So as you know, a while back in May I made a post about appreciating my body and changing my life. For those of you who missed it, you might want to check it out so that this post makes sense to you. Since a lot of you seemed to really like that article about how I was making a lot of health changes and really feeling positive about it, giving me energy and a much happier outlook on life, I thought it was about time that I shared some of my favourite healthy snacks with you.
These are some of the easiest and quickest food options for me as I am pretty lazy when it comes to food. I don’t enjoy cooking, neither can I actually cook (without ruining everything anyway), I’m more into seasoning and making sure things are flavoured as best as can be. So, what you can definitely be assured about for this is that each of these little recipes take less than 5 minutes each! Just the way I like it!
Fresh Vegetable & Fruit Juice
So one thing that my mum and I invested in a few months ago was a Nutri-Bullet. We had been seeing on the TV just how quickly and easily it chops up and blends fruit and vegetables, making it a really easy way to get your nutrients. It was quite pricey, but we managed to get it on installments and it’s definitely been worth it! You literally just throw in your fruit and vegetables, roughly chopped, add water, then blend it and it takes about 30 seconds, depending on what you have in there. You can even put nuts and lentils in there too!
My favourite drink to make to make sure I’m getting my nutrients is a mixture of carrot, cucumber and kale for vegetables and raspberries, blackberries and grapes for fruit. The kale gives me iron, the carrot gives me vitamin A, the cucumber has hydration and then the fruits are a good source of vitamin C.
You can make anything you want to and I have experimented with different variations. I tried broccoli in there and it was the worst thing I had drank, the same with beetroot, so I don’t recommend those two! I only make sure I use berry type of fruits though as the citrus and sticky fruits, despite having amazing flavour, are not that good for my skin. They tend to give me a break out. I try to have one of these juices a day, but sometimes I do miss out, but they really do give me energy and health!
Porridge With Soya Milk & Raw Honey
Before you think this is gross and skip by, you might want to read it. I had never been a fan of porridge, the only way I would eat it was if I had put loads of sugar in it to make it sweet, but by doing this, it really ruined the point of eating something healthy.
I’m lactose intolerant as most of you know, so I have to have soya milk with my porridge. I love the organic plain version the most for my porridge as the consistency of it is great and the fact that it’s organic is helpful too. I don’t like drinking it on its own though as it has a weird texture and taste, I only use it for porridge. The important part for me is taste so just using the soya milk in my porridge alone is really not palatable, it makes me feel quite sick, so that’s when I found out about adding in honey.
The runny honey that you get in those bear jars is really no good, it’s lost all of the nutritional benefits and it’s full of sugar and additives, so the honey I am talking about is raw. You can find it in organic health shops or online, but it’s directly from the bee hive. It’s not had anything done to it, nothing added, nothing taken away, it’s pure and raw and this is why it’s so good for you. Raw honey has anti inflammatory properties and healing agents so it’s really good at making you feel better if you are sick too. What I do is I put a spoonful (equal to 2 tea spoons) of raw honey into my porridge and mix it in until it melts. This really sweetens it up and makes it taste really good, like a natural sugar, then I put a couple of pieces of fruit on top.
I usually have this for supper as I get hungry at night time. Not only is porridge a low GI food which releases your energy slowly, keeping your blood sugars balanced, it’s also really low in calories. For my bowl of porridge with soya milk and honey, it’s less than 150 calories. It also keeps you full for a long time!
Frozen Fruit Raspberry Sorbet
If you follow me on Instagram (@LornaRaindrops) or you have read my blog for a long time, you will know how much sorbet is a weakness of mine. If there’s sorbet on a desert menu then I have to have it. Being lactose intolerant means I can’t have ice-cream, lucky for me I don’t like it anyway, so sorbet plays a huge part in my life! I know the sorbet you buy is filled with so much sugar and other bad things though to give it that sweet flavour and chewy consistency, so that’s where I came up with the idea of making my own. It was my mum that suggested it actually.
I didn’t know that you could also use the Nutri-Bullet for frozen fruit too! What I do now is I throw in a handful of frozen raspberries and then I add in some Innocent raspberry and apple juice, to give it a bit of flavour and water. The fruit alone, when blended, just ends up getting chopped and going like crushed ice, so you need to add some type of juice or water to it to make sure it blends into a frozen yoghurt type of texture. I use the Innocent juice purely because it’s just fruit and nothing more, they don’t add sugar, they never use concentrated fruit etc, just pure fruit. It does take a while to blend it up and you do have to stop a few times to shake it up and mix it, but once it’s done, it comes out just like a softer version of sorbet! I usually top it off with some frozen berries too! I will say though that it is a bit sour, and the seeds do make it a bit crunchy, but for a healthy version of sorbet which is actually good for you, I love it. I’m good with sour fruits and flavours anyway as I’ve always liked them, so it’s no bother to me that there’s no sugar to sweeten the bitterness.
So these are my 3 very quick and easy snack recipes which I love and live off at the moment. Sometimes I do accidentally break from my healthy eating lifestyle and at certain times of the month I will give into a little bit of chocolate, regret it after when I get stomach ache and a sticky feeling face, and then try and get back on track, so I’m in no way saying that I’m perfect and trying to be healthy is easy when there’s so much temptation around, but as long as you stick to eating nutrients and getting your fruit and vegetables in, as well as your whole grains (not refined grains like white bread, rice and pasta) you will be good to go.
I learned a lot this year in terms of what your body needs to run perfectly and function at its best and that is nutrients and fuel. When you eat empty calories in the form of food with no nutritional value, you might as well not eat it. It has nothing in it to fuel your muscles and make your body work, it just fills your stomach to stop the hunger, so essentially by eating junk food all of the time, you are starving yourself and your brain wont function at its best, neither will your muscles and you will feel tired and sad.
I never had a really bad diet before, but I definitely felt those effects by not eating as well as I could have been. I eat a lot of wholegrain rice and bread, chicken, vegetables, salads, plain natural soya yoghurt, fruits, eggs, tuna etc. Everything to make sure I get my proteins and complex carbs, but I do allow myself to sometimes have a little snack that might be not that good for you. Otherwise I have one of those mentalities where I crave what I can’t have and it makes it worse for me.
I also do some lighter exercises now, I used to struggle a lot a long while ago, but now my health has improved over the years from the things I was suffering with and I’ve improved my diet, I am able to do some exercises. These include squats, tummy exercises, arm lifts and various gentle things. I also have an exercise bike that I love since it’s easier on my joints and doesn’t hurt my hips and knees. I included the photo below to show how much my body has changed since March. I’ve lost a small bit of weight, just a few pounds, but the main thing is the way my body has changed shape. My muscles are more lean and defined now. I do plan on doing another one of these posts with other healthy ideas and lifestyle choices, maybe in a month or two, so I hope you enjoy this one! Please do let me know what you think!
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you look amazing. I also eat oatmeal in the mornings too.
Author
Thank you so much!
u look great..quite inspiring….look forward to your upcoming posts…
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Thank you!
Look so delicious!
Author
Glad you think so!
You look amazing right and I agree beetroot is not exactly tasty 😉 Your blend however looks yummy! http://kjandersen.org/
Author
Thank you 🙂 That one does taste good!
Tried with spinach in the past, that is not yummy at all hihi.
Author
Ha ha, just spinach on its own? I think for me broccoli was the worst!
Ohh that’s very inspiring and these snacks look delicious! 😀
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xoxo,
Jess
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Thanks 🙂
amazing post, thanks for the infos!
kisses Gi.
new post
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Thank you!
Yummy!!
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Author
Glad you like it!
The bullet, yes, that is so handy for healthy eating. Great post and fantastic shot of you at the end. You do look so healthy and lovely. xoxo
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Author
It’s really good isn’t it? Thank you!
Yummy!
Have an energetic Friday 🙂
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Thanks 🙂
Beautiful pictures!! I love to try new things with food. Check out my blog, i have some dishes that are really good, and some dessert of course without sugar, healthy, good and tastfull:) Have a lovely Friday!!:)
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Author
Thank you, I will check out yours too!
You look great and I love the recipes in this post! Thanks for sharing!
Much love xxx
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Thank you!
Great receps They look so tasty and healthy 🙂
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Thanks!
Aw look so yummy! Great recipes!
xx
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Thank you!
It looks so yummy and healthy 🙂
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Thanks 🙂
Like your post ^^ XoxPK
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Thank you!
Great post as always. I recently picked up a new mini blender too and am loving it. I used to make smoothies every morning for breakfast and I had strayed away from that for a while for some reason but now I feel back on track.
I know that I wouldn’t mind seeing more recipes on your blog- if you were looking for feedback.
Thanks for sharing!
Author
Smoothies are amazing! I love them! And thank you, that’s good to know actually!
I love fruits and vegetables ^^
Kisses
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Me too!
Wow, amazing recipe, dear, thanks for sharing!
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No problem!
and OMG! it all looks so healthy! nice post! have a great weekend dear 🙂
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Thank you 🙂 You too!
Amazing post full of inspiration 😉
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Thanks 🙂
Actually whole grain is not that healthy. They are baby plants and the plant doesn’t like it when somebody eats their babies so they are packed full with toxins and anti-nutritions. Fruits and vegetables on the other hand are healthy because plants want you to eat them to spread their offspring.
Author
By whole grains or whole wheat it means unprocessed and unrefined, so brown bread with seeds in it over white bread which has no nutritional value since it has been processed. I’m not sure what you are referring to with baby grains as I’ve never heard this before? I’m simply talking about the more natural breads and rices which are not white. Everyone says to eat them and so many scientific studies have been done on them to prove they are good for you. I don’t have any toxins and I’ve been eating them almost my whole life 🙂 good luck with your healthy eating though 🙂
Grains are seeds. A seed contains an embryonic plant, so it´s a baby plant (literally). Obviously the seed does not want to be eaten, so it has several ways to protect itself. First is mechanical protection with a hard outer covering. But that’s not all. Seeds contain toxins to harm animals, who want to eat them like anti-nutrients, lectins, gluten, and phytates.
For example, brown rice is full of phytates and lectins, which bind to vitamins and minerals and prevent them from being absorbed. White rice does not contain them, so actually white rice is more healthy than brown rice.
There are many food myths out there and “whole grain is healthy” is one of them. Others are saturated fats are bad, unsaturated fats are healthy or cholesterol is bad.
Author
I Googled what you were saying and found a little bit of information on it, but they definitely don’t make me ill. I’ve eaten them almost my whole life and I’m really healthy, I never have any trouble digesting them or anything like that and I don’t get sick eating them or vitamin deficient, so I’m fine. Maybe it’s only towards animals or other creatures, the human digestive system is really strong. I still don’t think white rice is healthy for you, it has no nutritional value what so ever. It’s stripped of all its nutrients so it’s pointless, it also spikes your blood sugars.
And I don’t understand the last part, are you saying saturated fats are good for you? Because they definitely aren’t. There are many fats that are good for you, from omega 3 fish, avocado, olives etc and those are beneficial, but the saturated types in fatty foods are not good for you. They clog your arteries if eaten too much. Cholesterol has good and bad parts, you get the bad cholesterol which is what you need to lower, but you also have the good cholesterol in your blood too. I’m aware there are different types of cholesterol and not all of it is bad.
Those look great! I’ll have to try adding some kale next time I make smoothies – I usually just stick to fruits because I don’t like a lot of the green juices but your recipe seems to have plenty of fruit in it too!
Author
It’s definitely a great way to get extra nutrients without tasting it!