How Can I Start Eating More Healthy Snacks?
We’ve all been tempted by the snack section at the supermarket – shelf after shelf of crisps, biscuits and chocolate – stuffed with saturated fat, low on nutrition and completely catastrophic for our waistlines! So what’s the alternative?
In 2019, the UK’s savoury snack sector was valued at £3.2 billion, and crisps were responsible for about a third of this figure.[1] The NHS advises us to avoid fried snacks and opt instead for fruit and vegetable-based ones instead – they even have a page of snack ideas, based mainly around whole foods.[2]
But doesn’t eating between meals mean we’ll put on weight? Well, probably not, because it means we won’t be as hungry at our next meal, and this will lead to reduced calorie intake – and the authors of a report published in the British Journal of Nutrition discovered that the same amount of energy divided over three meals compared with two meals increased feelings of fullness over 24 hours.[3] So let’s take a deeper look at the ins and outs of good snacking….
If you’re trying to lose weight but would still like to snack, good foods to seek out are ones with plenty of bulk but relatively few calories. These will fill you up without you piling on the pounds. Fruit and vegetables are brilliant, as they’re largely made up of water. Caulirice is excellent – 3 minutes in the microwave and you’re eating hot, tasty rice, but made of cauliflower – and with under 100 calories per packet. High fibre foods like Prunes or Figs are a great choice to fill you up, as they contain fibre, which means their progress through the digestive system is slower, leading to you feeling fuller for longer. Protein is superb at increasing feelings of fullness too, making snacks based around Pulses a wise choice.
Seeds are a mega-healthy snacking option. They offer fantastic nutrition, lip-smacking taste and wonderful textures, and can be eaten on their own or used as a hugely versatile and exciting ingredient. They’re full of incredibly beneficial minerals such as potassium, magnesium, calcium, zinc and iron. They’re packed with vitamins, such as Vitamins B1, B2, B3 and E, and they contain healthy fats, which will give you energy without clogging your arteries. Seeds are full of fibre, and contain a nice whack of protein too, so they’re one of the best snack foods to fill you up until your next meal.
What’s not to love about nuts? They’re knobbly, tasty and there are loads of different types. You can have them roasted or as nut butters. They’re a superb source of protein, fibre, vitamins, minerals and healthy fats, and regular nut consumption is associated with lower rates of heart attack. Even better, they have their own special kind of nut magic, which means that although they’re calorie-dense, they don’t have the effect on your weight you’d think they would, and there is a lack of evidence to support the restriction of nut consumption in weight management.[4] A study which followed 90 participants in 2005, half of whom added a handful of walnuts to their daily diet, found that no significant differences were observed in body weight, even though the walnut group were eating over 200 calories more every day.[5] Even when people in another study ate 320 calories more daily for 6 months (this time in the shape of Almonds), the weight gain compared to a control group who didn’t consume these extra nut calories was so small as not to be statistically significant.[6]
What healthy snacks can I make?
There are hundreds of ways you can fit some really premium nutrition into your homemade snacks, and you don’t need to be Heston Blumenthal to make something tasty, filling and packed with health. Why not give these delicious Seed Crackers a go? Or grab the kids and get them to mix and roll out some of these gorgeous Gingerbread Goji Snack Balls. Or quickly rustle up some simple, appealing, nutritious, bite-sized Almond Butter Stuffed Medjools. The beauty of making your own snacks is that you can mix and match the ingredients to suit your own personal taste. Don’t like Sunflower Seeds? Use Pumpkin Seeds instead. Not a fan of Goji Berries? Use some deep purple, antioxidant-packed Blueberries instead!
Why healthy snacks are important
Healthy snacking is extremely important. When we eat unhealthy snacks, we take on ’empty calories’ with little nutrition, and the lack of fibre and protein often means the food passes through us quickly and doesn’t keep us feeling full. We’re then tempted to eat more, and this will make us heavier, more sluggish, more inclined to feel bad about our expanding waistline, and more likely to get locked into a vicious cycle of eating calorie-rich, ultra-processed foods in an attempt to make ourselves feel better in the short term. Break the chains of bad snacking now – eat healthful, balanced, invigorating snacks and stay fuller for longer!
[1]https://www.bakeryandsnacks.com/Article/2020/02/19/The-appetising-future-of-the-UK-s-savoury-snacks-space-Industry-stats-from-SNACMA
[2]https://www.nhs.uk/change4life/food-facts/healthier-snacks-for-kids/100-calorie-snacks
[3]https://www.cambridge.org/core/services/aop-cambridge-core/content/view/4AE8C3FC32CE7E456B9606F1AF963E76/S0007114507877646a.pdf/acute-effects-on-metabolism-and-appetite-profile-of-one-meal-difference-in-the-lower-range-of-meal-frequency.pdf/
[4]https://apjcn.nhri.org.tw/server/APJCN/16/4/588.pdf
[5]https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/16277792/
[6]https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/12074256/