Healthy Eating

taurusgb

I’ve found so much that is interesting and helpful on this site in all the months I’ve been lurking, I thought it was time to register and offer some of my own tips…apologies if they have already been given by others or they seem obvious!

1) Make the kids favourite jelly to ¾ pint and put in fridge until starting to set but still like a thick liquid. Add ¼ pint of natural yoghurt (live bio kind is best) and mix with an electric mixer until well combined. Pour into individual dishes and when set, top with a small amount of grated chocolate (you’d be surprised how far 2 small squares of chocolate will go when grated finely or chopped with sharp knife).
2) Put any left over crusts, slices of stale bread, ends of loaves into a bag in the freezer, use to make bread pudding, breadcrumbs etc.
3) Another use for left over or stale bread…cut into slices and remove crusts (remember to put these into freezer for that bread pudding!), or if rolls, slice in half. Spread with tomato puree, top with grated cheese (or slice it if you can’t be bothered to get the grater out – works as well either way), sprinkle on mixed herbs if liked, then pop in oven until golden brown. Result = mini pizza’s ready to eat hot, or put into lunch boxes cold – my kids love these as a change from sandwiches.
4) Can’t get the kids to eat enough fruit? Serve chunks of any sort of fruit on a plate with a small pot of melted chocolate (3 small squares looks a lot when melted!) and let the kids dip the fruit into it using fondue forks or cocktail sticks.
5) Hide nuts in fruit cake by grinding them to a powder.
6) Add grated carrot to home made burgers and shepherds pie – makes the meat go further and adds some extra veg to the diet
7) Buy a corner gammon joint (get mine from our butcher, costs £2.99) boil or roast according to how you like it, allow to get completely cold in fridge to ‘set’, then slice finely, freeze in useable portions and you’ll have ham for sandwiches that can be taken out as required, lasts ages, contains no extra additives, isn’t made up from selected cuts of anything, has no added water, and tastes gorgeous.

thriftlady_2

Brilliant suggestions taurusgb.
I think I do most of those too,except the nuts one :eek: I must do what you suggest about the gammon for sandwiches.That really is the best solution for my kids lunches apart from cheese.I find myself buying rubbishy processed ham and chicken too often.Butcher's home cured ham is gorgeous but v.expensive,so a corner gammon seems a sensible option.thanks :T

I've got some hm yogurt to use up,so I think I'll put it in a jelly tomorrow,can't do it today as I'm making Black Saturn's fruit cobbler.So many brilliant suggetions on this board :j

Queenie

:hello: Welcome taurusgb

Delighted that you've progressed from lurker to poster

Thank you for sharing your tips, it's always refreshing to have new people join in and share their ideas/tips/suggestions. I especially enjoyed tip #7

Looking forward to getting to know you around the boards.

recovering_spendaholic

These are great suggestions - I never thought of the melted chocolate with fruit thing - I bet my kids would love that!!! It would be like a personal chocolate fondue!!

black-saturn

OMG theres so many people relying on my fruit cobbler tonight. I hope you all dont have a go at me tomorrow if you dont like it.

Skintmama

Thanks Taurusgb and Welcome!

I did a kind of experimental variation on your corner gammon idea recently.

The market butcher was selling gammon hocks for 75p each. Seemed too good to miss, although I wasn't sure what to do with them. I bought two and put the first one in with a beef in stout casserole in the SC, not adding any salt. I removed it afterwards and stripped away all skin and fat. We were left with lots of delicious and tender ham and the casserole was also perfectly seasoned. Tried it again in another beef casserole recipe and had equally good results, giving us a surprising amount of ham for lunchtime sandwiches.

I do have a very large SC and it was a good way to help fill it up. I'll definitely be doing this again but will follow your corner gammon idea for when I need the slices to look good, as well as taste good.

Skintmama

recovering_spendaholic wrote:

These are great suggestions - I never thought of the melted chocolate with fruit thing - I bet my kids would love that!!! It would be like a personal chocolate fondue!!

My children like to do this with clementines, means they eat 3or 4 each!

Prudent

I find it possible to buy healthy food and be money saving by shopping at the time the 'reduce to clears' are done in my local morrisons.

All but four items off my whole trolley were reduced. here's some of the top of my head:

3 punnets organic peaches @39p each (going to make peach crumble with one)

3 punnets organic strawberries @ 29 p each

2 packets cold cooked chicken @ 20 p each/ 2 packets chicken tikka at same

4 PJ smoothies @ 20p each

3 cartons organic milk @10p each

5 packets cheddar @ 20 p each plus Red Leicester at same

Also bought loads of nice reduced rolls to make up with chicken and cheese to freeze.

Perhaps though I shouldn't mention the large bags of Indian meals @99p each or the chocolate coated doughnuts @ 20p a pack ....

frosty

Thanks taurusgb,for sharing some good ideas,I think I will try your ham idea.For sandwich fillings I always make sure I have them ready made in the fridge ,if you have teenagers in the house you will know how they like to open the fridge and just eat what is to hand,so I always have tuna and salad cream,egg and salad cream,grated cheese,homemade coleslaw,thinly sliced chicken breast(I only buy when on bogof)and a selection of salad stuff.Serving fruit with melted chocolate sounds very nice.

Prudent

That is a really good idea Frosty. Maybe it would stop my daughter going for the crisps so much, as she is always looking for something instant.