Dinners that can be made in a hotel room?

LadyM

I recently realized that despite the fact that my current job involves physical movement, usually in the hot sun and often up and down steep slopes, I am basically maintaining the same body weight, (about 20 lbs overweight of where I should be.) I think the problem is that during the work week I've been eating out almost every night, fueled by the fact that I get per diem for food and that the rest of the crew does. Burning off calories during the day, regaining them in the evening.

I'd like to figure out some meals I can eat in hotels since it would not only reduce my calorie intake (hopefully) but also net me more money, since I get the same amount per diem no matter where/whether I eat out or not.

So far the hotels we've stayed in have had mini-fridges and microwaves, although there is no guarantee they all will. No stoves or kitchenettes.

Any ideas? So far I've come up with sandwiches and canned things, like canned chili.

JebusUD

If you stay by a grocery store.

fruit

bread, like a nice french loaf, dip in some garlic powder mixed with butter or olive oil for some flavor.

maybe some carrots or other easy going dont need to cook veggies. or a salad. salads can be all kinds of delicious.

None of this needs any cooking.

Deebaser

without a reliable microwave / fridge you're pretty limited.

If you have a fridge, make a salad and pick up oil/vinegar (netiher require refrigeration). You can pick up a bag of sald for about $5 and spruce it up for another $2 (Tomato/onion) and get 2 meals out of it.

matt has a problem

Salad-in-a-bag is nice and healthy, and you can usually get 2 or 3 servings out of one bag. They run around $4. Microwave dinners are... not that great. Even the 'healthy' ones are usually pretty heavy on the salt. There's microwaveable rice, add some broccoli, carrots, snow peas and a generic Asian sauce like teriyaki and you've got a pretty decent microwave veggie stir fry.

RUNN1NGMAN

Get a copy of "Eat This Not That" and follow it religiously. Even when you're forced to eat out you can probably be making better decisions about what you eat (and as the book will show you it's not always so obvious what the healthier choice is).

onceling

If you want to make sure you don't just fall back into old habits and put the weight back on, you really need to make a permanent change to what you eat. That means learning what you can eat out as much as what you can make "at home" (hotel or real home).

For the hotel room, sandwiches, pre-cooked chicken, canned tuna, hummus & whole wheat pita.

But when you go out to a restaurant, there's no reason you have to pack down an unhealthy meal (depending on where you eat, I guess!). Options on most menu's that are good to eat:

- grilled chicken & vegetables
- salmon
- salads

Captain Vash

Hummus and Pita bread.
Delicious and requires no preparation!

also, pretty much healthy!

saint2e

When I was on a 8 month "ordeal" in Dayton Ohio I would often stay in a Marriott Residence Inn... It's a normal-ish hotel room that comes with a kitchen including microwave, dishwasher, fridge, dishes, etc.

Might be worth checking out. I was paid per diem and made a killing just doing a grocery run at the beginning of the week and having dinner back at the hotel at night.

LadyM

The company books the hotel rooms, so that aspect is in their hands. (Mostly Comfort Inns, Motel Sixes, that caliber. Although the place we're staying next is local, tiny, and doesn't have air conditioning, which fills me with fear. God only knows if they have microwaves/fridges.)

Thanks for the suggestions so far . . . I'm loving the hummus idea!

I usually just eat one or two fruit and nut bars for lunch, would a sandwich be healthier? Something about work + heat prevents me from being hungry/eating much at lunch.

Dark_Side

I do a lot of traveling and spend a lot of time working in extremely hot environments, so I know your pain. For the most part, I've found trying to cook in hotel rooms to be next to impossible, almost wholly because by the time you get to your room, you're so dog tired you can't really be hassled to do much cooking. Just finding a place to store and wash the dishes is hard enough.

The real key for extended stays is a grocery store trip, stocking up on healthier foods such as fruit, quality lunchmeats and cheese, whole wheat bread, lowfat milk and so on, but making sure it's easy to prepare it with minimal time and mess. It's hard to stick with it, and so when you do find yourself inevitably eating out, you need to try and stick to healthier orders such as salads and so on. Honestly you should probably just look at the first post of the working out thread which has a huge and quality run down on generally eating healthy. As well as important points such as making sure you eat breakfast, not eating right before bed, and a host of other good ways to keep weight off.

tech_hunter

Lack of hunger I think may be a sign you are not consuming enough fluids while working.

I would advise getting a collapsible cooler and doing a grocery run the day you check into the room. Ice is cheap and as long as you don't open and close the cooler a 1000 times should keep everything relatively chill. This will allow you more and healthier options for preparing and keeping food in a room. If the room happens to have a fridge already then bonus but you are prepared if it doesnt.

chocolove

Get a rice cooker and look up some good recipes. You can do a lot of nice steamed items with a rice cooker.
Although I don't know if you'll be able to carry one with you everywhere you go.

Tron

Couscous is simple to make.

You just need the ability to boil less than a cup of water. (Electric Kettle, Microwave, or possibly a hot water dispenser at a lobby/ store)

And a mug.

Boil water, put in mug, add equal part couscous, cover for 5 minutes.

LadyM

chocolove wrote: »

Get a rice cooker and look up some good recipes. You can do a lot of nice steamed items with a rice cooker.
Although I don't know if you'll be able to carry one with you everywhere you go.

That's the other thing, space is really tight. We've got four people in one work truck and there's already a lot of work stuff in both the cab and the bed already. As it is I can barely jam my suitcase into the bed and am leaning against a pile of junk inside the truck. I have acquired a tiny cooler (big enough on the inside for a six pack of pop) that I will squeeze in SOMEHOW for carrying meat/cheese, but that's really . . . it.

(This also limits my ability to shop for stuff on my own once we get to a destination, since it's not my truck, but luckily we usually visit a grocery store within the first day or so.)

PracticalProblemSolver

I don't see how people can survive without heat, so get an electric skillet or camp stove if you're feeling adventurous. If you don't want to bother with that and carrying around dishes, learn how to make a nice salad, you can get deli meat and throw it in there. When I get hot in the summer I don't have a big appetite either, but I can usually down some cold pasta salad, salad or grain mix from the deli.

Canned meals are usually either gross(hippie food) or really bad for you, I would avoid it.

salad recipe just off the top of my head: greens, apple, cranberries, sugar pecans, cheese, chicken, easy on the sauce.

I like the 'in defense of food' motto: "eat food, not too much, mostly vegetables." Food meaning something a caveman would recognize as edible. Also: ramen.

ps are you on tour or something? Sounds miserable.

Elin

Most hotel rooms have a coffee maker. This will make you some hot water. Ramen, oatmeal, couscous. Be creative. I saw on tv (but never tried) wrapping a cheese sammich in tin foil and using the iron in the room to toast it.