Check out these summer meal ideas that are quick, easy, and made from whole foods. These healthy, made-from-scratch summer recipes will fill your family’s bellies with nutritious foods. Follow my tips below to make summer meals easy.
Today I’m going to share with you 5 healthy summer meal ideas. This goes along with my healthy meals in a week series that I’ve done on YouTube, but since they can be challenging to make and shoot, I naturally put it off. But I have it for your today, and I’m going to try to do it more often to give you more lunch, dinner, and breakfast ideas.
I know how helpful they can be, since it is really nice to take a peek into other families’ menus and see what they make. It can also help others gather some new ideas and gain a fresh perspective when it comes to summer meal ideas.
Personally, we tend to make a lot of the same thing over and over again.
Since it is summer, these meals will include a lot of fresh herbs, tomatoes, zucchini, greens, and other fresh ingredients you can find easily at the farmers markets or in your own gardens. It’s very different from winter time, when the meals are more centered around the fall harvest and heartier root vegetables, like carrots, potatoes, squashes and pumpkins.
That is how meals usually flow in our house: meals usually consist of meats, vegetables, fruits, and then we throw in some grains with sourdough recipes.
I don’t love making recipes; as you’ll see in this meal plan, I’m more of a throw-it-together kind of girl.
If you are an on-the-go person, many of these summer recipes can be adapted for you. Make some sourdough English muffins in advance, and use them to top a lot of the recipes.
You will notice a pattern in these recipes. If we purchase a pack of lemons, or get lot of zucchini or cucumbers at the farmers market, then those ingredients will be seen a lot throughout that week’s meals.
Summer Meal Ideas – Easy Side Dishes
- One of our favorite, easy side dishes that basically takes no extra work is sauerkraut. You have to make it in advance, but you can make a huge amount of it, and then just pull it out every time you need it. This also works great with fermented pickles. You never have to think of what side dish to make; it is in the fridge, ready to eat.
- Sliced avocado is also an easy side dish we eat at almost all meals, and it can help bulk up the meal.
- Fresh salad can go with anything.
- Sourdough English muffins is a simple side, or to use instead of sandwich bread.
- Fruit – summer is full of delicious fruit.
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Tips For Summer Meals
- Make things ahead of time and reuse throughout the week.
- Use fresh, in-season fruits and vegetables as much as possible.
- Make quick sides like the ones listed above for really simple meals.
- Add fresh herbs and lemon juice to flavor dishes.
What We Eat In A Week – Healthy Summer Meal Ideas Video
5 Healthy Summer Meal Ideas
Day 1: Southwest Chicken Salad On Sourdough English Muffins Served With A Side Salad
Whole Chicken In The Instant Pot
Make the chicken in advance, and then use the chicken in 4 other meals.
Directions: Put the chicken in the Instant Pot with 1 cup of water. Cook it for 60 minutes if it’s fresh, and 90 minutes if the chicken is frozen.
Southwest Chicken Salad
- Fresh bell peppers- diced
- Red onions – diced
- Avocado- diced
- Fresh cilantro
- Garlic powder
- Salt
- Avocado mayo
- Cooked shredded chicken – use chicken made in the Instant Pot
- Crumbled bacon – I cooked bacon and used some for this recipe, and then will use the rest later in the week for another recipe, or to throw in eggs to make them more tasty.
Serve on top of sourdough English muffins. I do have a sourdough bread recipe, but I almost always go with the English muffins because they are faster. The bread takes days to make, but the sourdough English muffins just need to be started the day before.
Side: fresh greens with homemade honey mustard dressing.
Homemade Honey Mustard Dressing: equal parts of mayo, mustard, and a little less than equal parts of honey, and a drop of lemon essential oil. Add salt, pepper, and garlic powder to taste.
Homemade Broth
Make the broth right after the chicken so you don’t have to clean the Instant Pot. I threw in the bones from another chicken I had in the freezer, added the bones of the chicken I had just cooked and then filled it with filtered water.
Day 2: Baked Salmon Topped with Lemon Dill Sauce Served with Side Salad
Baked Salmon
Bake salmon in a glass baking dish at 400 degrees for 15 minutes. Just sprinkle it with some salt, avocado oil, and lemon juice. I like to use avocado oil, butter, or coconut oil in baking, because they have a higher smoke point than olive oil.
I topped the salmon with some lemon dill yogurt sauce. To make it, mix together plain yogurt with salt pepper, garlic powder, lemon juice, chopped fresh dill (or dried if you don’t have access to fresh), and chopped up cucumbers (chop up super small if your kids aren’t huge cucumber fans).
Served with salad with honey mustard and sauerkraut.
Day 3: Mexican Beef And Sweet Potato Skillet Served Over Lettuce Greens
Something I just whipped up, hadn’t given it a lot of thought before. My daughter had the main idea for it. I was going to do meatloaf but she suggested something Mexican.
Mexican Beef
I cut up some onions and peppers and saute them. Then I take the vegetables out of the pan and add ground beef with minced garlic, which I find cooks better than if you add it to the veggies to cook. Add salt and pepper. I may add some lime juice or lemon juice if I have it on hand. Top with cilantro.
For a side, I diced up some sweet potatoes and cooked them with coconut oil in a cast iron skillet.
To serve, I started with a bed of lettuce drizzled with honey mustard dressing. Then I topped it with the sweet potatoes, peppers, onions, and beef. Then I added some fresh avocado slices and a side of sauerkraut. Kids don’t like that combined, so I served this meal to them separated
Day 4: Quick & Easy Tuna Salad With Fruit
This is a great, light dish. You can serve it along with some fresh fruit, and it’s a great thing to whip up if you’ve been out of the house all day and you have nothing planned: you can just pull that canned tuna out of the pantry and whip it together. You can mix this up even if you don’t have all the ingredients on hand.
For example, I’ve used celery instead of cucumber, lime juice instead of lemon juice, etc. Play around with what you have and what your family likes. We actually got burnt out on this recipe, because we made it so many times and loved it for so long.
We used the Wild Planet tuna. I did a lot of research for the best one available, and this is the one I chose. You can get it off Amazon here.
Tuna Salad Recipe
Wild Planet Tuna mixed up with some red onions, fresh cilantro, lemon juice, olive oil, salt, pepper, garlic powder, avocado, and cucumber.
Served with fruit.
Would be great on a sourdough English muffin or a sourdough tortilla for a lunch on the go.
Day 5: Creamy Chicken Soup With Avocado Served With Salad
This won’t seem like a summer meal because it is not a summer meal. It’s soup. However, we like to continue consuming homemade bone broth, even in the summer months, and this is the best way to get it done. .
Creamy Chicken Soup
I made our favorite chicken soup with all the veggies: carrots, celery, onions, fresh garlic, fresh herbs, frozen green beans, simmered in homemade bone broth.
Once it is all cooked and everything is nice and soft, at the very end I will add in the chicken from earlier in the week with some salt, pepper, some fresh herbs, and allow it to cook a little longer.
Then I spoon it into bowls and add in a bunch of sour cream and cheddar cheese, and serve it with some leftover crumbled bacon. Top it with some avocados, and when it cools down, you can even add in some sauerkraut.
You could make it a little lighter without adding the sour cream, bacon, and cheese, but my kids absolutely devour it. This also helps it cool down to serve it to the kids.
Serve it with salad.
Check out some other family meal ideas:
- 5 Tips for Having Healthy Meals Every Night Without Meal Planning
- Healthy Family Dinner Recipes
- Where we Source Real Organic Food | TIPS FOR BUYING LOCAL FOOD
- Healthy Lunch Ideas for Family
- Healthy Breakfast Ideas for Family
Thanks so much for checking out our summer meal ideas and what we eat in a week. Let me know in the comments below if you want to see more ideas.
Shari says
I can’t think of anything I appreciate much more than ideas for lunch, these look wonderful. I love your blog.
Thank you,
Shari
Tonya says
This type of video is my absolute favorite!! Keep doing them please, please, please! ☺️
Julie says
Excellent job! Wow I saw the email and just “devoured” the video from start to finish without interruptions. You two do a really good job. It is obvious all the hard work you two put into these videos and then the blog to go with it with the recipes written out. Wow! I really appreciate it. Lisa, you are so good at this! It is really helpful for me to listen to you, and to watch the sped-up video of how you made the meals. Really helpful. I could definitely see myself stopping to watch you do this again. For me, it is quick, and informative, gives me ideas immediately, and you are so encouraging in the way you do your videos in that you let us know that you’re just trying to use what you have in the kitchen with selections of foods that are really healthy. Super! I have started making sauerkraut and have a ton of it being made right now. I really would like to do the sourdough starter, in the way you use it so easily. I blew it on my first batch and the lid got mold in it and ruined the batch. I still need to get back to trying that. Someone here in our apartment complex was giving away a bread maker, so I have it and would like to make sourdough bread. I did make some fermented beets with bay leaf, peppercorn and garlic. I need to make some more. I have not been able to read all your blogs you send me, but I did hop right on this video that I thought and did find to be very helpful and quick. Thanks for all the hard work you and your husband and family put into doing these videos. I look forward to trying to implement your ideas from today’s video. I really appreciate all you and your husband are doing to try to make our Home Sweet Home even more homey!. Love in Christ, Julie Crabtree for my husband Tim Crabtree and me
terrie says
Thankyou for your hard work….very helpful.
Linda says
Hi Lisa,
I made sourdough english muffins but I also add 2 t of baking soda to the batch the next day after the dough has sat all night. Then I form them into little bun shapes, with only a light dusting of flour. I cook them on a skillet for a total of 21 minutes. 7 minutes each side, buttering the skillet the first 2 times, flip them, another seven, flip them and then the final 7 minutes. They turn out lovely and fluffy soft. I also add 1 t of psyllium husks to the dough and it makes a lovely texture.
Regards sourdough bread: I bake this for my daughter nearly every week (x3 loaves today). My method is easy peasy. The day before in the morning I mix up (sample 1 x loaf) = 3.5 cups flour (I use 2 C wholewheat – freshly ground & 1.5 cups unbleached white), 1 t psyllium, 1 t sugar (optional), or honey, 1 teaspoon salt, 1 cup starter, 1.5 – 2 cups water. Mix all together, add more flour if not a moist dough, or more water if dry. Then I cover with a giant size beeswax wrap. Leave all day and overnight. Next morning it’s risen and bubbly. I scrape the sides down, add a little more flour to make a soft/slightly sticky dough. Turn out onto floured bench. knead very briefly 1-2 minutes. Soak a piece of baking/parchment paper in water, scrunch it up, line a bread tin with this so it overlaps. Shape the dough into a loaf, with very little flour. Plop into the tin. Cover with a damp t-towel or plastic bag so there’s room for it to rise and not stick at the top. Allow to double in size in a warm place – usually 4 hours. I then make a rounded foil top that completely seals in the edges of the bread pan, with room for it to rise. Place into a 200 C oven for 30 minutes. Remove foil and bake another 15 – 20 minutes. There you have it. I actually find it super easy. 🙂 ~ Linda
Emily says
Wow! Love this post. Thank you.
Linda, thank you for your ideas for sourdough bread. I’d like to try your method. I’m not sure I understood it all. Is there a place to read the recipe? I’ve never heard of psyllium husks….
Dianne says
Love your blog and appreciate the meal videos! It really helps to have a visual of meal preps and the finished product. I am older now but love seeing happy, large families run so efficiently and lovingly.
Jean says
Thank you for sharing your ideas. I love to try new things.
Heidi says
Absolutely love watching your videos. Please keep them coming if at all possible. Very inspiring!😊
Joan says
Would you share your canning recipes
Barb says
Butter and coconut oil each have a smoke point of 350 degrees and olive oil is 410, only the avocado oil has a higher smoke point. I’m surprised you got this wrong. Otherwise I enjoy your recipes a lot. Keep them coming!