If you *do* manage 7+ portions of fruit and veg a day…

[CindersAgain]

… would you mind sharing a day’s typical food for me?

I reckon I’m about 3-4 and am needing some inspiration.

Normally
Breakfast: a coissant with some strawberries on the side
Lunch: salad - as an example: containing chickpeas, leaves, tomato, pepper and cucumber.
Dinner: for example tonight I’m having a stirfry this will have peppers, broccoli, carrot, baby corn and mange tout.

Get two or three in at breakfast if you can - 2 x berries and a banana? Appreciate that berries aren’t cheap though.

Then lunch would normally be something bread based! But with a combination of cucumber/tomato/pepper/apple on the side.

Tea, most meals we make have at least 2 portions in - I love adding in spinach to stuff as it wilts down so much. Or if you’re more of a meat/fish kind of person then have at least 2 portions of veg on the side. Sweet potato good as a carb too.

You know, I think I’m massively undercounting. I was looking at the stir fry thinking you’d need a whole pepper sort of size to be one potion, but it looks like a half. And so on.

Here’s my day:

high fruit/nut muesli and a banana and yoghurt

half tin peaches and yoghurt

cheese toastie and an apple

dinner with a couple of fists of veg, often tomatoes/onions too if curry/pasta.

Try to have 3 items of fruit in a day, lots of apples, and salad items at lunchtime, then 2-3 veg at dinner. I also add in random portions of brocolli, cauliflower or peas on the side, pretty much regardless of what the meal is

I always do better on days I get some fruit or veg in for breakfast - so frozen berries and yoghurt, scrambled eggs and mushrooms, porridge with banana etc etc.

I have fresh bilberries, strawberries and blackberries on my breakfast porridge, then a homemade soup of various vegetables at lunch time (about a kilo and a half makes a week’s soups for me), then various veg in my dinner, eg a lamb stew with carrots, leeks, swede, onions, tomatoes.
Alternatively, a mixed salad can cover a lot of bases.

Pulses count, too, as do juice, smoothies, dried, frozen or tinned fruit and veg. Eating crudites and fruit for snacks during the day, yoghurt and fruit for a pudding, or a fruit puree on porridge, hummus, 2 veg for dinner. It's doable, but I don't manage it every day. Today I've had coffee, a nectarine, a packet of crisps and 2 strawberries...

DD does the best. She loves eating, but I'm trying to help her lose a bit of weight, so her lunchbox is stuffed with fruit and veg so she can snack freely. She regularly manages 8 or 9 portions a day! (strawberries, cucumber, cherry tomatoes, apple, banana, carrot sticks, greek yoghurt and berries) then veg for dinner! She's unusual though. DS just eats carbs!

I wake up and have a banana and yoghurt, then snack on berries mid morning, lunch I try and have a salad and carrot or cucumber sticks and dinner I try and have two portions of vegetables. Might snack on more veggies and fruit if needed

Typical day (probably not full portions but variety is maybe more important now?)
Breakfast - eggs, half an avocado, half a tomato on toast
Lunch - tuna pitta with lettuce/salad, cucumber, tomato
Dinner - protein and bulger wheat and quinoa salad - sauerkraut, pickled cabbage and apple, cucumber, spring onions, olives, tomatoes, beetroot,
OR protein and steamed tenderstem, asparagus, carrots, and peas
snacks - strawberries, banana and apple.

Depends if you are talking portions or eat a rainbow gut health/biome variety

My salad for lunch has chickpeas, cucumber, various leaves, tomato, quinoa, peas, edemame beans, mangetout and spring onion. Tonnes of variety but probably only 2 portions.

www.nhs.uk/live-well/eat-well/5-a-day/portion-sizes/

Portions are actually much smaller than you might think, for most cooked veg it’s 3 tablespoons (even less for raw), one medium tomato is a portion, so is 5cm of cucumber. A decent salad should cover at least 4 portions.

A portion is 80g. I have:

80g frozen mixed berries and a pear with mixed seeds, a small handful of nuts and a spoon of natural kefir yogurt for breakfast

Lunch is homemade veg soup (2 portions) or large mixed salad (2-3 portions, yes I do weigh it...) plus an apple and one other piece of fruit in the afternoon.

Having done six by dinner, everything there is extra and usually more veg than anything else so probably average 8 portions a day.

Rarely have fruit at breakfast, but have a banana or apple mid morning;
lunch is a salad - 1/2 Romaine lettuce, 2-3 inches of cucumber, either 1 salad tomato or at least 6 baby toms; 1-2 tablespoons of tinned sweetcorn, 2 spring onions, 2-4 steamed beetroot so around 4-5 portions if not more;
dinner have 2-3 veggies alongside protein.

Plus I’ll often have a bowl of fruit (pear, nectarine and strawberries or some pineapple) as a snack

The 5 a day thing is really out of date. The current thinking is 30 different plant based food per week. Sounds like loads, but includes fruit, veg, nuts, seeds, pulses, beans, and wholegrains. Ideally one food from each of those groups per day

Typical day for me

Breakfast - porridge with soya milk, blueberries, chia seeds, sunflower seeds and some Greek yogurt
Lunch - homemade sweetcorn and red pepper soup, wholemeal pitta with hummus
Snack - apple, 2 satsumas or apple, handful of walnuts
Dinner - roasted veg traybake (mushrooms, peppers, butternut squash, herbs, garlic) with spelt and crumbled feta

Breakfast: yoghurt with berries + seeds + nuts
Lunch: veg soup (in cold weather), cheese, salad etc (warner weather) + an apple
Dinner: something with loads of veg in it or a couple of veg dishes on the side or a salad on the side + two pieces of fruit

So prob around 8 a day

On average i'd say most days I have 7 or 8 portions. But I don't eat breakfast as I fast every day (16:8).

Large salad for lunch. I'm not a fancy salad person 😂 so it's just carrot, cucumber, pepper, celery, tomato, lettuce with eggs, ham or sardines and either rice or bread usually. 3 or 4 portions.

2 x fruit as snacks late afternoon.

2 veg with dinner. Today is jacket with tuna mayo, peas and sweetcorn. Yesterday chicken with egg rice, broccoli and green beans.

Mushroom omelette served with tinned tomatoes and spinach.
Or
Overnight oats with banana, apple and berries

Salad with leaves, cucumber, pepper, chickpeas, beetroot
Or
Home made soup with for eg sweet potato, carrot, beans.

Stir fry (brocolli, cabbage, beansprouts etc)
Or
Sausage and mash with peas, greens, brocolli

I follow the 80 grams is a portion rule and always get mine in, but I have a very boring/repetitive diet as a result.

Breakfast is a smoothie with frozen berries, frozen spinach and a banana (3).

Have a Nakd bar mid morning (1).

Lunch I have a homemade egg and veg slice with kale and spinach (1) carrot and pepper crudités with houmous (1) and some melon (2).

Then regardless of what’s for dinner I make sure I add a portion of veg or salad on the side (1).

Totals 9, and means I’m very chill about dinner as I have already got 8 in by then. But as I said, very boring and repetitive! I mix it up on the weekends but then I don’t tend to hit more than 6 as a result.

Today: bread and hummus with an apple

Lunch is nut sausage roll with beans, cucumber and tomato and then a banana

Dinner is veg cottage pie (carrots, peppers, celery, spinach, tomato, onion, lentils) with swede

According to nutracheck that's 10 portions.

Breakfast: couple handfuls of cherry tomatoes (with an egg and 50gr smoked salmon)
Lunch: big salad - today it's Caesar salad for two plus I've added more veg (plus some protein and roll).
Dinner: whatever it is I at least double the veg (usually steamed mix veg or brócoli Alf asparagus current faves). I try and make the veg half the plate.
If I eat fruit it's a banana.

When I'm eating well (not hoovering down takeaways and cake...) I don't eat breakfast, but pretty much always have a big mixed salad for lunch, then two veg or another salad with evening meal, and pudding is yoghurt with berries. Gets to 7 quite easily.

Id not eat more than two portions of fruit and less if you up the veg.

I get banana and apple at breakfast, or blueberries in place of one other.
Homemade soup for lunch is always what gets my score up - lentils, onion, carrot and celery as a minimum with other veg added different weeks.
Then at least 2 veg for dinner and piece of fruit for pudding or as my PM snack.

I usually have 4-5 but my youngest dS is the best out of the 5 of us for his many portions:

smoothie with croissant/cereal/waffle and chopped strawberries - 2 portions

lunchbox with portion of blueberries, a satsuma, cucumber slices, grape slices among other general lunchbox stuff - 4 portions

dinner whatever is cooked always with 2 portions of veg