healthy extra

Ryvita

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Hi lovelies, first of all apologies for the delay in writing this! I know many of you have been waiting for the syn values of the Ryvita goodies I was sent last week, so thank you for your patience. I have finally got around to finding them all out for you. I haven’t yet tried the whole range I was sent but I could not resist trying the new Sweet & Salted Rye Cakes – wow, they’re absolutely delicious! I had them plain and also had them topped with fruit and yogurt as well. I reckon these rye cakes would taste amazing with chocolate spread too, just remember to keep track of your syns! They’re currently available from Sainsbury’s and Waitrose only but I am pretty sure they will have them at other major supermarkets at some point too. Each rye cake is only 1 syn or you can enjoy 5 of these as your healthy extra (HE) B choice!

Ryvita

Ryvita

 

Thank you to the lovely Yessi from Ryvita for sending me all these goodies. I was not expecting such a beautiful range to try. I thought I was going to receive the new rye cakes only so when I opened the door for a huge delivery it was such a nice surprise! Thank you once again.

I will list the rest of the syn values below. Have you tried any of the Ryvita range? What’s your favourite? Comment below and feel free to share this with your fellow Slimming World friends.

  • Cheese crackerbread – 1 syn each
  • Cheddar & cracked black pepper thins – 1.5 syns each
  • Currants, seeds & oats crispbread – 2.5 syns each or 2 as HE
  • Multigrain crunchy rye bread – 1.5 syns each or 3 as HE
  • Rosemary & sea salt thins – 1.5 syns each
  • Caramelised onion thins – 1.5 syns each
  • Protein rye bread – Chia seed & buckwheat – 1.5 syns each or 3 as HE
  • Protein rye bread – Red quinoa & sesame – 1.5 syns each or 3 as HE
  • Protein rye bread – Linseed & nigella seed – 1.5 syns or 3 as HE
  • Cracked black pepper rye bread – 1.5 syns each or 4 as HE

Mozzarella & Chilli Pasta Bake

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This is such an easy and simple dish to put together and it tastes amazing! It is one of my daughter’s favourite dish. I have adapted the recipe slightly from the SW Veggie Deluxe recipe book and have made this quite cheesy (just the way we like it!). You can have 70g of reduced fat mozzarella cheese as healthy extra A choice but you can use less if you prefer or put a mixture of mozzarella and cheddar cheese, but remember to count the syns depending on how much you use. All the other ingredients in this recipe are Free.

Serves: 3

Syns: FREE (if using the cheese as healthy extra A choice)

Time Taken: 30-45 minutes

Difficulty: Easy

Mozzarella & Chilli Pasta

Mozzarella & Chilli Pasta

 

Ingredients

  • 300g dried pasta
  • 1 onion, finely chopped
  • 1 tbsp. Very Lazy garlic
  • 1/2 tbsp. Very Lazy chilli
  • 500g carton passata
  • 2 x Maggie seasoning cubes
  • 100g frozen peas
  • 210g reduced fat mozarella

Method

Pre heat the oven to gas mark 4.

Cook the pasta according to the packet instructions, drain well and run the pasta under cold water to stop it sticking together. Set aside till needed.

Whilst the pasta is cooking, make the sauce. Fry the onion, garlic and chilli in a pan with low cal spray for about 5 minutes or until softened. If you find the onion is starting to stick to the pan, add some of the water that the pasta is cooking in (around a tbsp. at a time if needed).

Add the passata and the seasoning cubes, stir and simmer for 3 minutes. Add seasoning if needed. Add the frozen peas and cook for a further 2 minutes then remove from the heat.

Mix the cooked pasta into the sauce, ensuring the pasta is well coated. Tip the pasta into a medium sized baking dish sprayed with low cal spray. Top with the mozzarella and bake in the pre heated oven for around 12-15 minutes till all the cheese is melted.

Oat Pancakes

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These pancakes are super easy to make and syn free if you’re using the oats as part of your healthy extra B choice. If you’re using your healthy extra for something else, you will need to syn these at 7 syns. This mixture makes 8 fluffy pancakes. The key to this is to use baking powder, but you don’t need a lot of it. Using too much baking powder can affect the taste of the pancakes and you’ll need to syn it at 0.5 syn per 1 tsp if you choose to use more than stated in the recipe! If you like your pancakes quite sweet, then you may need to increase the amount of sweetener used. But remember that if you’re using more than 1tbsp of sweetener, you’ll have to count it as 0.5 syn per tablespoon!

Stick to the recipe below and it will be syn free.

If you’d like to enjoy these on a SP day, you can replace the yogurt with plain natural quark. 2 or 3 tablespoons of quark should be enough.

Oat Pancakes

Oat Pancakes

 

Serves: 1

Syns: FREE (using oats as healthy extra B choice)

Time Taken: 45 minutes

Difficulty: Easy

Ingredients

  • 40g porridge oats
  • 2 eggs
  • 1/2 pot of Activia 0% vanilla yogurt (or similar)
  • 1tsp vanilla extract
  • 1tsp sweetner
  • 1/4tsp baking powder

Method

Blitz all ingredients together with a hand blender and let it rest for at least 30 minutes (very important to let it rest so that the mixture can thicken up).

Spray a frying pan with syn free cooking spray of your choice and add a dollop of the mixture to the pan. If you want, you can use a metal ring to make all your pancakes the same size but I don’t bother with that. As long as you’re adding roughly the same amount of mixture to the pan each time, you’ll get similar sized pancakes!

Cook the pancakes for a couple of minutes on one side before turning them and cooking them for another couple of minutes on the other side.

You can serve them with fresh chopped fruit and yogurt.

Easy Risotto

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Serves: 1

Syns: 1 syn plus healthy extra A choice

Time Taken: 30 minutes

Difficulty: Easy

Ingredients

  • 100g risotto rice
  • 350-400ml hot stock
  • 1 onion, finely chopped
  • 1 tsp Very Lazy chopped chilli
  • Handful of frozen peas
  • 2 Najma Foods Turkey rashers
  • 30g Primula cheese with Jalapenos

 

Risotto Ingredients

Risotto Ingredients

Method

Fry the chopped onion in a pan with low calorie cooking spray oil till it softens. Add the chilli and mix.

Add the risotto rice and the stock, a few tablespoons at a time, whilst stirring the whole time. If the rice is not cooked after you’ve used all the stock, add a little more stock till it is cooked. It should take around 30 minutes to cook the rice.

Add a handful of frozen peas towards the last few minutes of cooking the rice and mix in the cheese.

Fry the turkey rasher separately and add to the risotto once it is ready. Each turkey rasher is 0.5 syn, you can use more if you wish just remember to count the syns accordingly.

Easy Risotto

Easy Risotto

 

Prawn & Pesto Linguine

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A really quick and easy meal ready in less than 15 minutes! The pesto sauce can be stored in the fridge for a couple of days but I prefer to make it when I need it as it is super quick to prepare. If you do make extra, you can use the spare pesto over chicken and bake it for another quick meal.

This is syn free if you use the cheese as part of your healthy extra A choice (you can have 30g), I only use half the cheese allowance as I use milk in my coffees for the other half of healthy extra A choice. It is perfectly fine to split your healthy extra choices, you may not get the full calcium/fibre benefits but that is okay. I tend to do that with healthy extra B choices too. If you follow me on Instagram (@RahemaSW) you may notice that most of my breakfasts consists of 1 chocolate Weetabix, I almost always have a hifi bar for the other half of my B choice. You can find more information about splitting healthy extra choices on lifeline online if you are SW member, or your consultant can give you more info about it.

I have added chilli to this (I know, you don’t add chilli to pesto) but you can leave it out. I think most people know that I love spicy food so I tend to add chilli in almost everything! This isn’t a conventional pesto sauce as I didn’t use pine nuts (too many syns!) but tastes amazing nonetheless. Let me know if you make this and feel free to tag me if you’re on social media.

Prawn & Pesto Linguine

Prawn & Pesto Linguine

Serves: 2

Syns: FREE if using cheese as healthy extra A choice

Time Taken: Less than 15 minutes

Difficulty: Easy

Ingredients

  • 200g linguine
  • Cooked Prawns

Pesto Sauce:

  • 25g basil leaves
  • 15g rocket leaves
  • 2 garlic cloves
  • 30g parmesan cheese
  • 50ml vegetable stock
  • 75ml fat free fromage frais
  • 1 green chilli (optional)

Method

Cook the linguine according the pasta intructions and whilst that is cooking make the pesto sauce by adding all the ingredients together and blending it all till smooth. Set aside till needed.

Once the linguine is cooked, drain and mix in the pesto and prawns. You can serve this with extra rocket leaves and cherry tomatoes.

Chicken Fajitas

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This is perfect if you have a fussy family like mine. My girls love this recipe as they get to add whatever they want in their wraps and always have fun trying to stuff it with as many fillings as they can! I use a Weight Watchers wrap for myself which is a healthy extra B choice or 5.5 syns each and use cheese as part of my healthy extra A choice. If you want to save syns, you can use iceberg lettuce leaves instead of wraps. I tend not to use sauces like ketchup or mayo, but if you do use them, remember to syn them accordingly.

Serves: 4

Syns: FREE

Time Taken: 30-45 minutes

Difficulty: Easy

Chicken Fajitas

Chicken Fajitas

Ingredients

  • 3 chicken breasts, cut into strips
  • 2 red onions, finely sliced
  • 1 green, 1 red and 1 yellow pepper, deseeded and finely sliced
  • 1 tbsp ground cumin
  • 1 tbsp smoked paprika
  • 1 tbsp soy sauce
  • 1 tsp chilli flakes
  • Juice of 1 lime

Method

Spray a large wok with a free spray oil and place over a medium heat. Add the chicken and stir fry for 10-15 minutes until the chicken is mostly cooked.

Add the peppers and all the spices to coat the chicken spices and cook until the chicken is fully cooked.

Serve on a wrap with salad and cheese.

 

Broccoli Soup

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Broccoli is one of my favourite veg! I love it simply boiled with my meals but this is another favourite way to enjoy it – in soup!

This is a creamy, comforting soup. You can replace the cream cheese with fat free fromage frais but I personally prefer to use my healthy extra A choice or syns on cream cheese as it makes it more indulging. Another alternative which is equally tasty is the Laughing Cow Blue Cheese triangles, you can have 5 as a healthy extra A choice or count them as 1.5 syns each. 2 triangles are plenty for this soup.

Syns: FREE (if using cream cheese as part of healthy extra A choice)

Serves: 2

Time Taken: 20-25 minutes

Difficulty: Easy

Ingredients

  • 1 whole fresh broccoli, chopped
  • 1 medium baking potato, peeled and chopped
  • 1 onion, chopped
  • 1 vegetable stock pot or cube
  • 2 x 35g tubs of Philadelphia light cream cheese (healthy extra A choice)

Method

Place the broccoli, potato, onion and stock pot in a pan of water (place enough water to cover the veg) and boil for about 15 minutes till the potatoes are cooked.

Once all the veg are cooked add the cream cheese and blitz.

Broccoli Soup

Broccoli Soup

Carrot & Cinnamon Baked Oats

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I’ve had quite a few people ask me for the recipe for the carrot and cinnamon baked oats I posted on my Instagram and Facebook page. The basic recipe is exactly the same as I’ve posted previously here but this one should be clearer to follow if you intend on doing this flavour baked oats. Enjoy, and remember to tag me on your posts when you make them!

Carrot & Cinnamon Baked Oats

Carrot & Cinnamon Baked Oats

 

Serves: 1

Syns: 0.5 syn plus healthy extras A & B choices

Time Taken: 25 minutes

Difficulty: Easy

Ingredients

  • 40g porridge oats
  • 50ml milk (any of your choice, I use skimmed milk normally)
  • 1 tbsp sweetener
  • 1 egg, beaten
  • 1 small carrot, peeled and finely grated
  • 1 tsp vanilla extract
  • 1 tsp cinnamon powder

Method

Weigh out the porridge in a bowl and add all the ingredients to it apart from the carrot. Squeeze out any water from the grated carrot before adding it to the oats mix.

Spray a small baking dish with spray oil before adding the mixture to it.

Bake in a pre heated oven gas mark 6 for around 20-25 minutes.

Once baked, you can add any toppings of your choice. Just remember to syn accordingly!

Lasagne – Béchamel Sauce

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Lasagne is one of my children’s favourite meal, they have it quite often but it is never a Slimming World friendly version for them! They love it with homemade béchamel sauce which can be very high in syns for us slimmers, so I make my own for myself so I can still enjoy the meal guilt free! I use this recipe here for the mince.

Serves: 1

Syns: FREE if using cheese as healthy extra A choice

Time Taken: less than 10 minutes

Difficulty: Easy

Lasagne

Lasagne

Ingredients

  • 1 tub of cottage cheese (plain or flavoured, check if syns! I use Aldi’s cottage cheese with chives and onion, FREE)
  • 2 eggs
  • A pinch of mustard powder
  • 40g light cheddar cheese
  • Seasoning to taste

Method

Blend the cottage cheese with the eggs, mustard and seasoning with a hand held blender till smooth and no longer lumpy.

Add half of the cheese allowance into the cottage cheese mix.

Layer lasagne with mince, lasagne sheets and cottage cheese mix in an individual dish.

Top the lasagne with the remaining cheese and bake in the oven for around 40 minutes till the pasta is cooked. Cook the first 30 minutes with foil over the dish so the cheese doesn’t burn quickly.