What Do You Have For Dinner?

maman

Obviously salt content is important but it depends on how much processed food you're eating each day and throughout the week. Definitely best not too add to veg or at the table. It is good advice to ask the GP to be on the safe side.


What about veggie chilli or veggie curry? Things like pulses (chick peas, red beans) are good way of having cheap protein. What about omelettes or good old egg, chips and beans! I use an oil spray to keep fat to a minimum in my cooking.

Goldiegirl

I eat a low salt diet due to a medical condition(not high blood pressure), so I'm used to all this - my husband calls me the 'salt police'!

In view of me being the salt police, I'd just mention that baked beans are also something to be careful of - even the reduced salt tins are still quite high in salt.

But baked beans are very easy to prepare yourself. There's loads of recipes online. Basically, it's a tin of cannellini or haricot beans with passata, chopped onion and a few herbs and is very tasty.

chirpychick

wow thank you.

I was looking at the colour coded thing on the tesco website which put them as amber so i thought 2.5 wouldnt be too bad and i guess not if he's not consumed much during the day but I didn't realise in context how high in salt they actually were.

He has cut back dramatically on bread, prior to the high blood pressure he was having between 6-8 slices a day :shocked:
but now he has cut that in half, though we just got back from a trip away with the inlaws and now thats over i'll be looking into alternative options to sandwiches for his lunch as well to cut it back even more.

Everything we have been eating since my son arrived has been easy food. Our lives are so busy. But because of this we have both put on a ton of weight aswell hence coming on here to seek out ideas for cook from scratch meals for our menu plan.

I admit to feeling quite overwhelmed by it all.
My LO has such a healthy diet and is not overweight at all despite his aversion to veggies he does love fruit but i also want to get more veggies in him and have seen people blend them up and add them to sauces etc so I will give that a good go too.

I have never been taught to cook so it's all completely new to me but am very determined for us all to eat much more healthy and from what I can gather cheaper too.

We do have a market but not that cheap unless i go right before closing.

The greengrocer's shut down recently too.

peachyprice

You can make a decent spag bol with very little meat.

I only use 250g mince to serve 6, I use 1 carton passata, one tin toms, 2 onions, few mushrooms and some garlic. You can reduce the meat even further by adding grated carrots. The trick is to cook it on low for a long time so you get a nice rich flavour from the toms. I usually leave it to cook for 3 hours.

I usually serve it as spag bol for 3 and then the rest made into cannelloni/lasagne for 3. You can make the white sauce for lasagne/cannelloni without cheese, just put a little grated on the top when it goes in the oven.

Nobody even noticed when I reduced the mince down from 500g, it was just as tasty, just more saucy, which is actually nicer. Oooh I really fancy it now!

Grimbal

peachyprice wrote: »

You can make a decent spag bol with very little meat.
You can reduce the meat even further by adding grated carrots. The trick is to cook it on low for a long time so you get a nice rich flavour from the toms. I usually leave it to cook for 3 hours.
!

I've also added in Quorn/soya mince to beef mince & no one noticed either

Goldiegirl

On the subject of bread, something to consider, when the money situation is better, is a bread maker.

I make my own bread in my bread maker. Some salt is essential for making bread, but I use Lo-salt, so it keeps the levels down.

A second hand bread maker can be picked up at a reasonable price on the eBay.

On the dinner front, another thing to consider could be veggie burgers, made with whatever veg you fancy. Again, look online for recipes. I just leave out any added salt.

I like to experiment with herbs and spices for seasoning. A low salt diet doesn't have to be bland.

I actually enjoy my low salt diet. I must admit I'd sometimes kill for a bacon sandwich, but with my medical condition, it's really unwise eat highly salted items, so I don't risk it.

But apart from that, I've never eaten better, and feel really good.

Good luck - it can be a bit overwhelming at first, but it gets to be second nature in the end.

splishsplash

Goldiegirl wrote: »

I eat a low salt diet due to a medical condition(not high blood pressure), so I'm used to all this - my husband calls me the 'salt police'!

In view of me being the salt police, I'd just mention that baked beans are also something to be careful of - even the reduced salt tins are still quite high in salt.

But baked beans are very easy to prepare yourself. There's loads of recipes online. Basically, it's a tin of cannellini or haricot beans with passata, chopped onion and a few herbs and is very tasty.

Start checking labels - products vary hugely in salt content from one place to the next. I think Aldi's passata has almost twice the salt content of Lidl's passata, so it pays to look.

hatful-of-hollow

peachyprice wrote: »

You can make a decent spag bol with very little meat.

I only use 250g mince to serve 6, I use 1 carton passata, one tin toms, 2 onions, few mushrooms and some garlic. You can reduce the meat even further by adding grated carrots. The trick is to cook it on low for a long time so you get a nice rich flavour from the toms. I usually leave it to cook for 3 hours.

I do this and sometimes throw in a tin of green lentils, which makes it go much further again...

Goldiegirl

splishsplash wrote: »

Start checking labels - products vary hugely in salt content from one place to the next. I think Aldi's passata has almost twice the salt content of Lidl's passata, so it pays to look.

I check labels religiously...... I can home in on the salt content in seconds!:rotfl:

Lizling

Something I've been doing recently is making my own wraps and pittas. No salt at all in them and they're really easy. Might be a handy thing to do if he needs low-salt packed lunches.