Healthy letters of the alphabet

...in which I discuss healthy As and Bs

It's not as boring as it sounds, honest.

On Slimming World's Extra Easy plan you are allowed 1 "healthy extra A" and 1 "healthy extra B" per day. (You may have noticed that most days so far I've had a wholemeal roll as my healthy b with bacon and tomatoes, because bacon is awesome and it's a free food as long as it's lean, you cut the fat off and either grill it or fry it in frylight). 

On some of the other plans you're allowed more than 1 of each per day, but then there are more restrictions on meat and that's not going to happen.

The healthy A is generally something that involves calcium (milk, cheese etc); since I always use this for milk I rarely eat cheese any more, which is one of the only things I miss eating because cheese makes everything better (except possibly chocolate cake, and even then it's debatable). 

I could have cheese and apply syns to it, but then I'd have to drink less wine at the weekend (so it's my choice to go without cheese - it doesn't matter what diet you're on, there are always going to be choices like this, and Slimming World is very upfront about the fact that you will not lose weight if you don't change how you're eating).

Healthy extra B foods contain fibre; e.g. crispbread, wholemeal bread, cereals, nuts. A tablespoon of extra virgin olive oil can also count as your healthy B, which I did not know until just now when I looked up some examples.

Foods that count as healthy As/Bs have a syn value if you don't use them as a healthy extra or have more of them (e.g. if you've had a wholemeal roll as your healthy b and then have another the second one has 6 - 8 syns in it, depending on the brand, or if you've had your milk allowance for the day and then have cheese you have to count the cheese as syns).

Healthy As and Bs are the only items you need to specifically measure on the Extra Easy plan, and it's really not that bad to get a measuring jug and put 250ml of milk in it each morning (350ml for skimmed and I usually allow 300ml of 1% milk); weighing out cereal is more tedious, but you can get things like this cereal scoop, which lets you easily measure it out. 

Personally I usually stick to things that I can count, like crispbread and bread rolls, because it's easier, so I will either have a wholemeal roll with bacon and tomatoes (because bacon is awesome. Yes, I know I said that already, but it's worth repeating), or 4 crispbreads with Marmite and some pickled onions (pickled onions are superfree and have largely replaced crisps as my snack of choice; Marmite is free. If you don't like Marmite, there are probably other options).

However, tonight I think I will try "overnight oats", which is 35g of porridge oats stirred into a mullerlight and left overnight and used for breakfast (I'll probably add fruit) - the 35g of porridge oats counts as a healthy b.

If you're a Slimming World member, you may have noticed that there are 2 options for "healthy B" when using Ryvita - one is 2 slices and one is 4. I am told that the 2 slice option is the "speed" choice (more on speed and superspeed tomorrow). 

Friday 6th June

Breakfast

Apple, satsuma, pear (Yes, I know, I've had the same thing most days. I really like fruit, plus all 3 of these are classified as "speed" (very low calories for their type of food)).

Morning Snack

4 Rye Crispbread (from Aldi's - Healthy Extra B) with Marmite

Lunch

Pasta salad (onions & mushrooms stir fried in frylight with chopped garlic & crushed chilli peppers, mixed with a chopped tomato and 2 slices of wafer-thin cooked chicken and all stirred into cooked pasta. This would be nicer with a red pepper instead of the red onion, but it was OK), and a pear.

Dinner

Sirloin steak (fat removed), fried in frylight with fried onions and mushrooms and spicy potato wedges (0.75 syns for the mushrooms because they're cooked with a Laughing Cow Light blue cheese triangle, 1.5 syns, shared between 2 people).

Evening snacks/drinks

Mullerlight (strawberry)

750ml Red Wine  (27 Syns)
200ml Rosé Wine (7 Syns)

34 Syns today. Oops! (But I've had very few syns for most of the rest of the week, so I'm not over my Syns limit - this is how I choose to use my syns for the week, but you can have a little treat each day instead; I would think for most people that's a better option).

Exercise

Exercise bike - 15 minutes