How do you put on weight?

[FizzyPink]

Not a stealth boast I promise! I’m permanently watching my weight.

DP on the other hand is 6ft and only weighs 140lbs. His weight is really getting him down and he desperately wants to put on weight. When he wears jeans, his legs look like two twigs and he’s so embarrassed about it.

He works in sport so burns a huge amount of calories per day. He’s also very busy and out of the house for long hours so doesn’t tend to eat big main meals apart from dinner. He doesn’t have a huge appetite so bigger portions don’t really work, he’d rather have a normal size dinner and then snack throughout the evening.

Aside from forcing himself to eat more is there anything in particular he could be eating to pack in some extra calories that also isn’t super unhealthy?

Oooh, If I could eat unlimited 'healthy' calories, I would eat peanut butter and banana on seeded sourdough toast. Deli quality coleslaw, pate, homemade pancakes with fresh cream, melted dark chocolate and banana. Lasagne with salad and coleslaw.
Yum!

He needs to make time to stop and eat, and he can also add calories to drinks.
I used to drink a cup of soup with a half teaspoon of extra virgin olive oil and a half teaspoon of skim milk powder.
Milky drinks with milk powder and whey powder - coffee, malt extract, or hot chocolate.
Home made cake bars baked with milk powder, eggs and fruit.
Yorkshire tarts which include eggs and sieved cottage cheese.

Nuts and seeds, peanut butter, seeded bread, protein bars, flapjack, avocado, I'm hungry now!!

Some great ideas here, thank you! Sadly he’s allergic to nuts so nut butters are out

When my son wanted to put on weight the doctor told him to eat double carbs with every meal, so lasagna and garlic bread etc. It did the trick.

Jar of Nutella in the house.

Yes, you don't want to replace being underweight with an illness caused by too much sugar. A Mediterranean diet with lots of good fats, olive oils, fish, salad in dressing, cheeses, vegetables sauted in grass-fed butter, plus seeded bread would be my choice. Heart-healthy options.

Double carbs is a great idea and he’d love that. I think maybe we also need to start having separate evening meals. I calorie count so never cook with oil or fats and choose the leanest meats which probably isn’t helping either!

Macaroni cheese with lardons in it. Served with garlic bread.

Roast dinner but with fatty meat (eg belly pork, chicken thighs with skin on) and lots of roast potatoes.

If he like garlic, get that proper Spanish allioli in the yellow tub, it's about 1500 calories in a small tub. I like it on prawns, calamari, paella, bread, everything really.

Quiche made with cheese, bacon and cream.

Cream in his coffee or hot chocolate.

Soup with cream in and garlic bread.

Cereal bars while at work?

Fry ups?

Pizza, home made if you want to know what's in it, but I think that, a lot of the time, food that we see as 'unhealthy' isn't always unhealthy as such, more that it normally makes us gain weight and that's when we become unhealthy. If you eat the high calorie fatty food, but remain a normal weight and are active, it's fine.

Has he had his thyroid checked?

Get that man fed on mince and tatties! I will have him for a week and fatten him up.

He needs to be eating 3 meals and 3 snacks a day and making them count. So for breakfast he could do overnight oats with 60g of oats made with double cream, banana plus a coffee made with gold top milk. Morning snack, a no sugar protein bar plus a weight gainer protein shake. Lunch - oat cakes and avocado or hummus, full fat yogurt, dried fruit, dark chocolate. Milk drink. Afternoon snack - egg, ham, cheese frittata muffins (make at weekend, freeze and grab in the morning) or yogurt blender muffins (again, the same) and a shake Dinner - add cream, olive oil and carbs to dinner together Evening snack - pudding and full fat custard or cream

my friends dd was underweight, and due to swallowing problems found it hard to eat a lot.
She was told to find high calorie things to sneak in to her food.
double cream, full fat butter/spread/cream cheese/ full fta yoghurt/ chocolate/ peanut butter/ croissant type pastries

and so on.
Add cheese to things too. So instead ofham sandwhich, have ham and cheese, with a splash of mayo.

Ice cream. Custard. Pudding. All the things we don't have!

Calorie dense food, but ideally not that's full of crap and sugar otherwise that will not do him any favours! Peanut butter, nuts, shakes, full fat cheese, full fat yoghurt...

My DP is currently putting on weight. He got incredibly thin over the last summer/autumn
Rather than eating crap 24/7 he

Has a lot of nut butters
Drinks a lot of hills calories in smoothies/shakes etc. We did look into ensure for him but I don’t think it was quite that bad.
Lots of healthy fats
Little and often approach to eating - 5 small meals was less overwhelming than three big ones

My friend's son was quite underweight, and her GP suggested McDonald's milkshakes. Not healthy, but might help.

I normally jump on these threads saying add nut, nut butters and ground nuts to everything. So that advice is useless in his situation.

One thing I’d really advise is to read the labels on packaged foods. Just for example, a slice of bread can vary hugely starting at about 60 cals going right up to about 180. Similar goes for cereal, crisps, baked goods. As a pp said put double up on sandwich fillings, mayo is really helpful, egg mayo and bacon is good, cheese and anything, if you make a toastie even better because you can fit even more in with melted cheese. If eating crisps add a dip.
If making a pie make it pastry top and case.
Add clotted cream to any creamy sauce or porridge, rice pudding, custard, mashed potato. Make milk shakes with Ben and Jerry’s or Hagen Daz.
Don’t serve plain steamed or boiled veg, add butter or a cheese sauce, eg cauliflower cheese, cheesy leeks. Add olive oil to salads and tomato based dishes. Roast root veg like carrots, parsnips, beetroot, squash.
Where ever possible add cheese before serving, works well with pasta, chilli, potatoes.
Also, rapeseed oil will virtually disappear in most all in one type dishes, casseroles, stews, curries, chillies etc. For risotto add butter.