This page may contain affiliate links. As an Amazon Affiliate, I earn on qualifying purchases. Please see our disclaimer for more information.
I love exploring new places! Part of the fun when going to a new place is experiencing the local cuisine. But, alas, neither my stomach nor wallet can handle having every meal in a restaurant. Having a plan for healthy travel food allows me to try new things without relying on restaurants for every meal.
In today’s world of full-kitchen vacation rentals, vacation food can be very similar to our everyday meals. But it’s vacation! Who wants to spend all day chained to the stove? Humph. I don’t even want to spend an exorbitant amount of time in the kitchen when I’m not on vacation! My goal is healthy and nutritious meals with minimal hands-on effort.
For the most part, when planning our travel food, I like to stick with tried-and-true recipes. I’ll admit, I do like to try local ingredients and specialty items. When visiting the beach, I love finding a fresh catch that is simple to prepare. Many motels in beach towns will have outside grills, giving the opportunity to easily cook up something special. Taking along a few premixed containers of spices makes seasoning easy.
Road trips make packing a cooler and/or bag easy. When flying, I’ll tuck a few premixed spice baggies in my carry-on and plan to stop at a grocery store or have groceries delivered to my hotel. With new options for grocery delivery, and easy online ordering and pickup at major stores, eating healthy on the road has become much easier in recent years.
Healthy Travel Food: Perfect for Road Trips, Camping, or Hotel Rooms
Breakfast
- Design a Muffin: Make your favorite muffins ahead of time for a quick and easy breakfast or snack
- Kefir or Yogurt Parfait
- Pumpkin Pie Overnight Oats
- Blueberry Almond Overnight Oats
- Almond Meal Pudding
- Swirl Bread or Swirl Rolls (make ahead of time)
Snacks
Make these ahead of time to munch on as needed.
- Cracker Jacks
- Pimento Cheese Dip
- Spicy Pickled Carrots
- Hummus with veggies
- Black Bean Spread
- Grain-Free Almond Sunny Seed Crackers
- Whole Wheat Sourdough Crackers
Main Dishes
- Design a Meat Salad
- Main Dish Salad
- Sandwiches: Premake your favorite sourdough bread, pita pockets, or flatbread and assemble with your favorite fillings
- Super Flexible Stuffed Burritos (cook your ingredients ahead of time and then just reheat and assemble…so easy!)
- Cold Roasted Root Veggie Salad with your favorite precooked meat
- Cold Grain Salad
- Lentil Sprout Salad
- Salad in a Jar (endless variations and suitable for packing at home and eating several days later)
Get More Travel Food Ideas
Are you planning to hit the road for a family vacation? Do you want to take a road trip, but the idea of eating out three meals a day doesn’t work for your budget or your health? Would you like to continue with a real, whole, or traditional style of eating while away from home?
Real Food Hits the Road will be your guide to saving the budget, keeping your digestion working well, and enjoying real food away from home while letting you enjoy the trip and not “cook” all of the time.
Inside Real Food Hits the Road, you’ll find:
- Tons of information on budgeting, packing, and planning
- A two-week road trip meal plan for cooking breakfast, lunch, dinner, and dessert in your hotel room
- Recipes and ideas for healthy road trip snacks
- A 10-day camping meal plan
Real Food Hits the Road is not just a cookbook, it is a tutorial in making real food simple and enjoyable while away from home. Many of the recipes and concepts are based on teachings from the Weston A. Price Foundation and encourage traditional preparation methods, while keeping things as simple as possible.
Click here to get your copy of Real Food Hits the Road!
