Serves: 4
Syns: FREE
Time Taken: less than 30 minutes
Difficulty: Easy
Caribbean Rice Salad
Cook the rice, drain and rinse under cold running water.
Mix the rice and all the ingredients together in a large bowl and season to taste.
Smoothies are not something I usually have, if ever. I made one the other day as my daughter really wanted one for Suhoor (pre dawn meal in Ramadan) and thought I would do myself one too. To be fair I don’t think I would make them again for a couple of reasons: 1) it took me a while to work out syn values for all the fruit I was going to use! I wanted to keep it as low as syns as possible. Fruits are a Free Food if you follow Slimming World but only when eaten whole, so if blending you have to count the syns accordingly. 2) It did not fill me up, I need proper food! Smoothies are fine as a drink but I would personally rather use my syns on something other than blended fruit and I am quite happy drinking Free drinks.
But if you are partial to smoothies, why not give this one a go and let me know what you think! If you make any other low syn smoothies do share what you have.
Serves: 1
Syns: 5
Time Taken: less than 5 minutes, if you don’t include time taken working out syn values!
Difficulty: Easy
Smoothie
Place all ingredients in a blender and blitz! Enjoy 🙂
Some people eat breakfast whilst others cannot eat anything first thing in the morning, not me though! I can eat anytime! Breakfast is one of my favourite meals of the day, having a good breakfast sets me up for the rest of the day. I do find on the days I just grab a piece of fruit or have nothing to eat because I am in a rush, those are the days I tend to go overboard with my syns.
If you don’t enjoy eating breakfast, you don’t have to force yourself to eat it. Maybe just grabbing a piece of fruit may be enough for you.
My breakfast tends to be the same most days. If you follow me on Instagram, you may have seen that the majority of the time my breakfast consists of half a pot of Alpro Plain with Coconut ‘yogurt’ mixed with 1tbsp of sweetener, layered with crushed Weetabix and fruit. Raspberries are my favourite fruit for this breakfast, sometimes I add chopped mango or kiwi and drizzle some passion fruit on top. This is my all time favourite breakfast! I have recently started having chocolate Weetabix and oh em gee it is soooo good. You can have the chocolate Weetabix as a healthy extra B choice which is a bonus! But I tend to just syn my breakfast and use my healthy extra B choice later on in the day on Slimming World hifi bars. You can prepare this breakfast the night before as you do with overnight oats or make it in the morning.
Alpro with Weetabix
I do love overnight oats but don’t make it as often as I don’t like to use my healthy extra B choice first thing in the morning! If I do overnight Weetabix that is fine for me as I only ever use 1 Weetabix which is half a B choice or just 3 syns each for the plain Weetabix.
If I have the time, I do enjoy a Slimming Word friendly cooked breakfast. I have fried eggs, beans, mushrooms, tomatoes and vegetarian sausages. This is a great way of saving your healthy extra B choice for later in the day and it is a completely FREE breakfast depending on what type of sausages you use.
Another breakfast that I enjoy eating is scrambled eggs! Get the recipe for perfectly scrambled eggs every time here
Scrambled eggs with mushrooms & beans
Eggs are just good in any way really, I do always have boiled eggs ready in the fridge to snack on throughout the day or breakfasts when I am in a rush.
On the odd occasions I do have porridge – sometimes just cooked simply in half water half milk mixture and topped with fruit or I do baked oats. Recipe here for baked oats. Bear in mind not all porridge sachets can be used as a healthy extra B choice, do check your food optimising book or the Slimming World app for all the up to date healthy extras. This one below is a B choice and it is lovely.
Big Bowl Porridge
What is your favourite breakfast? Do share in the comments below what you enjoy eating for breakfast.
I fancied something different for breakfast this morning so made French toast and it was ready in less than 15 minutes. This is such an easy recipe (like most of my other recipes). You can also add a couple of tablespoons of milk from your allowance if you wish but I don’t bother. I served it some speedy raspberries and strawberries and also added a dollop of my favourite Alpro Plain with Coconut yogurt. It was simply divine!
Serves: 1
Syns: 1 plus Healthy Extra B choice
Time Taken: 10 minutes
Difficulty: Easy
French Toast with Berries
Mix together the egg with the sweetener, vanilla and cinnamon if using. Place the egg mixture on a shallow plate.
Dip the bread in the egg mixture and let it soak up all the mixture for a couple of minutes.
Spray a low calorie cooking spray on a frying pan and place the eggy bread on it. Cook for about 4 minutes on each side.
I don’t tend to stick to one supermarket when shopping but one of my favourite has to be Asda. I am more likely to pick up what I use most in an Asda rather than any other supermarket, so it is always my first choice followed by Aldi then Tesco!
I went to Asda this morning to pick up my essentials and this is what it looks like!
Asda Shopping Haul
My favourite fruit includes raspberries, banana and pear. I am obsessed with clementines at the moment though, I’ve lost count on how many I have in a day! I picked up a melon and some strawberries and apples to vary my fruit a bit.
We eat a lot of pasta in our house. We go through a lot in a week and I tend to buy a big bag. We never run out of pasta in our house!
Passata is an absolutely essential store cupboard item for us slimmers. I use it to make pasta sauces and curries.
Eggs is another food item that I buy often! I usually make 5 or 6 boiled eggs in the morning so I can snack on them whenever I am hungry throughout the day. That amount usually lasts me a couple of days unless my youngest daughter and hubby decide to have some too! I’ve seen Asda and other supermarkets sell a couple of boiled eggs with some spinach leaves for £1 or so, I wouldn’t pay that much for it. You can get a box of 6 free range eggs for less than £1 and make your own in minutes!
I always buy packet salads for convenience as I am the only one that eats them at home and add cherry tomatoes, jalapeños and any other pickles I have in my fridge to it.
I bought leeks and celery today as I intend on making a soup with it in the next couple of days, or I might make a Homity Pie with the leeks! I am not too sure yet.
Kia Ora is our family favourite sugar free cordial, we don’t like any other brand.
It is the first time I bought best of both milk, it was on offer for £1 instead of £1.50 so why not? You can have 300ml as a healthy extra A choice. It is supposed to taste like semi skimmed milk but has a lot less fat in it. I also bought the Low Low cheese for the first time. Not sure if it a healthy extra choice but it is handy for my girls to sprinkle on their pasta!
I bought the teas for my members at groups. I am not a fan of tea, I prefer coffee. I like to offer my members a variety of drinks to choose from to enjoy in group.
We love baked beans in our house and it has to be Branston. I only buy Heinz baked beans if it’s the chilli ones.
Lastly on my shopping is the halal turkey slices. Perfect protein rich snack to enjoy anytime or as part of a meal.
What are your essentials? Comment below with your favourite items x
I’ve collected some really quick, easy and Free or low-syn ideas here to help you enjoy your pudding and stay on track for a weight loss. Please do share your favourite free or low syn sweet treats.
Alpro Go On Pot
If you fancy custard but without the high syns, gently heat a bowl of Aldi Brooklea Light Fat Free Banana & Custard Yogurt in the microwave for 10 seconds! Quick custard for 0.5 syn only!
For flavoured sauces without the syns, use fat free fromage frais, fat free natural yogurt or quark, and flavour with the desired essence or flavouring – coffee, coconut, vanilla – the choice is yours! (Remember, if you use the real thing rather than essence, you’ll need to keep track of the syns.) You can get a variety of flavourings from baking shops.
Another way to get your sweet fix is by mixing a low-Syn hot chocolate sachet (eg Options) with quark and pile high with fruit.
My all time favourite dessert is an Alpro Go On pot (1.5 syns for the passion fruit flavour pictured) topped with raspberries. It is simply delicious.
How about a low-syn toffee ice cream with a twist… Crush a 19.5g bag of Maltesers, and stir into 2 Toffee Aldi Brooklea Light Fat Free yogurts and a large tub of fat free fromage frais. Pop it in the freezer for a couple of hours, stir occasionally, and hey presto a 5 Syn sweet snack for the whole tub! Try it with other flavours of Free yoghurt and add chopped fresh fruit.
For a low-syn crumble, use stewed fruit as a Healthy Extra ‘b’ choice, and top it with a couple of crumbled malted milk biscuits (2 Syns each). If you fancy custard too, warm a Banana and Custard yogurt for 10 seconds in the microwave!
How about an Eton Mess? Here’s a low-syn version, which is just as delicious… Pile strawberries and raspberries (fresh or frozen) into a sundae dish. Pour over your favourite syn free yogurt, and then crumble in some broken meringue nest pieces. Repeat and enjoy! (1 meringue nest is, on average, 3 Syns).
I love Cadbury’s Freddo (19g bar is 5 Syns) and they’re delicious melted and enjoyed as a dip for fresh strawberries and banana or for drizzling over fruit.
Make up a knickerbocker glory using fresh or frozen fruit pieces and frozen yogurt of your choice instead of ice cream. If you fancy a bit of sauce, puree a small portion of fruit and count the Syns. A huge portion topped with 50g pureed raspberries is just ½ Syn – how tempting is that?
On a similar theme, how about a banana split? Cut a banana in half lengthways, and scoop frozen free yogurt of your choice on top – banana, vanilla and chocolate go really well together! If you have a Healthy Extra ‘b’ choice left, why not ‘go nuts’ and sprinkle 6 crushed walnut halves on top!
Thread fruit onto Mikado sticks – only ½ Syn per stick! Or if you prefer Matchsticks count 1 syn each,
This is a very popular breakfast option with members in group. I love it too as it is very easy to prepare and it is ready and waiting for you when you wake up! You can add any fruit to it, frozen fruit works really well as it is perfectly defrosted by morning.
Serves: 1
Syns: FREE if using porridge oats as Healthy Extra B choice
Time Taken: 2 minutes plus overnight chilling
Difficulty: Easy
Overnight Oats with Fruit
Layer the porridge, yogurt and fruit in a jar or bowl. Cover and put in the refrigerator overnight so the porridge absorbs all the yogurt.
In the morning stir so all the layers are mixed together and top with more fruit.
