At work I'm bombarded by cheap, unhealthy food. When you're stressed out and on your feet for 12 hours a day, no matter how good your intentions going in, you're going to succumb to your cravings, your deep and cellular need for ordering everything with sausage gravy on it, for ice cream every day with all the toppings, for whatever deep fried thing will make everything okay for ten minutes, for the cookies, the endless baked goods the messmen make out of the kind of deranged affection that's usually the territory of grandmothers who urge you to eat! eat! and then wonder aloud if you've gained weight. I digress.
So home has become my bastion of sensible eating. Most days my meals revolve around a bag of frozen veggies, gussied up with some kind of lentil stew or sludge. Or a salad, gussied up to its neck with chickpeas or avocado, boiled eggs, nuts and dried fruits. A treat is cheesy toast.
A super key component to eating like a cud-chewer and feeling satisfied, feeling satiated, even, is UMAMI. That sixth or seventh taste that's been in vogue for a minute now, not the delightful cover band that plays at the Cafe Hon on the regular in Baltimore, you should totally go see them. Melissa Sharlat is a sweetheart I met in Istanbul but that's a long story and I'll save it for another day.
Umami the taste sensation is MSG as found in nature all around us. Foods high in naturally occurring glutamate have a more satisfying taste to them. Something you can't put your finger on but feels better in your mouth.
It's ridiculously easy to pump up the MSG volume on your food. A good trick I picked up years ago is to throw a parmesan rind into any soup or stew you make. Parmesan rinds can be used or abused until they disintegrate. Simply wash off after using and store in the freezer. Whole Foods used to sell them cheap by the bag, but it's been many years since I lived in the real world so I can't confirm or deny if this is still a thing.
Other sources are soy sauce and its ilk- worcestershire, oystersauce, etc. Mushrooms. Preserved meats. Seaweed.
I've gotten into the habit of sprinkling a little parm, and/or some nutritional yeast, and/or some soy sauce or whathaveyou, on everything I eat. The savoriness tricks my brain and stomach into believing I'm fuller than I am, that I have, in fact, just had two bacon double cheeseburgers, and thus even my 20 year old self, who could put down quarts of orange juice (which I now know to be pure sugar water, with or without pulp) on top of bags of doritoes and taco bell for dessert, that 20 year old self who still resides in the hidden corners of my cells, is satisfied with a dinner of cabbage slaw and and avocado, or a bag of frozen veggies.
My go-to healthy meal:
Take a bag of frozen veggies. Any kind you like, or any that's on sale at the moment. Not, like, a bag of peas, but something with an exotic name like San Francisco Blend. I pay exorbitant grocery prices up here in Seward's Folly, but it never comes to more than 2.50, and unless it's a super carrot-heavy blend, seldom more than 200 calories for the whole pound.
Put the veggies in a pyrex pie dish (thrift stores always carry these) with a quick squirt of Pam or a scant 1/2 tsp fat, rubbed even to save you cleaning later. sprinkle with salt and, if you're feeling daring, a bit of cumin.
Bake at 350 for 20-35 minutes, to desired level of doneness. (Baked veggies beats boiled or steamed veggies in every conceivable Vegetable Desiredness category. Trust and believe.)
Sprinkle with soy sauce, or fancy soy sauce, or that lemon stuff, or mushroom catsup, or some other preserved fish sauce/garum type thing.
Sprinkle again with nutritional yeast, parmesan cheese, or ground seaweed.
If you're really feeling cray, sprinkle with toasted sesame seeds, of flax seeds, or chia, and if you want the best poop of your entire life, sprinkle psyllium husk powder on top of that.
It's a satisfying dinner. Lots of chewing and a full feeling belly, and no feeling of sacrifice.
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