Author: Trey Jones
Eating healthy at the office can present some surprising difficulties. Whether you find yourself skipping lunch because that latest deadline needs to be met, or you get home too late to cook a wholesome meal, we all find ourselves opting out for the easy fast food meal while working. So AdvantEdge is happy to compile this guide for our office space clients in order to improve your eating habits while spending the day at the desk!
1) Don’t be afraid of GOOD snacks. The first step in your new healthy office eating habits is to create a “snack drawer”! Regardless if you’re trying to lose weight or not, the biggest mistake people make in their eating habits is starving themselves throughout the day (because they’ve been led to believe that snacking is the enemy) and then pigging out at mealtime. A “snack drawer” will therefore help you maintain better portion control throughout the day until mealtimes if you forget to pack snacks during the morning rush. So browse through this list of healthy snack options (such as the various “100 calorie” snack packs) to populate your “drawer”!
2) Bring leftovers of cooked dinners. A healthier (and more cost-effective) meal option at the office is to cook wholesome meals at home that will provide leftovers. This way you can obviously avoid having to order fast food as often by spending an hour of your time after work to cook and pack the leftovers. Just invest in some tupperware and you're on the right track!
3) Walk to the nearest grocery store for lunch. Instead of ordering pizza to eat at your desk when you forget to cook the night before, simply walk to the closet grocery store. Grocery store prices normally aren’t as inflated as fast food restaurants and more wholesome options are available (if you look for them). Plus you’ll get out of the office for some light exercise! For our clients at the Chevy Chase Pavilion, Whole Foods Friendship Heights and Giant are both only a short walk away. Furthermore our clients at the West End and Downtown locations have the Whole Foods Foggy Bottom and Trader Joes Foggy Bottom both within walking distance as well.
4) Invite a coworker to lunch. Another option to avoid the temptation of ordering fast food is to invite a coworker out for a healthy lunch. While this will be more costly than a grocery store outing (most likely), it’s still a good way to go out for a stroll and get some social interaction after a long morning. All three of our locations are in prime areas filled with various restaurant options. In particular for our Chevy Chase clients we’d recommend Panera Bread or the Whole Foods buffet/hot meal bar, and for our downtown clients Chop’t or Pret-a-Manger are great eating options.
We’ll end this blog post with one last holistic message about healthy eating: information is power. There are so many products in the “healthy food” market that it can be somewhat overwhelming to make sense of what ingredients are actually good for you, what’s a marketing ploy, or simply the best price option. So we hope that this guide helps you reach a better grasp on how to truly go about changing your office eating habits for the better. Now go eat!
For additional resources please see the following:
http://www.webmd.com/diet/guide/7-tips-eating-while-you-work
http://www.coreperformance.com/daily/well-at-work/4-simple-ways-eat-healthy-at-the-office.html
http://www.livestrong.com/article/372612-how-to-eat-healthy-at-the-office/
http://www.livestrong.com/article/17363-eat-lunches-office/
