Second Cup: Plan your lunches

Upgrade your day by putting thought into the mid-day meal

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:03):
Welcome to Before Breakfast, a production of iHeartRadio. Good Morning,
This is Laura. Welcome to the Before Breakfast podcast. Today's
tip is to plan your lunches. Few people put much
thought into their midday meals, but a little intentionality can

(00:25):
make this time of day more tasty and may save
you some time and money too. So most of us
eat lunch most days, and yet every day it can
feel like a new problem. You are starving after a
meeting ends at one o'clock and you wind up waiting
in line ten minutes to grab something overpriced from the

(00:47):
cafeteria or something not so healthy from a fast food
restaurant nearby, or you are working at home and the
prospects look bleak so you eat cereal. We've all been there,
and what's interesting to me is that often even people
who do a lot of planning for everything else in

(01:08):
their lives, including dinners, can have a blind spot about lunch.
But it doesn't take a lot of thought to make
this meal a little more appetizing. Longtime listeners know that
I advocate planning the upcoming week on Friday. So on Friday,
when you are planning your upcoming week, take a quick

(01:31):
moment to think through your midday meals. Where will you
be working, are you working all five days? When will
you likely break for lunch or at least squeeze lunch
into your schedule. Do you have more time someday for
some reason. Rather than making mediocre restaurant food your default,

(01:55):
you might choose one day when you've got some flexibility
and schedule a real lunch date with a friend and
then pack your lunch the other days to balance out
the cost. As I look at an upcoming week, I
see that two of my kids have a random half
day off from school, so it might be worth blocking
that on my calendar to do something special for lunch

(02:17):
with them. You might also think through the cuisine. If
you plan your dinners, you can make enough to have
leftovers and then do something interesting with them to make
a better lunch if you have the groceries on hand.
So on Wednesday night this past week, we had pork
cooked in the crock pot. I saute the leftovers with

(02:40):
broccoli and spinach on Thursday and Friday for lunch. It
was definitely better than cereal. It is also good to
think through some non leftover lunch options when you do
your grocery shopping so you have some easy backup options.
I make sure that I always have the ingredients for
a curried chicken salad I like to make, and I

(03:02):
generally have that at least once a week. I also
buy a few cans of soups I like, so I
have those on hand with pre made dough that can
be stuck in the oven to make a very quick roll.
There's nothing quite like soup and fresh out of the
oven bread to make lunch feel much better. Of course,

(03:24):
if you do have a favorite fast casual restaurant near
your office, there is nothing wrong with going there sometimes,
but it's better if it's intentional. Place your order ahead
of time so you can just go pick it up, and,
better yet, coordinate with colleagues so you can walk over
there together and get some exercise and social time alongside

(03:48):
your food. And know that even if you do work
in an office and don't like packing lunches, you might
not have to buy every day. If you've got an
office fridge, you could bring some supplies on Monday for
the week. Hard boiled eggs, cheese, sticks, almonds, and apples

(04:10):
could make a lunch that is very close to some
boxes you might buy at a coffee shop. So shop
for those and bring them in and feel free to
buy some treats at the grocery store too, because the
honest truth is that you would have to buy a
lot of stuff at the grocery store to equal the
cost of eating lunch out every day. What do you

(04:33):
like to eat for lunch? How do you turn this
break into a bright spot in your day? I'd love
to hear about it. You can reach me at Laura
at Laura vandercam dot com. In the meantime, this is Laura.
Thanks for listening, and here's to making the most of

(04:55):
our time. Thanks for listening to Before Breakfast. If you've
got questions, ideas, or feedback, you can reach me at
Laura at Laura vandercam dot com. Before Breakfast is a

(05:18):
production of iHeartMedia. For more podcasts from iHeartMedia, please visit
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