Clyde1820

For me, a big revelation has been doing DIY spice and herb blends. I find that I can "spice"-up a dish sufficiently with my own blends that it really needs very little in the way of a dressing or drizzle over it. Any decent Indian or Asian grocery ought to have a wide range of spices (dried corns, seeds, etc). Can easily grind a mixture on the fly, as needed. Can easily make a lower-calorie and better-tasting dressing, vinaigrette or pesto-like variant. Mush fresher, more potent. Began doing this ~20yrs ago, and it has transformed the dishes I make. But without the need for all of the butter, oil, store-bought dressings.

Another revelation: making the vegetables and fruits the centerpiece of dishes, meals, where "meats" are ancillary additions in some of them. More seeds, nuts, vegetable-based fats and proteins. Still get plenty of protein with all of the necessary amino acids, but the nutritive value goes way up. As a nice side benefit, the need for packaged products almost disappears ... good simply from the standpoint of avoiding preservatives and chemicals that Nature rarely/never thought of.

Smaller portions, smaller overall meal sizes. But with these more-nutritive choices. Amazing, what comes out of that. More easily done with the DIY spice/herb blends and doing away with most bottled/packaged sauces and other products. Certainly requires the time to do the prep and cooking. But much cooking of the ingredient materials can be done several days prior (ie, on the weekend) in prep for the week's meals, then a meal ends up mostly a combining and re-heating exercise rather than a "cooking from scratch on the fly" one.