It’s been all over the news – new research suggests that eating lots (and lots and lots) of fruit and vegetables may give us longer lives. But with concern that this type of diet is unaffordable and struggling with the thought of eating so many vegetables, I challenged myself to eat 10 portions per day for a week to see how difficult it would really be. Here's what I found out
- There are ways to make it cheaper.
At first, I assumed my grocery bills would skyrocket, so I was pleasantly surprised that plenty of everyday, budget items can count towards your daily total. Having clued up on cheap ways to eat more fruit and veg and written a shopping list to avoid impulse purchases, I stocked up on some thrifty essentials – supermarket own-brand cans of chopped tomatoes, tomato puree, dried lentils and chickpeas, dried fruit, sweet potatoes and seasonal veg that was on offer. The resulting bill was comparable to what I’d usually spend on a weekly shop, although I do acknowledge that I probably spend more than average as I work in food.
- Frozen fruit and veg are your friend.
Like many people, a lengthy commute means I don’t have time to go shopping more than twice a week at the most, and I don’t have a massive fridge. So knowing that frozen fruit and vegetables are just as healthy as their fresh counterparts made my shopping a whole lot more manageable. I gleefully stashed away frozen beans, peas, sweetcorn, chopped spinach, blueberries, raspberries – name a food and it’s probably hidden somewhere in my freezer right now
- I had less of an appetite for sugary snacks.
Perhaps it was the sheer volume of food that I was eating, but I didn’t feel the need to pick in between meals as much. When I did, I tried to get more nutritional bang for my buck and fit in an extra portion where possible. 10-a-day friendly snacks included fresh fruit and yogurt, or carrot and cucumber sticks with houmous. Truth be told, after eating all that, I didn't want another morsel (although I did eat some chocolate – I’m only human).
- I ended up trying out new recipes that I wouldn’t have eaten otherwise.
Trust me, once you’ve invested in a whole kitchen full of perishable food, the last thing you want to do is throw any of it away. This put a bit of healthy pressure on me to a) come up with ways to actually cook and consume all of it, and b) to stick to my plan, and not give up and order pizza (because although tomatoes count, cheese sadly does not). The last thing that I wanted was to get stuck in a rut of repetitive meals, so I made the effort to come up with a list of recipes to try out during the week
- It takes a bit of forward planning.
It wasn’t the volume of fruit and vegetables that was the tricky part of the challenge, it was making sure that I got enough variety every day. If I’d already eaten one portion of, say, tomatoes for lunch, eating another portion at dinner wouldn’t count – meaning that I couldn’t just eat six apples and eight spears of broccoli and call it a day. Armed with my trusty colour-coded 5-a-day infographic, I set about creating a plan to ensure I was eating the entire spectrum each day – a true rainbow diet. This week also coincided with Pancake Day, so it was fun trying to think of ways to squeeze extra portions into my pancakes. I ended up making fajita-inspired crêpes filled with chipotle chicken, peppers, onions, mushrooms, tomato salsa and avocado, followed by fluffy American pancakes topped with strawberries, blackberries, grapes, pomegranate seeds and a sauce made from frozen blueberries, a squeeze of lime juice and a little bit of honey. Quite the feast!
- You have to limit fruit and smoothies (sad, but true).
When I first decided to try out this challenge, I thought it would be a breeze – I could just whizz up loads of fresh fruit into a litre of a delicious smoothie and have consumed all my portions before midday, right? Wrong. The NHS says that smoothies and fruit juice can only count as one portion, due to the sugar that they contain. It’s also worth noting they recommend that the majority of your portions come from vegetables, not fruit – sugar is still sugar, even if it’s natural sugar. Boo.
- I had to think of exciting (yet healthy) ways to add extra flavour.
Don’t get me wrong, I love the taste of vegetables – but there’s only so much steamed broccoli and cauliflower that you can eat before you want something different. Reluctant to smother my carefully prepared vegetables in sugary and salty condiments like ketchup or soy sauce, I made sure to add plenty of all-natural flavourings – including fresh garlic and ginger, miso paste, spices like smoked paprika, chilli and cumin, and my favourite herbs, such as basil, rosemary and sage.
- I didn’t lose any weight.
The challenge was a good reminder that eating well doesn’t necessarily mean cutting calories. It was only a week, and I wasn’t limiting my food intake in any way – just adding lots and lots of vegetables – so I didn't lose any weight. While lots of fruit and vegetables are low in calories, some of them are quite high – avocado, bananas and sweet potatoes being just a few. They’re also nutritious, but won’t necessarily equate to pounds lost just because you’re eating them instead of other snacks. (Plus, I really love dishes like cauliflower cheese and fried aubergine parmigiana, which simultaneously count towards your portion total and double your fat and salt intake for the day – but they’re so worth it).
- You can go out to eat and still reach your target.
Unlike following a restrictive diet or a prescribed meal plan, which can make socialising difficult, it’s relatively easy to eat out and stick to 10-a-day, providing that the restaurant has enough plant-based options. Vegetable-heavy cuisines such as Indian, Thai, Chinese and Italian are likely to contribute to your daily quota, although it's more difficult to count how many portions you’ve eaten when you’re not preparing the food yourself.
- I naturally ate less meat and grains.
Normally I base my meals around meat, fish or some kind of carb – whether that’s pasta, rice or bread. Now that I was planning my veggies first, I found myself switching to plant-based protein such as lentils and chickpeas, and swapping side dishes for cauliflower rice or sweet potatoes in order to tick off another portion. Although I still included all my usual choices and wasn’t purposely trying to cut down on them, making these swaps helped me to get more variety into my meals, which made me more satisfied overall.
- I felt really positive about making healthy choices.
Overall, I’m really glad that I did the challenge. As someone who struggles with restrictive diets this was great for me, as it was about including more rather than eating less, which made me feel really positive. Trying to come up with creative ways to reach my daily tally was fun and made me discover delicious new vegetable-packed dishes that I otherwise wouldn’t have tried. Although I won’t be strictly counting to 10 portions every day from now on, I think it’s a great number to aim for, and I will continue to base my meals and snacks around fruit and vegetables where possible.
Some recipes to get you started...
Five-a-day tagine
Five-a-day couscous
Five-a-day burger
Spanish meatball & butter bean stew
Minty roast veg & houmous salad
More recipes that contain lots of fruit & veg
新聞によれば、果物や野菜をたくさん食べれば、もっと長生きするかもしれないという新しい研究があります。しかし、このタイプのダイエットは手が足りず、たくさんの野菜を食べるという考えに苦しんでいるので、1週間に1日10部分を食べて、本当に難しいかどうかを確認しました。ここに私が知ったことがあります
1.それを安くする方法があります。
最初は、食料品の請求書が急騰すると思っていたので、日々の予算の項目をたくさん集めることができれば、私はうれしく思いました。もっと多くの果物や野菜を食べるための安い方法を手がかりにして、衝動買いを避けるための買い物リストを書いて、トマト、トマトピューレ、乾燥したレンズ豆とひよこのスーパーマーケット自身のブランドの缶、サツマイモと提供されていた季節のveg。結果として得られる法案は、私が食料の仕事をしているうちに平均以上のものを費やしているとは認めていますが、通常は週に1回のショップで費やすものに匹敵します。
2.冷凍フルーツと野菜はあなたの友人です。
多くの人と同様に、通勤時間が長いということは、一週間に2回以上買い物する時間がないことを意味し、私は大型の冷蔵庫を持っていません。だから、凍結した果物や野菜は新鮮な果物と同じくらい健康的であることを知っているので、私の買い物はずっと扱いやすくなりました。私は凍った豆、エンドウ豆、スィートコーン、ホウレンソウ、ブルーベリー、ラズベリーをひっそりと隠していました。これはおそらく私の冷凍庫のどこかに隠されています
3.私は甘いスナックの食欲が少なかった。
おそらく、私が食べていたのは膨大な量の食べ物だったかもしれませんが、私は食べ物と食事の間に入る必要はないと感じました。私がやったとき、私は自分の仕事のためにより多くの栄養価を得ようと努力し、できるだけ余分に収まるようにしました。新鮮なフルーツとヨーグルト、またはハムとニンジンとキュウリのスティックを含む10日間のフレンドリースナック。真実は、すべてのものを食べた後、私は別の小便を望んでいない（私はチョコレートを食べましたが、私は人間だけです）と言われました。
4.私は別の方法で食べたことのない新しいレシピを試してみました。
私を信じて、腐敗しやすい食物でいっぱいのキッチン全体に投資したら、最後にやりたいことは、それを投げ捨てることです。これは、私に健康的な圧力をかけるために、実際にはすべてを調理して消費する方法を考え出し、（b）私の計画に固執し、ピザをあきらめたり注文したりしないでください（トマトは数えますが、ない）。私が最後に望んだのは、繰り返し食べ物を食べることだったので、今週中に試してみるレシピのリストを思いついた。
5.それは少し前向きな計画が必要です。
挑戦の難しい部分であったのは果物や野菜の量ではなく、毎日十分な種類があることを確認していました。もし私がすでにトマトの一部を昼食に食べていたら、夕食時に別の部分を食べることはできません。つまり、リンゴ6本とブロッコリー8本を食べて1日と呼ぶことはできません。私の信頼できる色分けされた5日間のインフォグラフィックで武装して、私は毎日、本当の虹の食事であるスペクトル全体を食べる計画を立てました。今週はパンケーキデーと同じだったので、余分な部分を私のパンケーキに絞る方法を考えるのは面白かったです。私は、チョコレート、ピーマン、タマネギ、キノコ、トマトサルサ、アボカド、そしてイチゴ、ブラックベリー、ブドウ、ザクロの種子、冷凍ブルーベリーのソースを入れたふわふわのアメリカンパンケーキを詰め込んだファジータ風のクレープを作りました。ライムジュースと少しの蜂蜜。かなりの饗宴！
あなたはフルーツとスムージーを制限しなければならない（悲しい、しかし真実）。
私が最初にこの挑戦を試してみることにしましたときに、私はそれが風だろうと思った - 私は右、ちょうどおいしいスムージーのリットル中に新鮮な果物の負荷を達人ができ、正午前にすべての私の部分を消費していますか？違う。 NHSはスムージーやフルーツジュースをのみ、それらが含まれる糖に、一つの部分として数えることができると述べています。それはまた、彼らはあなたの部分の大半は野菜、果物ではないから来ることをお勧めしますは注目に値します - 砂糖はそれが自然な砂糖だ場合でも、まだ砂糖です。ブー。
7.私は余分な風味を加えるエキサイティングな（しかし健康的な）方法を考えなければならなかった。
誤解しないで、私は野菜の味が大好きです - しかし、あなたは、あなたが別の何かをしたいの前に食べることができるだけでそんなに蒸しブロッコリーとカリフラワーがあります。新鮮なニンニクと生姜、味噌、スモークパプリカ、唐辛子とクミンなどのスパイス、そして私を含め - ケチャップや醤油のような甘いと塩味の調味料で私慎重に作成した野菜をもみ消すことに消極的、私はすべて天然香料の多くを追加することを確認しましたバジル、ローズマリー、セージなどの好きなハーブ。