I’ve been in a bit of a food rut recently, but with the change of seasons comes fresh inspiration to shake things up in the kitchen! I’ve rounded up 14 spring meals so that your breakfast, lunch and dinner can take advantage of what’s in season, as well providing a lighter (but still filling) change after winter’s heavier foods.
Make sure you bookmark this page so that you refer back to it for all your spring meals! All the videos should start playing for the appropriate recipes, but I’ve also included the timestamps just in case.
Fresh spring breakfasts
Meal prep: tropical chia pudding
First, let’s go to my favourite meal prep lady on the internet, Maddie of Let’s Eat Plants! The chia pudding recipe starts at 0:50.
I’ve been having overnight oats for a while, so chia pudding would help mix things up a bit! I’ve also been craving tropical fruit recently, so maybe stocking up on some frozen mango that I can thaw overnight would be great.
I wrote a whole article on spring meal prep, you can find it here:
🌷 13 spring meal prep ideas to make this your healthiest season yet! 🌷
Higher protein avocado toast
Like all millennials, I do love avocado toast. We receive avocados every week from Abel & Cole, so I’m always open to ideas of how to use them. This recipe involves adding hummus and tofu as well to make it a more complete meal. This recipe starts at 1:29.
I have been on a bit of a hummus kick recently, but I also think this would be nice with homemade cashew cheese. I’ve never tried sprouts and I’m not sure where to start, so do share your tips in the comments or by DMing me on Instagram!
The bread in this video is this from this recipe book, but you can just use whatever you want (for some reason I fancy bagels right now…).
Matcha smoothie
While I’m not personally a fan of having “just” a smoothie for breakfast (I need something to chew on to not be hungry!), this would be great with something slightly less healthy*, e.g. pastries, etc. *We’re all about balance here, I’m definitely not demonising eating pastries, I often crave something healthier afterwards.
The smoothie recipe is at the beginning of this video:
Spring lunches: salads four ways
I’ve ordered these lunches based on how quickly you need to use up your ingredients. So whether you receive a veggie box, like me, or you go shopping for vegetables once a week, some of them need to used up earlier than others, specifically leafy greens. So I’ve ordered these recipes based on using the freshest ingredients first and then using more pantry items towards the end of the week.
ABEL & COLE
Medium Very Veggie Veg Box, Organic
Simple green salad
As mentioned in the video (at 3:16), this salad works well as a side. To make it a main meal, add croutons (I just chop up a slice of toast) and legumes (e.g. some rinsed canned lentils or chickpeas).
Almond butter noodle salad
This one sounds like a great idea for a refreshing yet filling meal on a warm spring day (starts at 1:26). I love edamame beans, just writing this is making me crave them!
This salad is a great option for slightly later on in the week, when you’ve eaten all your leafy greens, but you’ve still got fresh veggies like carrots and cabbage to chop up and include in your salad.
The full recipe is available here: Healthy Soba Noodle Salad With Almond Butter Dressing.
Lemony quinoa salad
This one would be a great way of using leftover quinoa for an express meal (recipe starts at 5:07). The lemony dressing seems especially springy!
The recipe is also availabe here: Herbed Spring Quinoa Salad.
Pasta primavera
If you know me, you know I’ll be skipping the onions on this one! But otherwise it all sounds great. Maddie offers two options, hot and cold, starting at 2:10:
Spring dinners: updating our meal rotation
So, if you’ve read some of my older food blog posts, you’ll know that we have a rotation for dinners:
- Mediterranean Monday: mostly pasta
- Curry on Tuesdays
- Soups on Wednesdays
- Chili on Thursdays
- Stir Fry-day
- Pizza on Saturdays
- And something roasted on Sundays, e.g. roast veggies with veggie sausages or “fishless fingers”
I don’t want to chuck this rotation in the bin, because it is an easy way to make decisions when everyone’s starting to run out of steam at the end of the day. But some of the meals are getting a bit repetitive (I’m looking at you, chili). So instead I’m keeping the themes the same and freshening things up with the following spring meals!
Monday: pasta alfredo
We’ve had pasta with a tomato-y sauce for years now, so here’s a way of mixing things up!
I’d also add some broccoli or other veggies + some edamame to make it a complete meal, but it also looks very yummy on its own!
Tuesday: Thai curry
Similarly, we typically make curry with a can of chopped tomatoes and coconut milk. Here’s a green alternative, perfect for spring! I like the trick with the pestle and mortar at the beginning:
Here’s the recipe all written out if that’s easier for the amounts, etc: Vegan Thai Green Curry Meat Eaters Will Love.
Wednesday: spring vegetable soup
I’ve been making minestrone for a while, so this “blended” soup would be good to mix things up a bit:
Adding a bit of olive oil at the end + enjoying it with crusty bread would bring it to the next level.
Thursday: taco bowls
I mentioned earlier that chili was getting a bit old; well this is a fresh take on a Mexican / Tex-Mex theme day:
We don’t eat meat, so I’d swap the beef out for tofu with a vegan beef seasoning. Our kids would probably enjoy picking at various parts of this!
Friday: noodles with peanut butter sauce
Stir fry never gets old to me, but the peanut butter sauce is a nice twist:
I’d add tofu because I love it, but you do you!
Saturday: spring pizza
So, as I mentioned earlier, I don’t eat meat, so the video below would very much be used for inspiration rather that copying it directly. A nice fresh pizza with cashew cheese, asparagus and vegan pastrami sounds great to me!
Sunday: roast veggies
So we normally do something roasted on a Sunday anyway, but with the change in seasons, there’s a nice opportunity to mix things up, for example by doing a Mediterranean-inspired tray bake with asparagus, new potatoes, tomatoes and olives.
We could have it with store-bought “fishless fingers” or make cabbage “steaks”. The recipe for those is here: 13 spring meal prep ideas to make this your healthiest season yet!
This blog post was all about spring meals
Hopefully you found something to tickle your fancy! Feel free to bookmark the page so you can come back when you have a “what the heck are we going to eat?” crisis. 🙂
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