Do you eat the same foods all the time?

Do you always cook foods the same way?

 

I remember my mother-in-law making the same meals every week. Sunday was a traditional roast. Monday was the left-over meat from Sunday, cold with mash and pickles. Friday was always fish, and there was a sausage day in there somewhere as well. I always found this funny, as did my 2 daughters!

My mother in law was quite a bit older than my mother and it just goes to show how things change over the years. We have so many different foods available to us now.

We need many different nutrients to nourish our body and eating a varied diet will definitely help with this.

But it is easy to stick to the same foods and recipes all the time.

Play/experiment with you food.

By preparing food differently you may find that you are eating foods that you thought you didn’t even like.

Red and yellow peppers taste totally different when eaten raw to when eaten cooked.

Try cooking peppers in the oven on a baking tray with other veg. Serve up with some feta cheese and a drizzle of garlic infused olive oil. Ummmm.

…and when raw, slice up and dip in houmas or add to a salad.

I find cauliflower an uninteresting taste when steamed (unless it’s covered in cheese and baked). But have you tried eating that raw?

How about grated and stir fried with other veg? It looks (and can be mistaken for) special fried rice…honestly…I made it for my brother and he didn’t know the difference.

 

If you usually break it up into florets, try slicing the whole cauli instead and adding it to an omelette with tomatoes and some cooked chicken or ham. Gives it a totally different taste.

Do you like mash potato? Have you ever thought about mashing other root veg? Swede I expect? From school? Now remove the thought of school dinners from your head and think instead about posh mash.

Celeriac and potatoes with a spoonful of wholegrain mustard; lovely: 0)

Or add carrots to your potatoes to give an interesting colour combination, flavour and also a way to get more veg into your diet.

Houmous can be made with other beans, not just chick peas. Try mashing down butter beans or cannellini and experimenting with different herbs and spices.

 What about

• Veg you usually cook…try it raw. Courgettes are so much nicer raw! I use them instead of cucumber in a salad

 

• Cooling cooked foods before you eat them – I have only started eating fish in the last year (to increase my protein intake and Omega 3 fatty acids). I thought I didn’t like salmon, but it tasted differently after I had cooked it and left it to go cold.

 

• Add veg in with the meat of your bolognaise, lasagne, shepherd/cottage pie meat. Grating carrots, adding tinned legumes, diced veg can be easily added to bulk out the meat and it’s also a great way of getting the children to eat more veg as well – most of the time they won’t even notice you’ve sneaked some veg in there!

 

Lots of interesting replacements you can make with lots of different foods, recipes and meal. But I shall leave it there and let you experiment. Let me know what you come up with :0) I would love to hear what you have done differently, let me know on my facebook page

Penny x