One of the best way to stay healthy or regain your health is to cook your own meals. However, when you have worked all day (at work or at home), this is often the last thing you feel like doing. The key is planning, preparation, and using time saving hacks. Many people resort to eating out for convenience and believe that a fast food meal is inexpensive. In reality, shopping might have a slightly higher upfront cost, but usually provides more meals at a smaller cost per serving. If you factor in the excluded costs of poor health care, requiring doctor visits, time off work, feeling poorly, then cooking comes out a clear winner!
Find and keep on hand recipes that are fast and easy that can be put together on busy days. You can take a recipe and make simple changes that make it faster, and can even be cheaper, without hurting the nutrition. In this recipe, I modified a recipe to make it easier and cheaper to put a healthy meal on the table for your family. You can choose between purchasing pre-chopped vegetables in produce section, frozen food, or take longer to prepare the vegetables yourself (often cheaper).
Serve this soup with healthy crackers or crusty sourdough bread with butter. Don't forget to read your labels when choosing these!
Winter Borscht Soup
Yields: 4-6 servings
Preparation Time: Up to 1 hour
- 1 lb. ground beef
- 1 large potato, diced (or 1-1/2 c. frozen diced potatoes)
- 1 c. sliced cooked beets (organic preferred)
- 2 c. beef broth
- 2 c. water
- 2 Tbsp. butter
- 1-1/2 c. chopped onion (fresh or frozen)
- 1 celery stalk, chopped
- 1 carrot, diced (or 1/2 c. sliced frozen)
- 1/2 cabbage, shredded (or 1 pkg. coleslaw mix and drop carrot)
- 2 Tbsp. cider vinegar
- 1 Tbsp. brown cane sugar or honey
- 1-1/2 tsp. sea salt
- 1 tsp. caraway seeds
- 1 tsp. dill
- 1 tsp. black pepper
Melt butter in large Dutch oven over medium heat. Saute onion until onion is clear. Add ground beef and cook until meat is done. Add carrots, celery, cabbage, and potatoes and cook for 10 minutes. Add remaining ingredients. Bring to a simmer and cover. Cook for another 15 more minutes.