Like most people this year, I made a New Year’s resolution to try to eat healthier. I started off by thinking of ways that I could make healthier substitutes in my life. For example, instead of white English muffins, I started buying whole wheat. When I was craving pizza, I made sure to ask for less cheese than usual and packed it with veggies. Instead of buying Ben & Jerry’s, I switched to Halo Top. From there, I continued to eat cleaner and smarter. But now that it has been three straight months with no more than four “cheat” meals, I’ve become bored with my usual recipes. As a means to escape this, I turned to Instagram. I started following accounts that pride themselves on creating delicious and beautiful healthy meals and snacks.
If you too are looking for some healthy inspiration or just like to admire the beauty of colorful and flavorful food, check out my favorite Instagram accounts that are guaranteed to give you healthy #foodgoals.
Arielle is a writer for Buzzfeed who is most widely known for completely changing her lifestyle and losing 100+ pounds. She documents her journey with posts about food and exercise. Her account is one of my all-time favorites because she makes food that anyone could make. It is easy to get discouraged when you think you have to make an extravagant meal every day, but she proves that eating healthy can be easy.
I look forward to Lee’s posts every day. She gives me the most inspiration for her bowls and smoothies. While I love her posts, her Instagram stories are where it’s at. In her stories, she takes her followers behind the scenes to show them how to make the smoothies or bowls that she ends up posting. While Arielle shows how you can eat healthy with easily-accessible food, Lee is slightly opposite because she uses strange ingredients that I wouldn’t even know where to find. What is key is that you can still get inspiration to try some new and wacky things (like cauliflower in a smoothie) without the complicated ingredients.
I found Gina through Arielle. In fact, Arielle creates and posts a lot of recipes from Gina’s cookbook, but I actually don’t follow her for her recipes. One of the things I love most about this account is that she posts her meal plan every week. When I am feeling lazy and don’t want to craft my own meal plan, Gina is a good reminder that it doesn’t have to take all your time to plan amazing meals. In addition to the motivation she gives me to meal plan, she also gives me meal ideas, like chicken and asparagus lemon stir fry with cauliflower rice or chicken shiitake wild rice soup.
A post shared by Gina Homolka (@skinnytaste) on
Another account that I found through a competing food blogger. Lee of @leefromamerica once posted something about @shutthekaleup’s Jeanette and when I checked out this account, I was hooked. Like Lee, her bowls are a reminder that you can pretty much mix anything to create something good and healthy. One of my favorites has zoodles (zucchini noodles/spiralized zucchini), grape tomatoes, spinach, bean dip, chive cream cheese, and a fried egg (see amazing photo below).
Yes, this account is about 80% spiralized food. If spiralizing is not your thing, I get it, but don’t knock it til you try it. This account proves that creating funky looking food (like spiralized anything) makes cooking more fun and feel more adventurous. She spiralizes the typical veggies like zucchini, carrots, and sweet potatoes but she also does bell peppers, parsnip, and beets!
You don’t have to shop at Whole Foods to appreciate their posts. You also don’t have to shop at a high-end grocery store to eat healthy. Although their posts look almost too perfect, it is still a good reminder that anyone who has access to a grocery store with fresh ingredients can make these foods, like a veggie omelette with broccoli, onion, chickpeas, and turmeric (see photo below) or a pasta salad with lentil pasta, Italian sausage, and whatever veggies you like! All simple ingredients that can create a beautiful dish.
A post shared by Whole Foods Market (@wholefoods) on
Sarah is my close-to-home inspiration because she lives in Minnesota like me! She seems to show the most variety of food, which is greatly appreciated when I catch myself eating the same thing over and over again. Like the Whole Foods account, Sarah’s Instagram serves as a great reminder that I have no excuse to buy the ingredients she uses since we share the same grocery stores.
A post shared by A Whisk and Two Wands (@miss_whisk) on
After following these accounts, I have definitely broadened my palate. This week, I am focusing my dinners on bowls and taking pointers from @leefromamerica and @shutthekaleup. I made one with cauliflower rice as the base with mushrooms, tomatoes, zoodles, asparagus, and chicken. Another one has cauliflower rice with mushrooms, green beans, spaghetti squash, chickpeas, and chicken. @ariellesays has inspired a few of my new go-to snacks, like banana and peanut butter on toast sprinkled with cinnamon.
If there is anything I have learned by following these accounts is that you can always adjust recipes to make them your own. Use these accounts for inspiration but put your personal spin on it. I love mushrooms so I add it to everything. So be creative! I guarantee eating healthy will be easier if you add a little fun.
Have any food bloggers that you think we need to follow? Let us know by tweeting @Litdarling
Share this:
- Click to share on Tumblr (Opens in new window)
- Click to share on Twitter (Opens in new window)
- Click to share on Facebook (Opens in new window)
- Click to share on Reddit (Opens in new window)
- Click to email a link to a friend (Opens in new window)
- Click to print (Opens in new window)
- Click to share on Pocket (Opens in new window)
- Click to share on LinkedIn (Opens in new window)
- Click to share on Pinterest (Opens in new window)
