Dining Solo

If you frequently eat alone, you have lots of company! An estimated 46% of all adult eating occasions take place alone.¹ Perhaps you eat alone because you are among the 33.2 million Americans who live alone. Other popular reasons to dine solo are grabbing lunch at your desk while multitasking or snacking for dinner when the rest of the family is out.

Eating tasty meals that provide good nutrition is important for everyone—at every stage of life. But it can be hard to prepare such meals just for yourself. Several strategies can help you easily fix “solo” meals that taste good and are good for you.

Plan Ahead: Making the Market Work for One

Planning ahead helps turn the challenge of foods packaged or marketed for families to your advantage.

• Identify key ingredients from which you can make several meals. For example, a roast chicken can provide meat for 2 dinners and leftovers for 2 lunches (a sandwich and a salad).

• Cook a dish once, and eat it twice or more. Stews, casseroles, soups, and other large dishes can be frozen in single-serving portions for later meals.

• Shop in markets that let you select fruits and vegetables from loose displays, rather than only prepackaged quantities. That way you can choose just the amount you need.

• Include fruits and vegetables that perish less quickly. Carrots, cauliflower, broccoli, sweet potatoes, apples, and oranges will keep longer when refrigerated than salad greens, summer squash, strawberries, or cut melon. To avoid costly waste, eat more perishable produce first.

• Investigate the single-serving prepared meals in the freezer section of your favorite store. These foods can help you when you don’t know how to cook a particular dish or don’t feel like preparing a meal from scratch.

Stock Your Pantry and Freezer for Quickly Prepared Meals

Having versatile ingredients on hand makes it easy to prepare a balanced meal quickly. It is also cheaper than take-out. Here are some basics to stock.

• Wholegrain pasta, brown or white rice, quinoa, and bulgar wheat. Such healthful starches are easily cooked in portions for one.

• Single servings of frozen or canned vegetables, beans, and fruits. Jarred low-fat pasta sauce. (Freeze the leftovers from larger packages in single-serve containers for a later meal.)

• Individually frozen portions of ready-to-cook meat, poultry, or fish. For example, ground turkey or beef, chicken pieces, sliced pork tenderloin or loin, and fish fillets are easily divided into single portions and frozen right after you buy them.

• Single-serving frozen entrees and meals. These foods provide a portion- and calorie-controlled meal.

• Condiments for flavor, such as dried herbs and spices, light soy sauce, lemons or lemon juice, hot sauce, low-fat salad dressing.

• Cooking spray (such as PAMⓇ), extra virgin olive oil, and canola oil for quick stir-frys and sautés.

Tips for Breakfast for One

• Whole grain ready-to-eat cereal or hot cereals are quickly fixed. Add low-fat yogurt, fruit, and nuts for even more taste and nutrition.

• Freeze whole grain bread, bagels, or English muffins in single portions. Do it right after purchase to keep bread fresh. All can go directly from freezer to toaster or toaster oven.

• Slice up and refrigerate a large container of mixed fruit—melon chunks, apples, pears, oranges, strawberries, grapes, kiwi fruit. Citrus in the mixture will prevent the fruit browning. Eat it with breakfast, on cereal, mixed with nonfat yogurt.

• Enjoy the nutrition of eggs. Egg substitutes (such as Egg BeatersⓇ) give you all the nutrients of shell eggs without the yolk’s cholesterol and saturated fat.

Tips for Lunch and Dinners for One

• Keep it simple. Use MyPlate from the Dietary Guidelines for Americans as a basic guide for planning lunch or dinner. Start with a protein (¼ plate featuring dairy, bean, egg, or meat serving). Add vegetables and fruits (½ plate). Finish with a healthful starch (¼ plate featuring sweet potato, whole grain pasta or bread, or similar).

• Make your meal colorful at lunch and dinner with a variety of fruits and vegetables. A 4- or 5-serving container of marinated vegetables is enough for a side dish for several lunches or dinners. Include your choice of carrots, radishes, broccoli, cauliflower, cherry tomatoes, green and red peppers, summer squash, and so forth. Keep these in the refrigerator for up to 3 or 4 days.

• Pair a healthful single-serve frozen entree (such as Healthy ChoiceⓇ) with a large green salad for lunch or dinner.

• Go with a one-dish meal for dinner. The dish should feature several food groups such as a protein, vegetables, and a starch. Stews, stir-frys, chilis, omelets, and soups can make good choices.

Make Your Meals Pleasurable: Eat Mindfully

• Set the table for yourself. Put on a little music.

• Serve your meal on a plate. Don’t eat straight out of the pot.

• Don’t eat in front of the TV or multitask on your smartphone or tablet computer.

• Invite a friend or two to dine on occasion.

What if You Don’t or Can’t Cook?

• Take a cooking class. Use the Internet to explore options in your community or call your local county extension office.

• Explore cooking-for-one cookbooks at your local library. Many have basic how-to instructions. First try easy recipes such as steaming vegetables or making chili.

• Invite a friend to teach you several easy but tasty dishes.

• If you are physically unable to cook, explore options such as Meals on Wheels.

Resources

• ChooseMyPlate.gov from the Dietary Guidelines for Americans and the US Department of Agriculture

• Eatright.org from the Academy of Nutrition and Dietetics

• HomeFoodSafety.org from the Academy of Nutrition and Dietetics

Recommendation From My Health Care Provider.