Extra Easy - The changes.....

[Honeyoc]

To be fair, the one-third requirement is really not a huge amount of fruit/veg, and should in my opinion be part of any healthy eating plan including green and red.

Agreed! And if you cook it in interesting ways rather than plain steamed it'll be a lot more enjoyable too rather than something on your plate that you have to eat because its good for you and not necessarily because you think its yummy! Some interesting ways I cook veggies are;

Baked cauliflower
Cut cauliflower into florets and put in a baking dish, season with salt pepper & cumin powder. Spray with frylight and bake for 25 mins at 200C. This is a great side dish to curry and rice.

Sauteed beans and mushrooms
Finely chop some garlic and sautee in a pan sprayed with frylight. Add fine green beans (cut in half) and sliced mushrooms. Cook for about 10 minutes stirring often so it doesn't burn. Season with salt & pepper and a splash of worcestershire sauce. Goes great with a steak!

Roasted mediterranean vegetables
Chop into big chunks some red, green & yellow peppers, courgette, red onion, whole cherry tomatoes. Season with salt, pepper & fresh chopped rosemary. Roast at 200C for 30-35mins. Perfect with grilled fish and steamed baby potatoes.

Roasted tomato salsa
Throw some whole cherry tomatoes in a roasting tin and a couple of whole garlic cloves. Season with salt, pepper and 1/2 a tsp of sugar/splenda. Spray with frylight and roast at 200C for 20 minutes. When cooked, mash the garlic and tomatoes, the garlic will pop out of the skin, discard skin. Stir in some fresh chopped parsley and basil. Goes with everything, chicken, fish, especially a fritatta or omelette! Really nice as a fuss free pasta sauce too!

Roasted superfree root vegetables
Chop into big chunks some butternut squash, beetroot, carrots, peppers, swede, turnips etc. Season with salt, pepper and rosemary and roast at 200C for about an hour. This is my fave!

Mixed vegetables
Chop into small cubes some carrots, peppers, baby corn, broccoli, green beans, onions garlic etc. Sautee in a hot pan until softened. Season with salt, pepper and a pinch of chicken stock cube powder. Absolutely delicious with grilled salmon.

Stir fried veggies
Buy a bag of stir fry veggies, empty into wok, add soy and oyster sauce, eat
Great with grilled fish and rice

Vegetable gratin
Slice some red pepper, aubergine, courgette and butternut squash and layer in a baking dish slightly overlapping. Add some chopped plum tomatoes over it. Sprinkle with fresh chopped parsley and fresh thyme (just a little), add 1/4 cup of chicken stock, cover with foil and bake for 40 minutes at 200C. Take foil off and sprinkle with some parmesan cheese (HEA) and bake for another 10 minutes. Serve!

I think that's all I can think of for now lol. Hey we should start a thread on veggie ideas!

 

[shrinkingannie]

Hi Im a bit confused about the new EE plan so Im going to say what I believe it to be here in summary - will someone kindly correct if Im wrong

Free: fruit,veg, pasta, potato, rice, yogurts (some), eggs
Superfree: fruit and veg (except potato, peas, sweetcorn, sweet potato)

Have 1/3 of meal portion superfree
snack on superfree

Is this the jist of it??

 

[jaylou]

Hi Im a bit confused about the new EE plan so Im going to say what I believe it to be here in summary - will someone kindly correct if Im wrong

Free: fruit,veg, pasta, potato, rice, yogurts (some), eggs
Superfree: fruit and veg (except potato, peas, sweetcorn, sweet potato)

Have 1/3 of meal portion superfree
snack on superfree

Is this the jist of it??

Yes, cottage cheese is free also.
It is recommended that you snack on superfree foods but not essential.

Don't forget your A and B choice too.

 

[Honeyoc]

Hi Im a bit confused about the new EE plan so Im going to say what I believe it to be here in summary - will someone kindly correct if Im wrong

Free: fruit,veg, pasta, potato, rice, yogurts (some), eggs
Superfree: fruit and veg (except potato, peas, sweetcorn, sweet potato)

Have 1/3 of meal portion superfree
snack on superfree

Is this the jist of it??

Yep pretty much! Except you free foods also includes meat fish seafood etc

 

[SpaceAngel]

I'm a bit confused as to why eggs can't be used as your 1/3rd? Looks like I will have to eat loads of mushrooms with my Saturday Brekkie now.

 

[TeresaTT]

Honeyoc, that's some great ideas for veggies. I'm trying to build up a list of interesting veg so that I can more easily incorporate them into my meals.

I went to my WI today (lost 3lb yippee, half my Christmas gain gone) and bought the new books. They make everything so much clearer now and it all makes sense to me. The books are really well laid out and very much worth the £3.

I will need to make a few adjustments to follow the tweaked EE plan but I'm pretty sure that I'll have better losses on it now. For example, before I eat chilli and rice or curry and rice, I'll have a superfree salad starter. I've now got a lot more confidence that EE will work for me so I'm going to do EE everyday and not bother with red or green and see how it goes. All I have to do is have more veg with my meals and I can have all of the EE flexibility.

 

[kanslow]

Yes I'm trying Extra Easy for a week to see how I get on. Although I've had great losses with red and green days, it makes things more interesting!!

 

[Littleslimmingbee]

Thanks hun, i read through my bessie's new pack this eve and was a bit mind boggled (luckily i never thought that you could have cheese as a HEB on EE so no hard luck for me there)

thanks for putting all down in one post and informing us! x

 

[goth girl]

i would say that if what you have been doing up till now is working..then stick to it!

 

[jaylou]

i would say that if what you have been doing up till now is working..then stick to it!

I would say follow the changes if you want to follow the plan correctly!

They've done this for a reason!!

It's up the individual though, but I'd say - try it

 

[jaylou]

I will need to make a few adjustments to follow the tweaked EE plan but I'm pretty sure that I'll have better losses on it now. For example, before I eat chilli and rice or curry and rice, I'll have a superfree salad starter. I've now got a lot more confidence that EE will work for me so I'm going to do EE everyday and not bother with red or green and see how it goes. All I have to do is have more veg with my meals and I can have all of the EE flexibility.

Well said Teresa!
My thoughts exactly

 

[fatstitcher]

Hi all,

I have just been reading this thread and first of all I want to say thanks to JayLou for spending the time to provide us with a clear and concise run down of the changes.

I too was questioning about the HEB cheese situation as up to and including Tuesday of this week the Lifeline Online website was giving conflicting information it was stating in one article that under EE cheese was OK as HEB and on another Cheese not allowed. Also my consultant was stating the former.

So I wrote to Slimming World on Tuesday evening pointing out all of the discrepancies and had the following reply Wednesday morning, which as you can see clearly states the reasoning behind the changes and when the changes took place.

I wanted to let you know that the changes to the Healthy Extras for Extra Easy are from 1st January, and we have already updated our bodyOptimise website (downloadable pdfs and online food diary to reflect the changes).

Our Consultants are also aware of the change, and the new 2010 Food Optimising book reflects this too – you can purchase a copy from your Consultant for £3 until the end of January if you wish.

We will be updating the information on the Extra Easy feature and menu on LifelineOnline as soon as possible to avoid any confusion, and LifelineOnline’s food diary has already been updated so that nuts, seeds and cheese aren’t listed as ‘b’ choices either.

The reason we made this change is that the aim of Healthy Extras is to ensure that members get all the vital vitamins, minerals and fibre they need to enjoy a healthy balanced diet. Just as each eating plan puts emphasis on different Free Foods, Healthy Extras vary slightly from plan to plan so that members consume a wide range of nutrients on a daily basis. Our Green plan makes Food Optimising a truly fabulous option for vegetarians and those who prefer less meat. On Green days the Free Foods tend to be rich in complex carbohydrates and limited in protein. Therefore members can get the protein and other nutrients not available in the carbohydrate-rich Free Foods on the Green plan from the Healthy Extra choices of lean meat, fish and poultry. Cheese and nuts are also a source of protein and rich in certain vitamins and minerals (e.g. B vitamins, zinc, selenium and vitamin E) lacking in a low meat diet. And these are an additional option particularly for vegetarians and any members who don’t wish to get their protein from meat or fish choices.

On the Original and Extra Easy eating plans, members can obtain protein from Free lean meat and fish easily, and as such, Healthy Extra on these two plans tend to be rich in complex-carbohydrate and fibre. If nuts and cheese were allowed as a ‘b’ choice on the Original and Extra Easy plans, members could miss out on a vital fibre or complex carbohydrate choice by only choosing these options, and having a less well balanced diet.

Having also read the comments about the 1/3 of Superfree at all meal times, surely if you carefully look at what you are eating at your lunch and evening meals you would probably see that you are having approx 1/3 Superfree food. The issue people appear to be having is the one of "on the plate at the same time" - surely this is the meal as an whole not each individual aspect, eg if you make a Chilli using Quorn = you would have the following Superfree items on your plate = Quorn, tomatoes, Peppers, Onions - that would be more than 1/3.

The moral of this is don't look just at the whole plate, look at each ingredient that makes up your meal and you will find that the SuperFree items all add up...

Hope this makes some sense.

Michelle

 

[Leapfrog]

Gutted that you can't have cheese as B choice! No fair!!! *stamps feet*

Me too. I've even been known to have cheese for all 4 HE on green too!

Also gutted about the nuts not being a HEXB as I loved having HEXB walnuts with my HEXA cheese.

 

[TeresaTT]

Having also read the comments about the 1/3 of Superfree at all meal times, surely if you carefully look at what you are eating at your lunch and evening meals you would probably see that you are having approx 1/3 Superfree food. The issue people appear to be having is the one of "on the plate at the same time" - surely this is the meal as an whole not each individual aspect, eg if you make a Chilli using Quorn = you would have the following Superfree items on your plate = Quorn, tomatoes, Peppers, Onions - that would be more than 1/3.
Michelle

Thank you for that reply from SW. It's very informative.

Unfortunately Quorn is no longer superfree and cannot be used as part of your third of a plate superfree. You can only use non startchy vegetables and fruit.

 

[couteaux]

Thanks Jaylou for all this info.

Honeyoc - Those ideas look gorgeous! Thanks for sharing.

The moral of this is don't look just at the whole plate, look at each ingredient that makes up your meal and you will find that the SuperFree items all add up...
Michelle

Michelle - that makes perfect sense! I think there are probably plenty of ways we can get those superfree foods in our meals.

So, when making spaghetti bolognese, add some grated carrot, finely diced celery, onion, mushrooms, tomato (5 SF foods)

Chicken stew - add celery, carrots, onions, swede, turnip etc.

Chicken curry - serve it with a tomato & cucumber salad or cucumber raita and add a couple extra veggies to the curry.

Chilli - again, grate some carrot, extra tomoatoes, mushrooms, pepper.

We should all be upping the amount of veg we eat so think these changes look fair and will do us good to follow as intended.

Good luck all!

 

[cocktailprincess]

Jaylou- shouldn't you get a consultancy fee? What a great job you are doing!

I just keep thinking of a management book aimed at getting people to embrace change rather than fear it. It is called 'who stole my cheese?' which I think is hilarious given the new HEXB situation!

You are a star

 

[fatstitcher]

Thanks TeresaTT

Didn't realise that Quorn was one of the changes....

For breakfast today:

6 x Ryvita Wholegrain cracker bread (HEB)
Banana - Superfree
Quark - Free
Sweetener - Free
Ground Ginger - Free

Think that fits in with the new rules.

Michelle

 

[jaylou]

Quite correct!!