I started to substitute rice in many instances with chickpeas. Legumes themselves have protein but pair it with carbs, so I figured its actually “more effective” for my macros to not add bread/rice/pasta to a lentil/chickpeas/beans dish.

My current favourite is chickpeas in tomato sauce. I meal prep it for the week and all of the sudden chicken breast is not dry anymore.

Perhaps try to complement your animal protein with plant proteins. Quinoa, edamame, lentils, beans… Some vegetables have a surprisingly high protein value.

You could try things like tofu, since or vegan fake meat. Also lots of legumes

I’m not sure how you feel about the dairy industry, but Greek yogurt has been a life saver for me. I didn’t even really like yogurt before this, but it’s very much grown on me. I take chobani fruit on the bottom yogurts to work as breakfast everyday as I get the flats of them at Costco and they are very transportable (110cal, 11g protein) and at home I have fage 2% (120cal, 17g protein) with a splash of vanilla and either some fruit or a little drizzle of honey.

For non-dairy protein lentils are awesome. I like the brown lentils best, the ones you get when you pick up a pack just labeled “lentils.” You can do an easy lentil soup with just chicken broth, sautéed onion, celery, and carrot. Then just toss in a cup of lentils and a bay leaf and let it simmer for an hour. Or dahl is a very easy one pot dish that’s easy to batch cook. I use this recipe https://www.noracooks.com/red-lentil-dahl/ but let it simmer longer with my brown lentils.

For a snack, carrots and hummus is great, just be careful on portion sizes because the fat content in hummus is also high.

Shrimp/prawn is quite low calorie Or if you are in Australia, kangaroo meat

Eggs are my go to, but sliced turkey breast (sandwich meat) can also be a good lean source of protein.