St. Patrick’s Day is this week and with green being a major theme of the holiday, it is the perfect opportunity to incorporate some healthy green recipes! You don’t even have to rely on food coloring—nature is full of healthy green foods for your St. Paddy’s day snacks.

Here are several easy recipe ideas you can implement while on the Optimal Weight 5 & 1 Plan^® to celebrate this green holiday the healthy way:

• Herb and Arugula Baked Eggs. Simply throw some eggs, herbs, and arugula in a skillet and bake until cooked through. Add any other green veggies you’d like to take it up a notch!
• Kale Chips. This tasty snack is the perfect healthy alternative to potato chips. Preheat the oven to 275 degrees F, remove the ribs from the kale, and cut into one and a half inch pieces. Lay on a baking sheet and toss with olive oil and salt. Bake until crisp, turning the leaves halfway though, for about 20 minutes.
• Crispy Green Beans with Pesto. All you need are fresh green beans, pesto sauce, garlic, and olive oil for this tasty recipe. Simply heat the olive oil, then add the garlic and green beans and sauté for about six minutes, or until the green beans are cooked but still crispy. Then toss the beans with the pesto sauce and serve.
• Cucumber Cups with Crab. Cucumbers make great edible serving cups when cut into two-inch chunks and then hollowed out. Combine sour cream and cream cheese in a bowl and add crabmeat. Simply fill each of the cucumber cups with the crab dip and refrigerate until ready to serve. Garnish with scallions and paprika before serving.
• Pesto Shrimp Cucumber Rolls. This recipe is similar to the cucumber cups, except you’ll roll pesto sauce and sautéed shrimp in thin, vertical slices of cucumber. Use a toothpick to keep the rolls intact and refrigerate until ready to serve, then garnish.

For the appropriate condiment serving recommendations, please refer to the OPTAVIA Condiment List.  Ask me, your OPTAVIA Coach, about other healthy alternatives to enjoy this St. Patrick’s Day on your journey to Lifelong Transformation, One Healthy Habit at a Time^®.