Top ten tips - wholegrain
Wholegrains are an important part of a healthy, balanced diet but if you’re unsure how to include them into your daily meals, here's our top ten tips to give you some inspiration.
- Kick-start the day with a bowl of porridge or wholegrain cereal
made with milk - and top with seasonal fruit to get the goodness of
a wholegrain breakfast and one of your five-a-day portions of fruit
and veg too.
- Alternate between different wholegrain cereals on a daily basis
to keep your first meal of the day interesting.
- If you're feeling peckish mid-morning, opt for wholegrain
crackers, oatcakes or rye crispbreads instead of high
fat/salt/sugar snacks. To add even more variety, try them with
toppings like savoury low fat cheese, or sweet fruit and low fat
crème fraiche, or you could use up some leftovers in your
fridge.
- Lunch doesn't have to be dull or expensive - make your own
sandwiches using wholemeal bread, pittas, tortillas, flatbread or
rolls.
- Choose wholegrain varieties where you can. Or try half and
half, like mixing wild rice with long grain rice, wholemeal pasta
with white pasta, or wholewheat flour with white flour.
- If you need a quick fix before bedtime, carbohydrates in
wholemeal toast can actually help poor sleepers and those with
energetic lifestyles get off to sleep.
- For a tasty and nutritious boost, add a handful of oats or a
wheat biscuit to your smoothies or yogurts, or add barley to soups
and stews.
- Popcorn is a wholegrain food and makes a perfect snack now and
then - just make sure it's the plain, air-popped variety. Try
flavouring your popcorn with different spices.
- Cook a little extra wholegrain pasta, rice or noodles for
dinner and make it into a salad for lunch the next day.
- Try and eat a serving of wholegrain with each meal, e.g.
porridge for breakfast, wholemeal roll for lunch and wholemeal
pasta for dinner.
