Slimming World and clean eating

[footballmum]

I joined SW just after new year and had my first weigh in last week (lost 3.5lbs yay!) My leader is a lovely lady and has lost (and kept off) a considerable amount of weight but she seems a bit overly reliant on ready meals and artificial sweeteners. She has her own Facebook group and everyone on there seems to want to spend their syns on chocolate or alcohol. That's fine for them but I'm trying to avoid artificial sweeteners, cakes, biscuits and alcohol because for me they're a bit addictive and are always my undoing!

I'd been on another diet which was a bit too extreme for my liking but what I did really like was the clean eating part of it. So no processed sauces or ready meals and cooking everything from scratch. So, for example, I've avoided salad dressings and have been making my own with olive oil, balsamic vinegar and wholegrain mustard and counting it as 2.5 syns. When my leader questioned this when she looked at my tracker she said, "but you can have a fat free dressing for free". She seems a bit bewildered that I want to use my sins on things like butter, oil or avocado. She even told me that syns were "there for treats"!

Am I doing this wrong? Surely I don't have to use all of this processed crap to get a result?

[alibongo5]

You can use your syns exactly how you want! A lot of people, including the consultants seem to like processed stuff but that's their choice. It'll work whatever you use your syns for.

[Chamonix1]

I use my syns to make my meals tastier.
I don't eat chocolate and drink alcohol unless it's a special occasion mainly because if I start I won't stop! And the amount of chocolate I can eat with my syns doesn't satisfy the chocolate monster.
So cheese, oils, homemade sauces etc for me.

[MargotFenring]

I am totally with you. I don't have a sweet tooth and can happily live without chocolate and sweet treats. I do like good cheese, avocado, olive oil based dressings and the like. I also hardly EVER eat ready meals and never give the family these at meal times.

There is a lot of discussion around different sauces you can buy for 'fakeaways'. I just ignore all that and crack on.

[harderandharder2breathe]

Agree, you can use your syns however you want. A lot of people do use them for small amounts of chocolate, crisps and alcohol (me included) but if you want to use them for butter, oil and avocado that's your choice.

I believe the point of syns is to allow small treats that we'd fall off the bandwagon without. For you, that's a proper salad dressing.

[carrotcakecupcake]

Another SW member here who isn't a fan of processed/artificial foods. What I like about SW is that you can fill up on "real" food, sure it tends to involve more cooking from scratch and less bread and cheese, but it worked. I've never used artificial sweetener but agree, there does seem a reliance on it in lots of their recipes. I think the one thing I did tend to go for were options hot chocolates every once in a while
Good luck - use your syns however you want!!

[footballmum]

Thank you. That's reassuring. I'll keep doing what I'm doing! To be fair a lot of the recipes are great but they seem to have this obsession with recreating these fake desserts! Part of my problem and the reason I put weight on was that I ate a dessert after my evening meal (and chocolates and biscuits in the day!) If I'm going to change my lifestyle I'd rather discipline myself to either go without or at least replace with more healthy alternatives such as fruit or natural yoghurt.

[Groovee]

Last time I did slimming world another member told me she had cut out her crisp & chocolate as she couldn't just have one so had started to use her syns in her cooking, so at the time oxo cubes were synned, so she would use that.

Some of my syns have been extra milk so I can have a cup of decaf tea.

It's entirely up to you. I don't drink alcohol so won't be using them on them.

[alibongo5]

I would never use artificial sweetener in cooking and rarely used sugar before SW (unless in cakes and puddings of course!). If I'm following a recipe which lists it, I usually just leave it out, or if I think it does need a bit of sweetness I'll put a bit of honey in and syn that (if I remember!).

But I guess a lot of people are coming from a background of not really cooking from scratch and also snacking a lot so SW is trying to make it easy for them to make a change but not so much they can't stick with it.

[Drquin]

Whilst my halo isn't sparkling, I'm a bit like you OP.
My downfall before SW was ready meals, wine, chocolate and crisps.
If I was going to lose, and keep off weight, I felt I had to change my habits ......

So, no cracking open bottles of wine because there's a "d" in the day.
Avoiding chocolate & crisps.
Cooking from scratch.

I'm no real fan of the the fake desserts, or bloody Quark. Amazingly, I will rather grab an apple or yoghurt after a meal ..... rather than a fake dessert.

Yeah, ok I had a twin-Bounty yesterday which used a massive 14 syns ..... but I've done that probably 6 times in the last 12 months. Before it would have been the chocolate AND wine AND ..... daily.

So I use syns for a mix of desserts / good cheese ...but also sauces, salad dressing. I thought the whole point was it's our choice Certainly my consultant uses hers for sauces, and whilst she does tell us about the syn-free options and Iceland ready meals, she more often posts photos of "proper" food she's cooked.

[Camelsinthegobi]

I like that it's flexible - you can cook from scratch happily on the plan, or used processed stuff. I can't bring myself to use sweetener and don't like the fake desserts Ive tried so am working out what real desserts i can have. Ive made egg custard with coconut milk, egg yolk, cornflour and 1 tsp sugar and syned it. Just had baked apple and custard for 6 syns and it was yummy.

[MollyHuaCha]

I think your way sounds very healthy. A lot of manufactured low-fat and low-sugar foods are poor quality, more chemicals in the ingredients than food.

[Pardalis]

I would much rather use syns in dinner. We don't buy frylight. But just use a couple of sprays of oil and syn it.

But I do save up my syns for g&t instead!

[QueenOnAPlate]

I use most of my syns on olive oil and butter. I don't eat white carbs and rarely eat fruit. It really is working for me, and when the sugar cravings strike a banana works as I'm so not used to the sweet stuff. I really think you can clean eat and do SW. I hex b with nuts or dried fruit. I don't go to group as all they do is discuss making Ferraro rocher from scan bran and similar things.

[TooManyButtons]

I've been doing Slimming World online for almost 3 weeks, and am really trying to do low-carb, 'clean eating', and cutting out sugar (although I'm still eating fruit).

I'm using my syns for good fats such as olive oil, avocado, and toasted seeds sprinkled on my food. This is a completely new way of eating for me; until now I've had a horrific diet, existing on mainly cheese toasties and chocolate since DD left for uni and I now live alone, but already I'm seeing the results.

I've lost 12lbs in my first 2 weeks and I feel much less bloated and sluggish.