggies instead.

Now, whenever I travel, whether it's vacation or work, I always make sure that there is a refrigerator in the room. This is such a pro tip because it allows you to do some grocery shopping. Whether you stop at a grocery store or order Instacart or something like that, you can fill up your fridge with as many things as possible. And sometimes your hotel might have a fridge that's like a mini bar and it already has snacks and alcohol in it.

just pull those out and set those aside. You won't get charged for them if they're still sitting in the room, but you can just take those out and then you have room. Most hotels though, anymore have a

Most hotels though anymore have a fridge in the room or you can call ahead and request it. So my recommendation is that you fill the fridge with things for breakfast and lunch and snacks. It's just going to be a lot easier for you. You'll be out and about during the evening so you can easily find a place for dinner. But if you're trying to get your family or your kids together and get up and get breakfast on time, sometimes that can be pretty challenging. So make it easy on yourself.

have something for breakfast like pre-cooked oatmeal, pre-cooked chicken sausage, 7 Sundays cereals, which are so good, either with milk or plain. All of these are going to be really good options for you.

And another tip is to bring protein powder with you. And that allows you to add some water, make a protein, a quick protein shake in your hotel in the morning. It might not have all of the ingredients you're used to, but it's going to help you to get some protein in first part of the day. And that can be extremely helpful. So if you get some things into that fridge for breakfast, for lunch, for lunch, it's like nitrate free deli, maybe some fresh cut veggies.

fresh cut fruits and then some snack options like the things.

then some snack options like the things that I earlier mentioned for the travel snacks, you are going to feel really good. Also, you're going to save money and you're going to save time in trying to find things that work for everyone. So be sure to get that fridge in your room, stock it with breakfast, lunch, and snack options, and then enjoy your food when you go out for dinner.

Now, if you're not staying at a hotel, maybe staying at an Airbnb or a rental property can be a really good option. And it also allows you to have a lot of control over your food choices and your cooking. Every rental property that I have ever stayed in has plenty of tools in the kitchen to be able to make dinners as well as breakfast and lunch. So it's a really

So that's always a great option. If you want your family to have lots of energy and to not feel sluggish on vacation, you just stay at the rental property so you can cook all of your foods. But I don't want you to get stuck being the one doing all of the cooking for the meals, because you're on vacation too, right? So make assignments before you ever leave for the trip so that everyone in the family is either helping out in the kitchen or is actually responsible for an entire meal.

That way everyone gets a turn and you don't get stuck doing all of the cooking.

So overall, while you're on vacation, I want you to pick the foods that are gonna help you feel your best. And that means prioritizing animal protein, fresh cut veggies and fruits, and then fill in with the other things. But if you start there, protein, veg, fruit, you're gonna feel so much better. You're gonna have a great time on your vacation. I mean, that's why you're there, right? To have a good time.

to feel good and to enjoy time with your family and friends. So make sure that you are fueling in the right way so that food is kind of an afterthought because you're just having so much fun.

Now, obviously summer is going to include some travel, vacation, but for most of us, we're actually home for a good portion of the summer. So I want to give you a bunch of ideas on how to get creative with the foods that you are already gonna be cooking at home, but I want you to have some ways to make it really, really easy.

I know about you, but sometimes the same food that you eat on a regular basis can actually feel a little bit more fun when it's in a different setting. So a great example of this is, you know, when you're camping in the mountains or you're at the lake, it's really easy to marinate meat and veggies and just make some skewers. And maybe that's something that you would probably have at home, but it's going to taste really good when you're out somewhere else having fun with family or friends.

But just being able to change your setting a little bit, that can give you a really elevated feel for your dinner.

If you are going to spend some time camping or out at the lake, just make sure that again, you're sticking with those anti-inflammatory food choices. There are a bunch of great options in the Supper Club and I'll link to that down below.

There's a bunch of great options in the supper club. And so I'll link to that in the show notes, things that you can make ahead of time, like bringing those pre-threaded skewers with veggies and meat all ready to go so that all you have to do when you get there is put them on the fire pit or the grill and you have a super fast and easy dinner.

If you're closer to home, you can still change up your setting a little bit. So in the summer, we love to eat outside, even on a random Tuesday. So start thinking about it now. Like, where could you set up some space? Maybe you already have a table on your back patio. Maybe it just needs to be cleaned off, or maybe you have some benches, or you can find a small table. Think ahead now.

How can you make your backyard an extension of your kitchen table so that it's really easy to eat there more often? One of the things that we did last summer is that we bought one of those giant Connect Four sets from Costco. You it's like life-size Connect Four. ⁓ my gosh, it was so much fun last summer. We would make our dinner and we would eat outside when the weather was nice. And then we could play a couple of games of Connect Four. We actually had such a good time.

And even when my husband's parents were visiting from out of the country, they had a good time playing Connect Four with Saraya and it gave them something to connect. ⁓

And even when my parents...

And even when my husband's parents were visiting from out of the country, they even had a good time playing connect four. It allowed them to have something to do with Suraya. So just really think about it. Like, can you pick up an easy game or is there something you can do to make it more fun outside while you're enjoying your dinner? And honestly, this approach, it does not take any more time than what a regular dinner would take.

but it is going to feel more fun than being stuck at your kitchen table when it's really nice and beautiful outside.

Another way to get creative with your meals is to grill as much as you can. So this is one of my favorite reasons.

So this is really one of my favorite approaches because it keeps the heat out of the kitchen, which is really helpful. know, last year I invested or not even invested, but I bought these like $10 grill baskets. So it's really easy to chop up veggies like zucchinis, peppers, onions, and put them in the grill baskets that you just put on top of the grill next to your chicken or your meat. I like this approach versus making skewers because skewers take

little bit time to make. if you're just chopping up the veggies and popping them in the grill basket, it makes it really easy. You can have dinner done in like eight minutes flat. Also on the grill, you can do things like grilled peaches and grilled apples. Like how cool is that to be able to have an entire dinner, the main dish, side dishes and dessert all done on the grill.

You can also change up your setting by creating a picnic for your family. Now, of course, you can do this in your backyard, but you could even go to a local park that's nearby. And again, just bring things like if there's a grill available, just

And again, bring things, you know, if there's a grill available at a local park, take advantage of that and just make some of your things ahead of time.

Again, there are some great recipes in the supper club to help you out with that, but making that food ahead of time and packing it into a picnic basket allows you to just head out the door, bring a frisbee, some bubbles, just make it a really fun adventure.

One of the favorite things that we do for our picnics is finger foods and almost like a charcuterie basket. So just make sure that you are choosing foods like that are protein forward, veggie forward. But again, then you can just add in like dips, guacamole, hummus, some grain free crackers. And then while everyone is having fun out playing frisbee or blowing bubbles, it's really easy to just stop over to the picnic blanket, grab a couple of bites to eat and then get back out.

and have fun playing with the frisbee or the bubbles.

And hands down, of my absolute favorite ways to get really creative with food in the summer is with presentation. So my sister, Laura, and I always laugh that if something is cute or in a creative package, I'll probably buy it no matter what it is or whatever the product is. So the same thing definitely applies with food. So just remember, keep it fun, but keep it simple. So here are a few of my favorite ideas.

Many years ago, we got from Target, I'm sure you can still find them in the summertime, those plastic baskets that are used at takeout joints where they have like a hot dog or a hamburger and then some fries. They're usually lined with paper. So that is a really fun way for us to present dinner. If I'm grilling hamburgers at home, I can make some French fries. I'll pull those baskets out, line them with checkered paper. And again, you know, we're eating outside, so it feels really fun.

Obviously, this presentation feels way different than a dinner plate. And I actually find that my family eats more when the presentation looks really fun and creative like that. Right now is a great time to shop Target or Walmart, some of the big box stores, ⁓ look for those bento style lunch boxes like glass containers or lunch boxes with divided sections.

This is another great option for the charcuterie baskets or if you're making finger food plates to take on picnics, because each section can be filled with something different. I find that this works especially well with younger kids because having the different options that aren't touching, right? That are clearly visible, it just makes them really fun for them to be able to pick what they want and then be on their way.

Now, if you really want your family to eat food, put it on a stick. Whatever it is, it's so easy to eat food on a stick. And I want to tell you a funny story. So when I was at summer camp, like a hundred years ago, I wrote my parents a letter and I was so excited because at camp we were having shish kebabs for one of our camp out dinners. And I thought it was the coolest thing, but

I spent half of my letter trying to spell the word shish kebab and I kept scratching it out and trying again and scratching it out. And ultimately I had to just write, well, we're having meat and vegetables on a steel rod because that was the only thing I could spell.

Truly, if you have skewers or sticks, you can put meat, vegetables, you can even dice up or chop up pears and peaches and apples, put those on a stick and you can grill those. Popsicles are on a stick. Honestly, anything that's on a stick or a steel rod, in my words, it's really going to get eaten by your family. Overall, the goal for you this summer is to cook less.

to feel way more energetic, less bloated and more confident. And you can do all of that with the food that you eat. So I want you to pick a couple of ideas from this episode, not everything, just pick a few that sound easiest and most fun to you and plan to put those in place for your family this summer. Think about your travel snacks on those days of travel. Think about how you can create breakfast and lunch options.

with the refrigerator in your hotel while you're on vacation. And then pick a couple of these creative options so that your family is still getting very healthy protein forward and veggie forward meals all summer long.

And then pick a couple of these creative options so that your family is still getting healthy protein forward veggie forward meals all summer long, but they're not feeling like they're tied to the kitchen table and you aren't feeling like you're tied to the kitchen doing all of the cooking. It should be easy. It should be fun and approachable. I really want you to maintain the work that you've already put in to change up your nutrition and to start feeling healthier. But summer.

It does not have to be the end of that. So be sure to pick a couple of these ideas and put them into practice for the summer and have your kids listen to this, get them involved, see what they are interested in doing as well so that it feels like a family decision on what you eat, where you eat, and how much fun you can have around your food this summer. Hopefully these are some really helpful ideas for you and I would love to know which options you are choosing for your family.

So send me a message on Instagram @theashleymalik I really, I do, I love to hear from you and I wanna know which of these things are going to work for you and your family this summer. Also, don't forget to share this episode with another mom or two who also needs to make food easier for their family this summer. All right, have a great one and we will see you back here next week for episode three of the Summer Success Series.