Travel Eats

How Do You Eat Well – Meaning Nutritiously While Traveling Long Term? 

On any travel itinerary, packing and organization of luggage seems to be the priority. But what about eating? All those meals that can’t be planned in advance? 

If you are a typical traveler more concerned about going through security and making your gate on time, eating well is furthest from your mind. Until… 

Now you and your family are hungry and have limited choices available. 

Some good news about air travel. TSA has become far more lenient in recent days regarding the ability to now take with you those peanut butter and jelly sandwiches you made the night before so that you wouldn’t have to spend $100 on coffee, a muffin, orange juice, etc. while captive in an airport terminal. 

TSA rules aside, you still have to choose carefully. The options seem endless until you realize how universally unhealthy your choices in an airport or travel rest area are. 

Those turnpike stops, the necessity of refueling and stretching your legs? It’s easy to grab a salty and sweet bag of chips. Cookies or even a forbidden ready-made sandwich made by someone else’s hand (more on that later). 

Marketers are way ahead of you. Super-sized slurpees, mega-coffee cup proportions and unnaturally flavored creamers and breakfast sandwiches pique the hungry heart, right next to the 24 hour fried chicken.  

Even the “salads” billed as a healthy alternative may already be dressed with hydrogenated oils, artificial flavors and whatever ingredients beyond your control. 

Here are some common sense suggestions from a gal who just traveled 8,200 road miles in a pickup, plus air travel in between PLUS living like a guest for two weeks at our son’s abode.  

Whatever setting, we travelers face the same truth.  Eating nutritiously needs planning. Here are a few common sense rules that apply. 

• Pack judiciously. Don’t underestimate the power of quality canned or packaged goods with a long shelf life. 

• Consider the fact that even so-called nonperishable foods are subject to heat and other elements (think soggy sandwiches in the rain). 

• Dried fruit and nuts are excellent sources of protein, and snack sized portions are a mere fraction of the cost you pay for in a travel stop or airport. 

• Use your water bottles at reputable rest stops as often as you can, rather than purchase water from who-knows-where. Remarkably, many rest areas and airports now offer free water refill stations (why pay $4 for bottled, plastic water?). 

• Yogurt, fruit and nuts are no-brainers. Protein, especially as we age is crucial not only for everyday function, but also for stamina. Travel takes its toll on even the best of us. You are out of routine, and without lecture, the importance of protein in our daily diet cannot be over-estimated. 

• Plan every meal of the day in order to avoid those incredibly dangerous snacks so available wherever you go or take a break while getting there. Get off the next exit instead of scarfing down a burger at a rest stop that may have been sitting there for two workers’ shifts. 

• Love or hate them, protein bars prove themselves as a meal replacement in a pinch. They come in all kinds of flavors shapes and sizes; just be mindful of their sugar and additive contents. 

• Stay hydrated! We are lectured on this relentlessly, but it is of utmost importance while you travel. Hydration helps to keep you focused and balanced (that’s another subject altogether, but it’s proven that even silent dehydration causes lack of concentration and energy). 

Fresh off a cross country, ultimately 8,200-mile truck journey without many amenities, my husband and I were faced with the daily quandary of how and where to eat. More importantly, it became my mission to do it in the most healthy way possible. 

When you are ambitious about covering miles, are sleep-deprived or just plain hungry, alternatives to your normal culinary routine are compromised more than you realize while traveling. 

Bon Voyage and Bon Appetit, 

Bridget