19 Things We Grab When Starving And Lazy That Won’t Sabotage All Our Health Goals
Snacks are not the enemy.
by The Candidly Team
Our biggest obstacle to staying on any kind of health track with food is getting hungry at times when we seemingly cannot get full on anything around us that’s actually good for us.
It’s at moments of inconvenience that we find ourselves tossing bags of chips onto the cash register, steering our cars into drive-thrus, and eating 37 fries off our spouse’s plate when we just ordered a salad.
The solution is to surround (practically enshrine) ourselves in foods that have the two things our body needs to feel fuller for longer: protein and fiber.
And for that, we’ve accumulated a list. These are the foods we turn to that satisfy specific cravings, serve different functions, and most of all don’t sabotage all of our hard work to be healthy.
And they make us feel just fine about feeling snacky.
1. The On-The-Go Purse Snacks
It’s not weird to carry our own food around in our purse. The mentality that we’ll just grab something while we’re out is what leaves us ravenous and desperate and grabbing greasy chips and sugary bars at the gas station, which can sometimes be the difference between meeting our goals and feeling totally stuck. These are the easy pantry snacks we tag along with us that don’t require refrigeration.
The Only Bean Crunchy Dry Roasted Edamame Snacks: We just wrote a whole thing about why edamame is a health trend we actually appreciate. They’re a complete protein with no cholesterol. Each little bag of these savory snack bags has 100 calories, 11 grams of protein, and 4 grams of fiber and satisfies a salt craving.
The New Primal Buffalo Style Chicken Sticks: What these tasty sticks have: 60 calories, 9 grams of protein. What they don’t have: hydrogenated fats, sugar or high fructose corn syrup, synthetic nitrates or nitrites.
Freeze Dried Fruit (or dried fruit) - There’s actually a huge amount of satiety that comes with eating high fiber foods. We love THESE and even toss them in our oatmeal in the morning for sweetness and crunch. And if you’re the kind of person who gets gummy bears at the movies, THIS dried mango will make you deeply happy.
Fermented Veggie Packs: Fermented foods are full of probiotics that support gut health. Plus they’re delicious, and these packs have everything from pickles themselves to all kinds of pickled veg.
Gimme Seaweed Teriyaki Organic Premium Roasted Seaweed Snacks: If you struggle hard not to eat chips on a daily basis, these will change your life. An entire pack is 30 calories and seaweed is oft discussed as a superfood.
Jackson’s Sweet Potato Chips: And if you must, must just have chips, these sweet potato chips have 3 ingredients: sweet potatoes, avocado oil, sea salt.
Aloha Bars: A bar isn’t the best but if you’re using one to replace a candy bar you would have grabbed (or another extremely unhealthy bar), this one tastes amazing. It’s organic and has around 14 grams of protein per bar. It’s free from gluten, dairy, soy, stevia, and sugar alcohol sweeteners. The peanut butter cup taste like candy and they have 5 grams of sugar as compared to Reese’s 22 grams.
2. The Packaged Things We Grab From The Fridge Or Carry In A Cute Little Cooler
If we’re home and don’t have time to even peel an orange, these are the things we reach for. And if you’re out or at work, you can buy tiny spoons to have on hand and invest in a small lunch bag that keeps food cool. It feels dumb and extreme except in some cases it’s literally the difference between managing your hunger and eating fast food and junk when you’re out.
Steamed Edamame: Once again, edamame is a dream and can come pre-steamed in most grocery stores. It’s so easy to snack on or throw into salads or rice dishes.
Vital Farms Hard Boiled Eggs: Yes, we could boil our own eggs and keep them in the fridge. Or we could just buy these, which always taste amazing. They have 6 grams of protein and 60 calories per egg, and they fill us up more than pretty much any other snack.
Good Culture Lowfat Cottage Cheese: The uncontestable winner of best-tasting cottage cheese. We buy the individual packs, which have 18 whopping grams of protein. We add fruit for extra fiber or a dollop of low-sugar jam for sweetness.
Frozen Pitted Cherries: Why cherries? Well, unlike a lot of frozen fruit, these stay whole and therefore filling when we eat them. The texture and flavor are amazing, addictive, Cherries are rich in polyphenols, which are anti-inflammatory and fight cellular damage.
Reduced Fat Mozzarella String Cheese: This makes us feel nostalgic while giving us a lovely 6 grams of protein and merely 50 calories per stick.
Chopped apples in a baggie: Always, always, always have these prepped. You might be shocked to learn apples rank 5th on the satiety index, with all that bulky fiber leaving you full for longer.
Fagé 0% Yogurt: Again, get the individual cups which have 16 grams of protein and a gorgeous texture. Add fruit or a drizzle of this incredible honey with huge health rewards. You can also use it to make these delicious yogurt bowls which take all of 3 minutes to prepare.
3. The Premade Snacks That Eat Like Meals
There are times when no amount of packaged things will really fill us up. It might be psychological or our hunger hormones going haywire. But having a few incredibly satiating, premade things in our fridge that are full of protein and/ or fiber can be life-changing. They’re all wildly easy to make so we make ourselves make them in those rare moments we have time or energy and have them ready to grab from the fridge.
The Chicken Salad - We make THIS incredible recipe wrapped in lettuce or pita. It has a wild 50 grams of protein per serving.
The Healthy Potato Salad - Boiled potatoes rank #1 on that satiety index we mentioned. They’re full of potassium and you can mix in orange and purple potatoes for added health rewards. Season them with Greek yogurt, light mayo, fresh dill, mustard, and a drizzle of hot honey. It banishes hunger with a vengeance.
The Premade Veg Roast And Dipping Sauce: Throw carrots, broccoli, cauliflower and brussel sprouts in a pan, drizzle on olive oil, add salt, pepper and a dusting of garlic powder and roast for about a half hour at 400. Keep them in the fridge with a healthy dipping sauce - our fave’s include TJ's Tzaziki, Green Goddess Dressing we make with yogurt, basil, tarragon, and white wine vinegar, or Chipotle Bitchin Sauce, which is true, true magic and has no cream.
Shrimp and Cocktail Sauce: We learned this little trick where we buy precooked shrimp and pre-made cocktail sauce and poof, we have a delectable snack that makes us feel like we went to a restaurant at any moment of the day (we find that 3PM is a our prime cocktail hour). A large shrimp has only about 12 calories, so this is such a filling bang for our caloric buck.
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