Meal Prep

Spoon this dressing over fresh fruit, such as melon or pineapple, when you want a pretty side salad or a light dessert.

A light cream sauce enhanced with Parmesan cheese coats fresh spinach in this side dish. Try it with pork chops, fish fillets, or turkey cutlets.

With this recipe, you don’t need to buy many ingredients or spend much time in the kitchen to get a colorful and tasty side dish.

Cooking the squash in a nonstick skillet gives it a caramelized crust that heightens its sweetness, which in turn is complemented by a light glaze of orange.

Green tea on your salad? Yes, it makes a great base for this Asian-style dressing, which lets you duplicate the flavor of restaurant salads at home without all the extra salt. Toss the dressing with a variety of salad greens and raw vegetables for a side salad or add grilled chicken, shrimp, or lean beef strips for an entrée.

Whenever you need a basic white sauce, this recipe does the trick. It’s also a useful substitute when a casserole recipe calls for a can of condensed creamy soup, which is usually high in sodium.

Fresh lemon juice and garlic intensify the flavor of this dressing. You’ll be able to complement many different types of salad with it and its variations.

Simple main dishes, such as broiled or grilled steak, pork chops, chicken breasts, or leftover Meat Loaf (page 184), get all dressed up with the addition of this sauce.

Serve this easy sauce over fish, use it as a dip for raw vegetables, or spoon it over sliced cucumbers.

After trying our healthful version of barbecue sauce, you’ll wonder why you ever bought the bottled kind.

Make a batch of this wonderful sauce ahead of time for the best blending of flavors. It will keep in an airtight container in the refrigerator for up to a week, or pour it into a freezer container and freeze it for up to six months.

Celery and green onions give this versatile salad a crunch and a fresh taste that will make you want to use it as often as you can—to stuff a tomato, fill half a pita, or provide protein on a salad plate.

Fresh spinach adds a new dimension to basil-based pesto. Try the pesto as a topping for chicken, fish, or pasta.

Spice up lean grilled hamburgers, chicken breasts, or pork tenderloin with this wonderful salsa, which gets its smoky flavor from the chipotle chile. Regulate the heat from mild to spicy by the amount of chipotle you add.

The right amount of mustard is a key ingredient for great potato salad. Since yellow mustard is usually high in sodium, this recipe calls for dry mustard instead.

Sweet and spicy, this fruit salsa is a refreshing accompaniment to grilled chicken, pork, fish, or shrimp. It is also great as a quick, healthy snack when served on apple or pear slices or warm whole-wheat pita triangles.

Even if you’ve never made pickles before, don’t hesitate to try this recipe. It is so easy! Just let the cucumbers simmer in a flavorful liquid, then cool and refrigerate them. The flavor of these pickles really brightens lean grilled burgers or your favorite potato salad or tuna salad recipe.

Apples cooked in orange juice and flavored with fresh ginger and spices—the combination smells as delicious as it tastes! Serve the chutney with roast pork, chicken, or turkey.

These quick-fix pickles have the traditional flavor you expect but only 1 milligram of sodium, a tremendous saving compared to commercial pickles of the same variety.

Add some zing to your food, but without the sodium usually found in bottled chili sauce. Drizzle this chili sauce on Spicy Baked Fish (page 103) or use it to make shrimp cocktail.