Due to my lifestyle (busy mum, running 2 businesses as a dietitian and a Pilates teacher) I tend to eat a good breakfast and dinner with my children. Lunchtime is quite variable. Sometimes I’m teaching classes, sometimes I am with clients and sometimes I am eating with the children. Either way it is busy so I tend to have a small lunch and snack mid morning and mid afternoon to top myself up. So healthy snacks are essential for me.
I was recently sent some snack foods for the launch of our new Pilates, nutrition and Wellness studio…. which meant I got to try them all, yay!
Lizi’s Granola:
I tend to eat porridge for breakfast or make my own version of a muesli. Oats are my mainstay. So I was quite excited to try out this granola. I was sent the Low Sugar Granola to review.
This provides 3.8g sugar per 100g so is classed as low sugar. Looking at the ingredients there is some sugar added in the way of fructose and black treacle, but these are the last ingredients on the list, each making up only 1.6% of the product.
The granola contains oats, pumpkin seeds, sunflower seeds, cashews, almonds, hazelnuts and walnuts plus coconut. It’s low in Glycamic Load which means when you eat a portion of this it will help maintain your blood sugar levels within a normal range rather than leading to a large rise in blood sugars. So eating this granola should help keep your energy levels up and keep you satiated.
So we know it is a healthy granola but is it tasty? YES. I still like my porridge or oats for breakfast but this has become a big hit in my family as a topping on yoghurt. I find it a great post-pilates snack in the evening after classes and my children are having some after tea on their yoghurt too.
Munchy Seeds:
A very versatile snack. I was really surprised by how many people liked these at our launch. Sometimes seeds can be seen as too fiddly to eat, not that tasty and in my husbands words “rabbit food”. However these seeds seemed to be a hit with our clients.
I like them as a snack, grabbing a handful as I’m on the way to a class. I find them a little salty for my palette….
Emily’s Fruit Crisps:
I’ve been a fan of these for a while so it was fabulous to introduce others to these amazing fruit crisps. They are rather addictive and were the first thing on our table to go.
Perfect to keep in your bag as a snack or mix with nuts/seeds to make your own Grazing snack box.
California Prunes:
Dried fruit is always a go to snack for me. I tend to keep it in large Kilner jars on a shelf in my kitchen so it’s easy to access and on view. If healthy snacks are visible you are more likely to eat those and not grab a biscuit 😉
Prunes can help you absorb iron, due to their content of Vitamin C. So if you are worried about your iron or are pregnant these could be a great thing to eat. They also contain soluble fibre which can help stabilise blod sugar levels and help keep you fuller for longer. Prunes are also well know for their effect on helping to keep the bowels regular, this is due to the insoluble fibre they contain, which passes into the large intestine where it feeds the “good” bacteria.
These prunes are sweet and juicy. A word of caution would be to make sure you watch your portion control!
Disclaimer: All these products were sent to me for free, I was not paid financially for this post. All views are my own.
