Healthy Meal Prep Bowls (2024)

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February 5, 2018 By Lorena Grater

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These Healthy Meal Prep Bowls SCREAM summer! I’m hitting you with one of my healthy meal prep ideas today so you can prepare everything ahead to take stress out of your week. Chickpeas, quinoa and plenty of veggies make this a super easy healthy meal prep recipe.

We have crunchy fresh cucumber, cherry tomatoes that taste like they ripened in the sun in my dad’s garden, quinoa, cold chickpeas, soft and salty feta, spicy and crunchy red onion and the most delicious lemon tahini dressing EVER!Healthy lunch meal prep has never been easier!

Healthy Meal Prep Bowls for Work

I love making healthy lunch bowls for my work week because they keep my energy up and help me keep mood swings at bay.

I cook chickpeas in my Instant Pot once a month and freeze them in 2 cup portions so they are easy to just take out and throw in my meal prep bowls for work. I cook quinoa in my instant pot, too. Quinoa cooked in the instant pot tastes out of this world!

Quinoa, chickpeas and fresh crunchy vegetables are the perfect combination of taste and texture. Plus, they are super nutritious!

Get in your protein with the chickpeas and feta, your carbs with the quinoa and as always, fill half your plate with veggies. Top it all with an out of this world Lemon Tahini dressing that brings summer to your lunch time. Healthy Meal Prep Bowls for Work….easy peasy lemon squeezy! That’s just one recipe though, the healthy Meal Prep Ideas are endless.

The key to a healthy diet: meal prepping

I know you are probably tired of hearing it time and time again here on Green Healthy Cooking. I will talk about it incessantly though. The key to “sticking to” a healthy diet is meal prepping. Healthy Meal Prep Bowls are the solution to avoiding eating unhealthy.

For more healthy lunch ideas check out my healthy lunches e-book:) And for advice on what lunch containers are the best for taking your healthy meal prep bowls to work, check out this post and scroll to about the middle.

Healthy Meal Prep Bowls Video

Healthy Meal Prep Bowls

Prep Time: 5 minutes minutes

Cook Time: 25 minutes minutes

Total Time: 30 minutes minutes

Servings: 4 bowls

I'm hitting you with one of my healthy meal prep ideas today so you can prepare everything ahead to take stress out of your week. Chickpeas, quinoa and plenty of veggies make this a super easy healthy meal prep recipe.

Print Recipe

Ingredients

▢ 2 cups cooked chickpeas
▢ 1 cup quinoa
▢ 1 cup water
▢ 1/4 tsp sea salt
▢ 1 large English cucumber
▢ 24 cherry tomatoes
▢ 1 small red onion
▢ 7 oz cubed feta - (200g)
▢ 1 Tbsp lemon juice
▢ 1 Tbsp tahini
▢ 1 Tbsp honey
▢ 4 Tbsp extra virgin olive oil
▢ sea salt
▢ black pepper

Instructions

Cook quinoa as instructed on package or cook it in the Instant Pot by preheating the instant pot with the "sauté" button, then once hot add a splash of oil and the quinoa and toast it for a couple minutes. Then, add water and sea salt, and immediately put on lid and seal. Make sure the venting knob is set to sealing. Press "cancel" and then "manual" and set the Instant Pot to 1 minute on high pressure. Then wait for natural pressure release (about 15 minutes).
In the meantime, wash and cut vegetables and divide all ingredients in 4 parts and add to 4 large bowls.
Prepare salad dressing my mixing lemon juice, tahini, honey and olive oil in an airtight container and shake until well combined.
Once quinoa is cooked, let cool and then divide into 4 parts and add to bowls.
Immediately refrigerate and take 1 bowl to work with about 4th of the dressing. Add dressing to bowl minutes before eating.

Nutrition

Reader Interactions

Comments

Melanie says
October 26, 2023 at 8:41 pm
Looks delicious – is there an alternative to tahini?
Reply
- Lorena Grater says
  November 9, 2023 at 9:17 am
  any nut or seed butter will work
  Reply
Alina says
August 7, 2023 at 3:58 pm

This is one of my favorite meal prep recipes and my husband loves it too! Thank you for posting this!
Reply
Bec says
March 21, 2022 at 9:30 am

Wow. This was my first meal prep to try and it was great. I so loved being able to reach into my fridge for a healthy meal and this was very filling. I did cut back on the olive oil since the tahini I used seemed to have a lot of oil in it. Also I used your recipe for quinoa in the Instant Pot and it was a success. Thanks!
Reply
Kassie says
January 11, 2022 at 11:35 pm

This was delicious – except for the dressing. So much olive oil – that was all I could taste. The rest came to get her well and was delicious. Thank you for the basic idea, I’ll just work to adjust the dressing to my taste.
Reply
- Lorena Grater says
  See Also
  Healthy Breakfast Meal Prep Bowls
  January 14, 2022 at 10:18 am
  Hi Kassie, did you use just 1/4 of the dressing per bowl? Not the whole dressing for one single bowl? There are strong and mild olive oils. I always choose mild extra virgin olive oils. A brand that I particularly like is “Bono”.
  Reply
Sherly Demosthenes says
May 23, 2021 at 4:42 pm
Which brand of tahini would you recommend?
Reply
- Lorena Grater says
  May 25, 2021 at 12:08 pm
  I don’t know where you live. Here in Montreal I buy a brand called “Nuts to You” but from what I understand that’s a Canadian brand and not available in the US? Any brand that offers natural tahini, i.e. tahini made from nothing but sesame seeds. No other additives.
  Reply
Courtney says
March 15, 2021 at 2:22 pm

Delicious dressing, very easy and healthy. Perfect for meal prep. Thank you!
Reply
Angelica says
March 13, 2021 at 6:40 am
This looks amazing but how do you cook chickpeas in the instant pot and/or slow cooker?
Reply
- Lorena Grater says
  March 15, 2021 at 3:14 pm
  I soak chickpeas overnight, then drain and rinse, then add to the Instant Pot barely covered with water and cook for 15 minutes on high pressure + full natural pressure release.
  Reply
Julie says
February 6, 2021 at 3:06 pm

This was an excellent make ahead lunch. I enjoyed eating it all week at work. Next time I’m going to try roasting the chickpeas.
Reply
Anita J. Norton says
May 4, 2020 at 6:45 am
Yum yum) Looks very tasty. I’ll take this recipe for attention. Many thanks!
Reply
Charlene says
April 2, 2019 at 2:56 pm

First off, the meal itself is beautiful. Secondly, it was super easy to make!! Last, it was DELICIOUS! Very filling (didn’t even finish it all) and I substituted the red onion with red pepper because I’m not too big on raw onion. Otherwise, a perfect healthy meal. Thank you!
Reply
- Lorena says
  April 2, 2019 at 5:18 pm
  You are very welcome :) I’m so happy you enjoyed it!!
  Reply
Grazina says
March 22, 2019 at 12:46 am

Looks yummy and healthy but the recipe would be more useful if it described a different way of preparing chickpeas and quinoa (for weirdos like me who don’t have the Instant Pot).
Reply
- Lorena says
  March 22, 2019 at 10:48 am
  I state in the recipe to cook quinoa “as instructed on the package” OR “in the Instant Pot”. If you don’t have an Instant Pot cook it as instructed on the package you bought it in. The recipe also asks for “cooked chickpeas”. I’m informing about the possibility to cook them in the Instant Pot but you can use canned, cooked in a pot, cooked in a slow cooker, whichever way is your favorite. But you are right, I definitely deserve 2 stars for a recipe you haven’t tried.
  Reply
  - Mandy Knowles says
    September 8, 2019 at 8:11 pm
    Good one LOL! Can’t rate a recipe if you haven’t tried it. I’m doing this meal prep tonight it seems delicious. Canned Chickpeas and Ready made Quinoa :)
    Reply
  - bridget.n2d says
    January 6, 2022 at 10:22 am
    Lorena, five stars for your reply to a ridiculous comment! It seems our manners and common sense have not kept pace with technology. Thank you for posting your delicious recipes!
    Reply