How to eat more vegetables the healthy, convenient, tasty way

Stop spending hours in the kitchen adding more veggies to your diet. Here’s how to eat more vegetables with healthy convenience foods.

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When do you feel like a broken record? Could it be when you say any of these?

“Have you done your homework?”

“No, I don’t know what’s for dinner.”

“I wish telemarketers would lose my phone number!”

For me – with more than 30 years yacking nutrition to clients, family, and well, everyone – “Eat more vegetables” is the theme song of my broken record.

I’ve learned that even veggie lovers rarely eat enough. They think it takes too long or is too expensive or inconvenient.

Why you need to eat more vegetables

When you eat more veggies, you get lots of rewards:

• nourish your body: get more dietary fiber, folate, and blood pressure-friendly potassium plus oodles of other vitamins and minerals
• fight disease: veggies are jam-packed with health-shielding phytonutrients like carotenoids and flavonols
• fill up: non-starchy vegetables like broccoli, green beans, and tomatoes tame your appetite for very few calories or carbohydrates – a boon for people watching their weight or their blood sugar levels
• smile more: when you eat better, you feel better

In general, diets rich in vegetables and fruit are linked to lower blood pressure, less stroke, less coronary heart disease, and reduced risks of type 2 diabetes, obesity, and some types of cancer.

Isn’t that a list that makes you want to go eat more veggies?

Eat more vegetables with healthy convenience foods

Even though I like creating in the kitchen, I don’t enjoy cooking every single day. Sometimes making one more meal is a dreaded chore instead of an inviting, creative endeavor. These are the times I rely on healthy convenience foods, including ready-to-eat or ready-to-cook vegetables.

Whatever your food goal, make easy your best friend. If you want to know how to eat more vegetables without the hassle, try some of these healthy, convenient veggies.

#1 Spiralized kohlrabi

Trader Joe’s calls it a vegetable “pasta.” I say, no way to the pasta analogy, but I still love this mild, slightly crunchy vegetable. Instead of drowning it with spaghetti sauce, I stir fry it in a smidgeon of olive oil and a sprinkling of red chile pepper flakes and kosher salt. I can get it on the table in less than 10 minutes from grabbing the bag from the fridge. For a super simple meal, eat it just like that with a couple fried eggs on top.

What else can you do with spiralized kohlrabi?

• Roast it in the oven with smoked paprika
• Toss it with other veggies and a dressing of rice vinegar, sesame oil, and reduced-sodium soy sauce for a salad with pizazz
• Mix cooked or raw spiralized kohlrabi with leftover farro and top with grilled shrimp for a fun nourish bowl

By the way, if you haven’t eaten kohlrabi, it looks like a bit like a turnip and tastes like a cross between cabbage and jicama. At least to me, that’s how it tastes.

#2 Other spiralized vegetables

Walk through the produce section of your grocery store to see what’s available. I’ve enjoyed spiralized beets as the base of a salad as well as a cooked veggie with goat cheese and toasted walnuts. You’ll find carrots, zucchini, cucumber, sweet potato, and more.

Next check out the frozen vegetable section. Grab a couple packages of spiralized veggies to have on hand when you haven’t got anything fresh in your refrigerator.

A few ideas:

• zucchini noodles with garlic shrimp
• Greek salad with spiralized cucumber
• spiralized beet and carrot salad with diced apples and feta cheese
• spiralized parsnips and carrots with balsamic chicken breasts

Of course, you can spiralize your own veggies and create an infinite number of dishes – simple or elaborate – and I do that sometimes, but today, we’re focusing on healthy convenience to foods so you can eat more veggies without the hassle of much preparation.

Want a huge list on low-calorie, non-starchy vegetables? You can print a non-starchy vegetables list here.

#3 Frozen edamame beans in the pod

What a fun snack or addition to a meal. When I’m short on time and short on veggies, I grab a bag of these from my freezer and toss them in the microwave. That’s it. The only thing left to do is sprinkle them with coarse salt and start nibbling.

When my girls were little, they thought it was cool to strip the pod and grab the protein- and fiber-packed seeds with their front teeth before tossing the empty pod back on their plates. I usually gave them a lesson on manners when they put food in and out of their mouths. But edamame beans – and lollipops and ice pops – were the exception.

Edamame beans boost your protein intake too. A 3/4-cup serving has only 90 calories, but it serves up 4 grams of fiber and 8 grams of protein. They’re an excellent choice for people with prediabetes or diabetes because they pack a lot of nutrition with just 2 grams of non-fiber carbohydrates.

#4 Other frozen veggies

A bag of frozen vegetables is a magical thing. Whether it’s non-starchy green beans, starchy corn or a combination of veggies and whole grains, you’ll save money, time, and effort.

Grab a bag from the freezer.

Pour out only what you need.

Seal up the bag and toss it back in the freezer.

Easy peasy.

Serve them as a side dish or add them to casseroles (like this healthy hashbrown casserole), soups, stews, and more.

#5 Ready-to-snack veggies

Typical grocery store veggie trays with their high-calorie ranch dressing or onion dip bore me. But supermarkets have plenty of other great snacking veggies. I always have cherry tomatoes and sugar snap peas on hand. Always.

When I travel, I fill a silicon bag (I use the Stasher brand) with sugar snap peas or snow peas to help me get my fill of veggies on the road.

Some grocery stores have snacking radishes, jicama (I love jicama), carrots, and more. Take a short walk through the produce section to see what crunchy, colorful, delight you can munch on next.

#6 Jarred or refrigerated salsa

How great that this favorite convenience food counts as a veggie! Think beyond the chip.

• Spoon it over scrambled eggs.
• Simmer fish in a skillet with salsa.
• Pour a jar into your slow cooker with chicken.
• Reheat rotisserie or leftover chicken in salsa. Serve over rice and sprinkle with cheddar cheese.
• Dress up your everyday meatloaf.
• Mix it with Greek yogurt for a yummy veggie dip.

#7 Packaged salads

Grocery stores are filled with these, but most aren’t your healthiest choices. Make smart choices by looking for salads or salad kits with a variety of vegetables and not much of anything else. Typical toppings include fried tortilla strips or pita chips with enough dressing to douse at least 2 bags of salad.

If your salad kit comes with dressing and other toppings, either use very little or toss them out and pick your own toppings. I usually buy bagged salads, which are mixes of greens and other vegetables, instead of salad kits, which come with high-calorie add-ins.

#8 Bagged baby spinach or kale

Washing leafy greens is one of my least favorite veggie chores. I do it when I buy leafy greens from the farmer’s market or when they come in my CSA basket. But I have to channel earthy, tree-hugger Jill to get the job done. Most of the year, I buy ready-to-use bagged greens. I have them for salads, side dishes, and additions to soups and stews. A couple handfuls of shredded kale elevate lentil soup or a hearty stew in an amazing way.

#9 Vegetable or tomato juice

This is my go-to for solving the hangries. When I’m uncomfortably hungry, a big glass of vegetable juice saves the day.

I’ll often sip some while cooking dinner – to prevent getting hangry.

And if you see me on an airplane during beverage service, you can bet I’ll be sipping tomato juice. That’s pretty much the only way to get a serving of vegetables on a plane.

#10 Ready-to-cook vegetables

This last category covers all the vegetables in the supermarket you can cook without having to wash or chop. What a saver of time and energy!

Think about what you can roast, sauté or steam. What can you toss in the microwave?

Try these:

• steam green beans
• roast baby broccoli or baby cauliflower
• stir-fry shredded Brussels sprouts
• sauté shredded cabbage or cole slaw veggies
• sauté or stir fry most any shredded or spiralized vegetable

All of these healthy convenience veggies are excellent choices for blood sugar control. Find out what else you can eat with prediabetes.

Get Can I Eat That with Prediabetes?

It covers 10 foods you’ll want to know about.