best low calorie treats,food swaps,unexpected diet foods?

[StoneFoxMama]

I offer up Alpro hazelnut milk- 13 cals for 125ml great for filling milky tea and coffee. Also good to add to options/highlights.

Organic peanut butter with no added sugar: around 100-125 cals for a 20g tablespoon, full of nutrients and protein, very filling on a rice cake and stop cravings and it feels good and satisfying to eat fat. Also add half a banana or sliced strawberries and it's so pudding like.

Options or highlights hot choc sachets, I've got fudge and caramel flavour 39 calories or add almond milk for an extra 13. Creamy and delicious, but contains lots of sweeteners so only use it when it would stop me breaking the diet.

Alpro Smooth chocolate soya pudding: 104 calories for a generous pot of creamy chocolate goodness, they don't taste like 104 cals! Throw in raspberries.

Sugar free jelly, again sweeteners galore so just for a sweet kick to keep on track. Something ridiculous like 4-10 calories.

Avocados- good fats, filling, nutritious, about 75-125 for half depending on size, spread it on something, combine it with egg for a protein boost.

Kallo dark choc rice cakes 55 cals.

Any more suggestions?

Obviously I normally try to get as much bang nutritionally for my calorie buck, but it's nice to have things in your arsenal to stop you going 'fuck it' and to keep you on track. I find it much easier to stick to a diet and persevere with occasional stuff like this, as well as occasional real treat days where calories don't count! Gimme your treats that don't break the diet please?

I was going to say options hot choc and sugar free jelly!

Popcorn. Loads of interesting flavours you can buy nowadays and a big bowl is only 100 cal

Fage 0% fat Greek yoghurt - lovely and creamy, high protein and no sweeteners - 56 cals per 100g

Fat free cottage cheese - as above but 65cals

I didn't even think of popcorn, it's practically air isn't it so that would make sense.
I need to keep my calcium levels up as an ex cheese & full fat milk monster. Creamy yogurt sounds great and I love cottage cheese, do you think the pineapple one is ok? It's probably quite sugary but I remember it being amazing.
Thanks, keep them coming I feel a shopping trip coming on.

Tesco do an amazing bannofee muffin dessert low-cal thing. 156cals. Full of sweetener but really delicious!

Low calorie things that I actually like include pickled onions, gherkins, raw carrots, big glasses of sparkling water with ice and a slice of lime, ryvita, thin slices of rare roast beef, cold roast chicken, mussels, sundried tomatoes, most of the Pret A Manger soups are low in calories, frozen yogurt, fruity ice lollies.

I wouldn't touch an artifically sweetened drink or pudding with a barge pole though!

I know mintyy they are grim. I'm really off sweeteners after the initial desperate stage of adjusting my calories. I've never used them before and was always a clean eating freak but that all went out the window in the first few weeks of dieting in order to drop my calorie intake.
Pickled onion Lidls version of monster munch, 91 calories and taste naughty!

Now I've adjusted its all about portion control and the most nutrient dense food but it is useful in the early days to have crutches.

I'm living off skinless chicken, avocados, hummous, tomatoes, olives, eggs, cottage cheese, homemade coleslaw and Turkey, mushroom and chickpea coconut curry (no rice) ham hock, peanut butter, corn thins, beetroot, tuna and sweet corn. No bread, potatoes, sugar, sweeteners and occasional small portion of rice, whole wheat wrap and a mean gluten free pizza base.

Anyone got any recipes, under 400 would be good?
Thanks everyone

Thanks for all these great snack ideas! Also: miso soup if you like it, great at under 50Cal for a mug when you need a savoury hit.

The Hairy Bikers' spanish-style chicken bake is 370Cal per portion, I made it last night and it is delicious as well as super-easy to make!

Home made apple sauce. I add it to smoothies, eat it as dessert, layer it with cottage cheese or Greek yoghurt and top it with Granola. Really sweet even though I don't add any sugar.

StoneFox, from your ingredient list you could make a great soup with the Ham hock as your base. Onion, carrot, chick peas, ham hock, passata, cook for half an hour, remove hock then blend with a stick blender. Add garlic, chilli if you are that way inclined

I'm loving apples at the moment, such a good idea. Might add a bit of cinnamon and pretend it's Apple pie!

Ham hock soup sounds great, and incidentally I'm a chilli fanatic, so absolutely that way inclined. I've been cooking the ham hock in guiness and making a glaze so it's all sticky, it really doesn't taste as low calorie as it is.

Any leftovers get made into a pea, mint and ham hock gluten free quiche for dh' s packed lunch box and I don't eat that due to the pastry, but I've just realised a crustless ham hock quiche would be diet friendly. Sorry dh, time to share!

Hairy bikers are great, their chicken Korma is quite nice and I'm a curry purist who cooks at least one new variation a week. Tandoori chicken tonight, Jamie Oliver's recipe adapted with low fat yogurt and skinless chicken only about 120 calories a piece with a vegetable curry on the side.

Any more recipes or ideas welcome!

I second popcorn. Also, I have 10g of roasted almonds for a quick pick me up of 63kcals and they are slow release.
Vodka lime and soda if I want alcohol (I measure out the vodka though!).
We do a curry with red lentils, chicken, sweet potato, low fat coconut milk, couole of tablespoons of curry paste (we use tikka) and an oxo. Just chuck it in a pan and simmer until sauce is thick and potato soft. My seven year old loves it!
We had a crustless quiche and salad for tea last night. We had boiled new potatoes in it instead. Everyone loved it!
Love the skinny cow mint ice creams for a 100 kcal pudding.

Great tips simply I'm a vodka convert, though I sneaked in a large glass of red last night due to a very good day and another half a stone down and it made me very drunk as it's been so long and I suppose that half a stone used to help soak up the alcohol!

Sweet potatoes are amazing, I use them all the time, so much lower in calories than they seem. I did a sweet potato, green bean, sweet corn, mushroom, onion and tomato dry curry to go with tandoori chicken and it was so filling and I didn't miss the rice at all.

Newest discoveries are poppadoms 36 calories each, yo sushi crispy chilli squid 145 calories and tastes so naughty, I have it with the salmon nigiri which is 92 calories. Yo sushi actually is great as the menu had all the calories written on it and nice small portions.

I made a pretty boring veg soup but it worked out less than 100 calories for a massive bowl, so really useful for lunch when you want a nice supper.

My favourite snacks are popcorn, strawberries, raspberries, bananas, walnuts and almonds.

Fill a bowl with raw spinach leaves, chopped tomato, cucumber and radishes. Season and squirt with lime juice.

Grill a wrap or pitta bread and break into pieces to simulate nachos.

Microwave a Sainsbury veggie hotdog (from the frozen section) and chop that in too. Don't worry they taste much better than they sound :)

Also Sainsbury tinned Be Good to Yourself spicy lentil and tomato soup is a tasty lunch for about 230 calories.

Mini milk - 30 calories. My 9pm treat!

These are brilliant, thanks! ReallyNotMe I think I'd rather eat a veggie hotdog than a real one, at least it wouldn't contain eyelids and scrotums!

Those veggie fingers (most supermarkets do their own brands) are only about 50 calories each too.

Keep them coming, I'm recovering from illness, not the most pleasant way to drop a couple of pounds. So anything gentle on the stomach would be good mrsjackson a mini milk is just what the doctor ordered!

I'm addicted to carrot and humus at the moment. I buy one with chilli and red pepper and it's really satisfying a craving for crunchy and savoury snacks.

Mint aero biscuits 99 calories - I have one every night.

Frozen grapes are nice, takes you ages to eat them. Soleros are very low in calories, a full size one is something like 90. Roast chickpeas are good and very high protein.

maths I also noticed aero pudding pots, hazelnut flavour were something like 99 calories too so think I'm going to have to investigate!

vivacia good call, I've got loads of tahini too so going to make a batch, I'm a massive chickpea fan.

ellli I'm not sure I could handle frozen grapes, my teeth are sensitive and I can't cope with biting, but I could manage a Solero, I can't get my head around them being so low calorie, such creamy goodness!

The chocolate mousse lighter at sainsburys are even less - 72 calories. Don't know if you've seen this book but it's brilliant - lists the calories of foods in the supermarkets - so for example you just look down the list of 'frozen chips' and it tells you the calories of all the different brands, including supermarkets own. www.amazon.co.uk/gp/aw/d/1904512143/ref=pd_aw_sim_14_1?refRID=123HA4HD6E1KTJWNYB7Y

Just had a meringue nest with strawberries, if you prepare it half an hour early the juice makes the meringue nice and sticky. Only about 80 calories.

Does anyone know how to make roasted chickpeas?

I'm going to try roasted beetroot and sweet potato crisps this week I think, toss slices in a little vinegar, salt and olive oil or other healthy fat and roast in the oven.

Adding meringues and chocolate mousse to the list of foods it's ok to fantasise about because I can actually eat them.

Thanks everyone, your tips are keeping me going!

I'm totally with you - I can't resist having something sweet in the evening after a long day and I also find it really hard to tell the kids that they have to have fruit for pudding. They always want ice cream. Anyway, if you are anything like me you will probably be grateful for the new no sugar, low calorie ice cream I buy at Waitrose. I eat it almost every day and I don't feel guilty at all. It's called Oppo Ice Cream and is 49 calls per scoop & totally hits the spot. No more popcorn for me!