Healthy winter recipes for a mama with her hands full
How I shifted to view cooking and cleaning as a gift, not a chore.
There’s a joke in our house that someone is always hungry and no matter if we just went to the grocery store, it will look like our shelves are empty. And then there’s the question: what’s for dinner?
This last year, we relied on a lot of convenience foods and snacks…even the healthy options, goodness I realized I didn’t love the ingredients. It was the reality of a difficult postpartum season and other factors, and that’s ok. It’s life. I’ve chosen not to hold onto guilt for that.
But…I started seeing some behavioral trends and eating habits I didn’t love in my children. I started noticing myself being more anxious around meal time and during meals. Why, with all this easy convenience was I more stressed? Why the more ‘easy’ I tried to make things, the harder it got, the more stressed I got.
Because I was missing the point—nourishment. Eating isn’t just about checking a box, although with 3 tiny and always hungry mouths in our house, that’s often reality. 🙃
Preparing a meal, nourishment and eating is a sensory and emotional process too.
Did you know that digestion actually begins before any food enters your mouth? Digestion begins with cooking. As you smell, touch, chop and prepare your meal, your brain signals your digestive enzymes to get active. This fact in nutrition school blew my mind. Modern convinces completely remove part of the digestive process.
I intensely struggled with anxiety and depression this past year. Of all the tools and things I have done to work through that season, I’ve found so much healing in the rhythms of creating nourishment with my hands again.
The rhythmic motion of chopping and using my hands releases so much stress and restores the nervous system. My confidence, even when meals are chaotic, has increased because I know that taking the time to nourish my family is always worth it.
Download your weekly meal plan template >
A few tips that have helped may approach to meals and cooking:
Take time to plan—and make it a fun project not a “have to do” task. Open some cookbooks, browse Pinterest, get excited about cooking and eating.
Build up a recipe bucket you can pull from—get a few on my list below. These are your ‘bread and butter’ go-to recipes that you and your family love and that are practical for your current season of life.
Get adventurous once a week—and it’s ok if you end up not liking this recipe. But trying something new will excite you.
Microdose CBD in the afternoon before dinner. This helps with the afternoon crazy and the rush ‘of all the things’…more joy, more energy and more capacity to handle the needs of this full time of day.
Always make a fun drink while you cook—my go to is this Lemon Lime Collagen with CBG that is both so calming and so energizing all at once.
View this as a beautiful opportunity to nourish my family. What helped me most view cooking as a gift, not a chore, was realizing that the act of nourishment isn’t just about the moment. Sure the moment may be loud, messy and you may feel like as a mom no one appreciates it (hello pretty much every meal), but sitting at the table and choosing to nourish is something that will forever impact my family. Gathering around the table boosts their immune system, is a ritual to connect as a family, teaches stillness, encourages digestion, releases anxiety, creates leaders and regulates the nervous system. Habits of the Household is a great book on this topic!
Have a 2 pan rule—as a mama with her hands full and endless messes, this one has saved me.
take 10-15 minutes in the morning or at lunch to prep—this could be chopping veggies and setting them aside, or something as simple as filling up the pot for pasta later on. Trust me, even doing a task that takes 30 seconds now will save you when the 5 o’clock hour approaches.
Download your weekly meal plan template >
Here’s what’s on our nourishing winter recipe list…
Baking
Sourdough bread
Sourdough Blueberry Muffins — I used half einkorn flour, undercook these a bit
5 Ingredient Chocolate Dipped Peanut Butter Cookies — soooo good and full of protein
Sourdough Chocolate Chip Cookies — I put half the dough in the freezer to save and keep on hand because these are just too good!
Dinners
Always on hand, 15 minutes to table dinners
Pesto pasta with chicken sausages
Grass-fed hot dogs + tater tots
Burgers with grilled veggies and fries
charcuterie platter
Weekly Rotation
Chicken Piccata or Chicken Piccata Meatballs, white rice, Brussels sprouts or green beans
Cobb Salad with sourdough (the kids will eat salad deconstructed)
Sheet Pan Ginger Sesame Beef with rice
Greek Turkey Burgers with sweet potato fries
White Chicken Chili Burrito Bowls with tortilla chips
Chicken Parmesan, gf fettuccini, caramelized onions and tomatoes —my mom used to make this growing up and I loved it. I don’t have an official recipe but make it up as I go. For the breadcrumbs I use leftover sourdough or gf bread. I top with pasta sauce and fresh mozzarella then broil at the very end. Serve with whatever veggies you like—I love caramelized onions, tomatoes and spinach with pasta.
Curry Bowls —I always keep a jar of curry on hand for quick meals. Add chicken to a dutch oven or crock pot, cover in sauce and cook for 4-6 hours. Serve with rice and vegetables.
Chicken Pot Pie —this is one of my all time favorite recipes from my cookbook and so nourishing, it’s dairy free too but you’d never know it (bonus because one of our littles can’t do dairy). You could use pre-made biscuits to make it simple!
Garlic Chicken Alfredo—this is my husband’s favorite meal I make and we usually make it for “date night at home” after the littles are asleep.