Mark Luigi Dacumos
Affordable Keto Lunch Ideas
If you incorporate intermittent fasting and skip breakfast as part of your keto routine, lunch will be your first meal of the day. Some people make lunch their most involved or biggest meal of the day, while others like something quick and easy, especially if they’re at work.
Here are some keto lunch ideas that are easy to make and easy on your wallet:
- Salads – The sky’s the limit when making a salad for your custom keto menu. Combine some greens, low-carb veggies, proteins like eggs, tuna, bacon, and a keto-friendly dressing for something slimming, flavorful, and affordable. Egg salad, chicken salad, and Caesar salads are pretty popular amongst ketoers who opt for more traditional recipes. Just make sure your keto ingredients are low-carb, and you read any labels, particularly for dressings, so that you can avoid hidden carbs and sugar.
- Wraps – Keto wraps are fuss-free, offer a nice mix of protein, healthy fats, and veggies, and won’t break your bank. You can make a keto wrap with nothing more than some deli meat, cheese, and lettuce.
- You can also find low-carb tortillas to make your wraps as close to the real thing as possible.
- Sandwiches – There are plenty of recipes for keto bread online that can be used for low-carb sandwiches. You can also make your sandwich without the bun, using just meat, cheese, and mayo.
What’s the easiest keto lunch you can make? Leftovers, which you should have plenty of if you’re prepping meals to save time and money.
This is one of the benefits of coming up with your own custom keto meal plan. It allows you to meal prep, cook in batches, store what you’re not eating, and save it for later so you can heat something when you’re short on time. Even better, leftovers make you less likely to waste money eating out.
Affordable Keto Snack Ideas
You’d be surprised at what you can snack on with keto, as you certainly won’t feel like you’re on a “diet.” However, when making your custom keto meal plan, you want to make sure that your snacks don’t contain any “trigger” foods that you know will cause you to overeat. So, if you know you love the saltiness and crunchiness of nuts or pork rinds, you may want to avoid them.
As for budget snack ideas that’ll add flavor to your custom keto menu without breaking the bank, here are some examples:
- Celery sticks with pimento cheese or cottage cheese on top
- A handful of seeds
- String cheese
- Sliced veggies with a keto-friendly dressing like ranch or blue cheese, or topped with a nut butter
- Homemade kale chips
- Hard-boiled eggs
When snacking on keto, try following this simple rule, so you reach your goals faster: If you’re hungry in between meals, have a snack. If you’re not hungry, though, do not have a snack. This is crucial to remember if you usually snack out of habit or have your snacks at a specific time each day. On keto, hunger is naturally reduced, so only eat when your body is genuinely telling you it needs fuel.
