What I Eat in a Day as a Minimalist: Simple Vegetarian Meal Ideas

Breakfast

After a stroll with my dog, it's time for breakfast. But hold on. Let's go back to yesterday, because I always prepare breakfast the day before.

We buy our oats from our local windmill. I buy them in bulk and always ask if they can use a paper bag for packaging to reduce plastic waste.

I used to make oats with soy milk, but I've switched to using water to reduce more waste and to lower my impact. I top the oatmeal with a mix of chia seeds, flax seeds, and sunflower seeds.

In the morning, I add walnuts and blackberries I picked this summer.

After I've warmed it up, I add a tablespoon of raw honey. We get our honey from a local beekeeper. Local honey has a ton of health benefits, and it makes the oatmeal nice and sweet.

The walnuts we eat in our breakfast are also local and organic.

In autumn, we try to collect a year's supply of walnuts. We foraged half of our walnuts and bought the other half from someone in our neighborhood who has a walnut tree in the garden.

In our shed, we also keep carrots from the garden, local organic apples, local onions, local potatoes, and local organic pears. These local foods we got either for free, or I bought them for a very small price.

We peel all the nuts ourselves. We peel a third of the nuts in advance and peel the other nuts throughout the year.

Last year, we dried our walnuts in the oven. But, this year, we are drying them on top of the fireplace to save energy, and it works even better.

Tea time

After I've done some work, it's time for a break. I quit drinking coffee in April, but I still enjoy a little bit of caffeine in the morning. So, I make myself a delicious cup of Earl Grey tea.

My tea collection is very minimal. I choose to have only three different flavors at a time. Right now, I have Earl Grey tea, peppermint tea, and green tea with raspberry.

Lunch

I'm going to prepare an egg salad to put on my sandwich for lunch. I'm using eggs from our own chickens. I don't mind eating those.

And to boil the eggs, I'm using the water that is left over from making tea. Once boiled, I peel the eggs and mash them together.

Now, it's time to prepare the sandwich. I buy my bread with an app called Too Good To Go. If you're not familiar with it, it's an app that prevents food waste, so you're basically buying bread that would otherwise be thrown in the trash.

I'm also having a raisin bun, which I like to eat with some vegan butter, and I'm also grabbing a kiwi.

I made a cup of green tea to drink with my lunch. In summer, I drink a lot of water, but in autumn and winter, I prefer to drink a nice warm beverage.

Dinner

I'm preparing a very simple and easy dinner today. We're eating potato wedges with green beans.

I start with washing the potatoes and cutting them into wedges. I'm not peeling them because the skin is very healthy, very tasty, and it prevents food waste. I'm giving them a quick boil before I put them in the frying pan.

Next, I'm cutting the green beans. I bought these green beans at the local farmers market in my own reusable bag to prevent plastic waste.

We tried to preserve green beans from our garden, but sadly they started rotting, so we had to throw them away.

Another zero waste hack is to use the oil from a jar of sun-dried tomatoes. It has a nice flavor that complements the potatoes. Once the potatoes are tender, I fry them with some spices until they are golden.

With my dinner, I'm having some homemade organic apple and pear sauce I made last weekend. And I'm also drinking a glass of water. Eating always makes me very thirsty. And water is perfect because it doesn't interfere with the flavors of the meal.

Dessert

For dessert, we're eating melon.

After dinner drink

I always like to have one last warm beverage in the evening. On days that my stomach is upset, I will have a cup of peppermint tea.