7 Heart-Healthy Meals Your Family Will Love and Your Heart Will Thank You For

One of my mom’s favorite dishes was spaghetti. She was not going to give up spaghetti – we just had to get creative. It is not hard to make spaghetti heart-healthy. The first step is picking out your pasta noodles. Instead of white pasta, choose whole wheat pasta. Whole wheat pasta is better for your heart.

When choosing a base, it’s beneficial to make your own sauce. Premade sauces at the grocery store are loaded with salt. Once you have selected your own homemade sauce, such as Haute & Healthy Living’s tomato sauce, you can pick any seasonings you would like to add. Oregano, garlic powder, onion powder, basil, and paprika are great seasonings to add to your dish. Seasonings bring out the flavor of the pasta—so make sure you do not neglect them!

Tacos often get a bad reputation for their high fat and salt intake. While commercial tacos can be rather unhealthy for our hearts, we can make our own healthy twists to this classic Mexican dish. The best place to start is rice. Tacos are not complete without Wholesome Made Easy’s Spanish rice. Once you have cooked the Spanish rice, you can add beans, lean meat, low-fat cheese, and baked vegetables into your dish.

It would be fun to have this meal served buffet style. In this way, your family will be able to build their own tacos with the toppings they want. For an added bonus, make it a family game night! Take some time away from the stress of everyday life to enjoy a heart-healthy meal with your family.

My mom loved salad, but we had to make a few changes. Since salad dressings tend to be high in fat, salt, and sugar, we opted to make our own dressings. If you want to try to make your own salad dressings, Being Nutritious has a great Italian dressing! Low So Recipes also has a delicious low-sodium ranch dressing recipe.

Salads do not have to be boring. Add in lean protein, cooked vegetables, beans, or fruit. You could have a fall-themed salad or a summer fruit salad. There are endless possibilities! If you make a summertime salad, you could add lean chicken, oranges, strawberries, blueberries, and almonds on top of your greens of choice. It would be a great meal to have in the summer or the winter.

Another salad that your entire family will love is a Mexican fiesta salad. On top of your bed of lettuce, place vegetarian ground meat, low-fat cheese, corn, fresh tomatoes, and seasonings. This will be a delicious dish that your entire family will enjoy. You can craft your own salad recipes, too – just make sure you are mindful of salt and fat content. This will keep it heart-healthy.

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Soups are a favorite year-round, but they are often loaded with salt. One serving of soup can be well over 1,000 mg of sodium. This is why it is important to make our own soups. A few ideas are listed below for your reference. I have tried each of these recipes, and I can attest that they are all tasty! Although some are harder than others, for the most part, they are not too challenging.

Cold Soups:

All Recipe’s Watermelon soup

Vanilla Bean Cuisine’s Melon soup

Warm Soups:

This Mama Loves’s Tortellini soup

Low So Recipe's Chicken Noodle soup

Low So Recipe’s Vegetable soup

The key is keeping to a low-sodium broth. If you do not want to make your own low-sodium broth, you can buy many versions at the grocery store. Build from the broth up. Add in vegetables, beans, and seasonings to your heart’s desire.

Potassium is great for heart health. When we make a dish for dinner, our family wants it to be yummy and filling. Heart-healthy baked loaded potatoes are the perfect weekday dish for your family. To make this recipe, you will need fresh baked potatoes (it's best to get a medium to large-sized potato), fresh vegetables, low-fat cheese, black beans, lean meat of your choice, and seasonings.

Gimme Some Oven can help you navigate how to bake the classic baked potato. Just make sure you omit any salt from this recipe. Once you have baked your potatoes, you can add your toppings. Place all your toppings inside your baked potatoes and bake for about 10 minutes more. Make sure you already cook any lean meats ahead of time.

This recipe will become a family favorite in no time! The best part of this recipe is its versatility. Each time you make it, you could do something different. It is also incredibly cost-effective, so your pocketbook will thank you, too.

Pasta salad was a family favorite growing up. My mom loved how we could create an unlimited number of variations. If the family didn't like one of the versions, we would just switch it up next time. You can add any vegetables, beans, or seasonings that you want to your pasta salad.

When choosing your noodles, make sure you choose whole wheat or whole grain which have more fiber. Pasta salad typically uses Italian dressing, vinaigrette, or mayonnaise.

Salt Sanity has a wonderful Italian dressing that is curated for families watching their sodium intake. Additionally, All Recipes’s has a delicious low-sodium vinaigrette recipe. You can also make your own low-fat, low-sodium mayonnaise. Check out Low So Recipe’s mayonnaise!

Enlist your family’s help when you make pasta salad. They will have a blast picking out various toppings and trying new variations. Even if one of your children makes a version that seems a bit different, it might be delicious. Give each recipe a chance – it could be the best pasta salad yet!

When people think of pizza, they normally think of it as being unhealthy. Due to the high fat, salt, and sugar content of pizza, it is not ideal for those trying to live a heart-healthy life. While traditional pizza at the grocery store or pizzeria might not be the best for us, we can make our own heart-healthy version.

This can be fun for the entire family! Recruit the help of your spouse and children when you begin to make this recipe. The first step is picking out the dough. Sadly, pre-made pizza crust can be salty. Choose to make your own low-sodium pizza dough. Low So Recipes has a great pizza dough recipe that's not too challenging!

Once you create your own pizza dough, you can make your own pizza sauce. The Oregon Dietitian has a fabulous recipe for low-salt pizza sauce. The next step is adding on toppings. It is best to choose low-fat cheese, but still be mindful of the sodium content. Portion out the correct amounts.

After adding the cheese to your pizza, add in any vegetables or toppings you would like. You could try a chicken parmesan pizza, a pineapple and black olive pizza, or a vegetarian pizza. It is best to have fresh vegetables on standby so you can add them to your pizza when you are ready.

Another option for your healthy pizza is to skip the cheese altogether. This might be needed if someone in your family has heart disease. In this case, continue with your plan to make pizza, but do not add the cheese. The pizza will still bake just fine. You may need to add extra tomato sauce to prevent the dough from drying out.

To make up for the lack of cheese, you can add extra vegetables. Get creative with what vegetables you add on your pizza. Perhaps potato slices, portobello mushrooms, or corn are ideal for a creative, healthy pizza. The key is to keep the recipe fresh and fun.

Healthy foods do not have to be boring, bland, or annoying. Instead, it can be delicious, fun, and nutritious. Do not let your healthy cooking end here! Make sure you are cooking healthy meals for your family throughout the year. This will help keep everyone happy and healthy. Happy cooking! 

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