Brown bagging your lunch at the office can help you save hundreds of dollars off your lunch expenses. Losing weight is also another great bonus of packing your lunch. Losing weight by changing your lunch habits does take some planning. Once you get into the habit of creating your own personalized lunch menus from home, you may not ever want to settle for the lunch special from your local cafeteria.
Pack a Healthy Diet Lunch for Work
Creating your own healthy diet does not have to be expensive or time consuming. The first step in creating your lunch, is to purchase a lunch box. Choose a lunch box that already has clear plastic containers and insulated panels.
If you would prefer to use a lunch box that you already have, simply look through your cupboards for containers that can comfortably hold hot and cold foods. A good size container is a large two quart see-through plastic container with a tight fitting lid. Find a small container that has two separate compartments. Have at least one insulated cup for hot or cold beverages.
Negative Calorie Foods
Select foods for your healthy lunch that are low in calories. Negative calorie foods help you lose weight quickly. Your body burns more extra calories in digestion of negative calorie foods. Fill your two quart container up with the vegetables that you like. Bring a salad to work each and every day. Choose salads that are made of deep greens and easy to prepare. Romain lettuce, coleslaw, spinach, radishes, tomatoes, asparagus, and cucumbers are negative calorie foods.
Healthy Sides
Healthy side items in your lunch that are high in fiber will leave you feeling full throughout your work day. Purchase an inexpensive vegetable dip. A good choice is using a natural sour cream and adding Hidden Valley Fiesta Ranch seasoning packet. You can purchase vegetable dips in your grocer's produce section. Crunchy vegetables that go well with vegetable dips should be a staple in your lunch. Healthy sides like bell peppers, carrot sticks, and cauliflower with a creamy dip are great alternatives to chips.
Protein Weight Loss
Choose protein that you can quickly serve with your salads. If you have a microwave in your office, choose something you could quickly warm up and add to your salad. If you can not warm your meal up, use cold packs or an insulated lunch box to keep your salad crisp. Great cold lunch protein choices are boiled eggs, left over meats from dinner, shrimp, black beans, chick peas, almonds, walnuts, cashews, and hard cheeses. Stick to a serving of protein that fits within the palm of your hand.
Bring something special in your lunch to work each day. This could be a low fat flavored yogurt, chopped fruit with light whip cream, or sugar free jello. Bring beverages from home that you enjoy drinking. This could be tea, coffee, juice, water, or diet soda. Pack a healthy diet lunch to work each day to lose weight quickly and to help maintain your weight loss.
