Dinner Ideas

Healthy Plant-Based Family Dinner Ideas for Dec. 28 to Jan. 3

December 27, 2020

We are starting a family plant-based adventure this week. The more I learn about the unhealthy effects of eating meat—not just on our bodies, but the environment and animal conditions too—the less I want to eat meat. Plus, as I’m learning to be more mindful and practice intuitive eating, I’ve realized I don’t feel my […]

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We are starting a family plant-based adventure this week. The more I learn about the unhealthy effects of eating meat—not just on our bodies, but the environment and animal conditions too—the less I want to eat meat. Plus, as I’m learning to be more mindful and practice intuitive eating, I’ve realized I don’t feel my best after eating meat.

I do love an In-N-Out burger every once in a while, and carnitas at my favorite Mexican restaurant, and chicken pad thai. So this will be a bit of a change for us. Instead of vowing to forever eat 100% plant-based, we’re going to try it for a month and see how it goes. If afterwards we want to eat plant-based 80/90% of the time and leave room for other foods we love too, we’re good with that.

So, for the month of January, I’ll be sharing our plant-based family dinner ideas. We’ll be focusing on fruits, veggies, nuts, seeds, beans, legumes. And eating a little organic cheese too. Join us and see how you feel after eating more plant-based meals for a month. 🙂

Here’s what we’re planning for dinners:

Monday: Cozy Butternut Squash, Sweet Potato and Red Lentil Stew from Oh She Glows. Sweet potato, butternut squash, coconut milk, lentils, chard….Mmm. Sounds comforting and delicious and I can’t wait to try it. We’ll be having it with some sourdough toast.

Plant-based family dinner ideas: sweet potato, butternut squash lentil soup from oh she glows
Image and recipe from Oh She Glows

Tuesday: Cilantro-Speckled Green Rice and Avocado Stack from Oh She Glows with black beans & grilled bell peppers, mushrooms and onions. Another Oh She Glows recipe I’m looking forward to trying (I got her dinner cookbook for Christmas full of all delicious looking plant-based recipes 🙂 ). The rice recipe can be found within this dal recipe HERE; we’re going to grill up fajita fixings and black beans for it too and top with avocado.

Image and recipe from Oh She Glows

Wednesday: Leftovers

Thursday: NYE! Fondue Night! We’re going to dip veggies and bread into a cheese sauce. And a chocolate fondue for dessert with fruit & other goodies. I think the girls are going to LOVE it. 

Friday: Burrito Bowls. Brown jasmine rice, black beans and butter lettuce as the base, with tomatoes, avocado and topped with marinated red onions and zesty garlic tahini dressing, both from the No Crumbs Left cookbook (both recipes can be found in this blog post HERE from Flavor the Moments).

Recipes from No Crumbs Left | Image by Flavor the Moments

Saturday: Leftovers or takeout.

Sunday: Soup Sunday: Creamy Broccoli Pesto Soup with Crispy Cauliflower Gnocchi from @PlantBased.Traveler on Instagram. This looks so so good. My girls love pesto, broccoli and cauliflower gnocchi so I hope this dinner is a hit.

Healthy plant-based family dinner ideas: broccoli pesto soup with pan fried cauliflower gnocchi from @plantbased.traveler on instagram
Image and recipe from @PlantBased.Traveler on Instagram

Do you have any plant-based family friendly dinner ideas? Please share them below; I’d love to try them!

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