Can you eat healthy while traveling? Yes you can!

How to enjoy your food, save money and feel your best

One of the pleasures of traveling is experiencing new places, new people and new customs — in other words, new cultures. Whether you’re visiting California or New York, South America or Europe, one fundamental aspect of culture is the food. You can certainly experience food culture in a restaurant, but to get up close and personal it helps to shop and cook for yourself.

My clients ask me all the time, “How can I eat healthfully when I’m traveling?” My go-to advice is to focus on eating enough protein at all meals, eating veggies at lunch and dinner, and keeping portion sizes moderate — basically eating enough to feel satisfied and comfortably full, but not so full that you don’t feel well. This is easier to accomplish when you aren’t relying on a steady stream of restaurant meals.

Be a temporary local

Generally speaking, most home-cooked meals ingredients are healthier than restaurant meals. They’re also less expensive. This is why, If you are traveling someplace for several days or more, I highly recommend renting an apartment or condominium instead of staying in a hotel. I’ve done this in Maui, Buenos Aires, Paris, Ecuador, Lisbon and Scotland. (As a bonus, you’ll get more space for less money than if you stayed in a hotel.)

Even in a small, minimally appointed apartment kitchen (and in Paris, the kitchens are tiny), you can quickly turn out a simple, satisfying, nutritious meal. Eating in, or preparing a simple picnic to eat in a park, helps you appreciate your restaurant and café meals more, because they punctuate instead of permeate your trip.

Finding your fruits and veggies

One of the best ways to get the flavor of a new place is to visit a farmers market. When you are staying in a hotel, farmers markets can be sweet torture, as you are limited as to what you can buy and actually use. When you have a kitchen at your disposal, you have the fun of filling your shopping bags with the bounty of enticingly displayed fruits and vegetables.

When I visit Paris, one of my must-visits is the Bastille Farmer’s Market. It’s huge, and almost overwhelming, but it’s great fun to people watch while shopping for fresh asparagus, salad ingredients and a rotisserie chicken for dinner. (Protein? Check. Veggies? Check.) On a smaller, delightful scale was the twice-weekly market a few blocks away from our Paris apartment. A huge, gorgeous head of lettuce for roughly $1.50? Merci! In Paris, small produce shops are ubiquitous, so there’s no excuse to not eat lots of fresh, juicy, nutrient-packed fruits and veggies.

Shop for fun — and food

Grocery stores are a fabulous place to shop for souvenirs — and sustenance. What may feel like a chore at home feels like an adventure when so when many products and brands are new and different. In both Paris and Buenos Aires I couldn’t go more than a few blocks without stumbling across a small grocery store stocked with all the essentials for outfitting my temporary kitchen, including healthy staples such as yogurt, a small bottle of olive oil, milk and coffee. Sometimes it’s nice to have breakfast and coffee before heading out for the day!

If I didn’t make to the neighborhood meat market before closing hours, I could pick up a few chicken breasts to bake or sauté, and a good-quality yet inexpensive bottle of red wine. A well-appointed store will often have some vegetable sides to round out a meal. Carrot and beet salads are common in Paris, on a three-day hotel stay in Amsterdam, I was able to skip a few restaurant meals thanks to a small, upscale grocery store that had some healthy and tasty pre-made salads.

Shopping in specialty shops can also be a healthy treat. One of the highlights of a Maui trip a few years ago was a tiny shop that sold fish so fresh that on most visits I saw fishermen walk through the door with their catch of the day. It was a joy to choose a new variety each time to grill for dinner — especially when I calculated how much more it would cost to order that fish in a restaurant.

Reap the benefits

Supporting your body with good nutrition when you travel will help you stay energized for all the sightseeing you want to do, which is especially important if you are feeling jetlagged and sleep-deprived from crossing multiple time zones. It will also help you stay healthy during your trip, so you can actually enjoy your trip!