Ah, early April. The birds are chirping, the snow is melting, and Easter is just around the corner. Unfortunately, most of us will be spending the holiday holed up in fire-safety-ambiguous apartments dragging ourselves through the last weeks of the semester. (Well, not me—I’m in journalism, so I’ll be done long before then, but I’ll extend my sympathy.)
Easter seems to be one of the holidays students forget about. It gets overshadowed by St. Patrick’s Day, and we’re usually too busy to care. Some of us might buy a bunch of discount Easter bunnies the day after, but that’s kind of sad, right? In my first year at university, I remember eating dinner on Easter Sunday at McDonalds. I forgot it was Easter until I saw they were advertising creme egg McFlurries.
Avoid the holiday blues, and make yourself proud by enjoying some lighter, more seasonal fare next weekend. Here are some easy, and healthy recipes to indulge in and shake up your weekly meal routine (or lack thereof).
This is the easiest recipe on the list, but probably the most comforting. It’s hard to finish an entire carrot cake by yourself, but eat two servings of this in a single meal and no one will bat an eye. It’s also less expensive to make than boxed cereal if you’ve got some cinnamon, oats, and a liquid sweetener kicking around. If you don’t have any maple syrup and decide to stir in some brown sugar instead, we won’t judge you—there’s vegetables in there.
This recipe might be a bit more of a project for you, but I promise it’s worth it! There’s only 10 ingredients in total, and all of them except nutritional yeast are available at your local grocery store. To find nutritional yeast, try the health food section at the South Keys Loblaws, the Herb and Spice Shop (downtown on Bank), or the bulk section in Whole Foods, the Natural Food Pantry in Billings Bridge, or any Bulk Barn. Making extra trips to a grocery store to find something you need for a recipe is personally my favourite way to procrastinate. You have to eat, right?
Nothing is more lovely to me than having a vat of soup in the fridge for when your to-do list is longer than the beginning-of-the-year lineup to get your U-Pass. This recipe also only requires a few grocery store friendly ingredients, and it comes together in about an hour with lots of inactive time you can spend calculating what marks you need on your exams to get the GPA you’re after. To save money on this recipe, use olive oil if you don’t already have coconut oil (though it’s a great thing to buy if you’re interested) and squeeze the orange juice by hand yourself instead of buying a carton. If you don’t have an immersion blender or a food processor, feel free to blend this soup in an ordinary blender.
Let’s be real about the fact that potatoes slay the grocery store by being cheap, delicious, and so damn versatile. Some people avoid them for low carb aspirations, but potatoes are the least processed form of carbs you can get, and they’re wonderfully filling for their calorie content. This version of potato salad is so easy to make, and the nutritional content is great because it’s flavoured with fresh herbs and Dijon mustard instead of mayonnaise. Serve this with grilled asparagus and paprika-baked chickpeas for a full meal.
