5 a day

[Mercy]

Does anyone else struggle with this?
Yesterday I had
Pumpkin soup
Glass of juice
Broccoli and salmon with watercress & cream sauce
I know that doesn't look too bad but I often go weeks with touching a single piece of fruit, especially during the winter months. My children have a better diet than me!

I have more problems with DD - I'm having fruit cravings right now, so not too much of an issue with me!

I've always been confused about how juice can only count as one portion - can anyone explain it to me? Surely you are still gettting the same vitamins and goodness?

According to the NHS leaflet

"A glass of 100% juice (fruit or vegetable juice) counts as 1 portion. But you can only count fruit juice as 1 portion, however much you drink. This is because it has very little fibre. Also, the juicing proces 'squashes' the natural sugars out of the cells that normally contain them, which means that drinking juice in between meals isn't good for your teeth"

I still don't understand!

You aren't getting the fibre. And the juice portion you do have needs to be squeezed, not from concentrate.

Tinned and frozen produce counts too.

I struggle too but lately I have been having, and giving dss freshly squeezed OJ daily. I had a sore throat a while back and everytime that happens I realise I'm not eating enough fruit.

I do eat veggies though.

I don't seem to struggle with this at all most days.
Yesterday I got loads of veg because I made a veg lasagne containing red onion, aubergine, courgette, carrot, celery, mushroom, peppers, tomatoes, sweetcorn, mixed beans and garlic. I also ate 2 or 3 pieces of fruit.

Why not just try having an extra veg with your dinner, and having an apple or banana mid morning?

Another reason why the juice would only count as 1 portion is that it has to be 5 DIFFERENT fruits or veggies, as each one contains slightly different vits. Ideally they should be 5 diff colours.

Thanks Tabs
My problem is that I only like a limited amount of fruit& veg, plus since having ds my diet has been quite poor and I'm beginning to feel (and see) the effect. Also, I've never been a particularly enthusiastic cook and it's become a real chore now.

On the plus side, dh has v recently decided to eat fish again (having been a vegetarian for several years) and I feel slightly more inspired to expand my repetoire. However I do not want to back to a mainly vegetarian diet again. It's sooo boring!

So tonight we are having tomato & basil sauce with mozarella and pasta. I forgot to buy salad so that's it really

Anyone else have any tips/recommendations to get me eating healthily again?

Thank you

I personally find it very easy to eat 5 a day and very often im nearer the 10 a day mark!

Nannyl
Thanks for responding - but how on earth do you do it?!

My children today had raisin with their cereal and fresh juice (2)
Snack was banana and dried apricot (2)
Beans on toast for lunch followed my stewed apple and custard (2 - cos beans count)
Tea was sausage chips and peas followed by plain yogurt with pureed pear (with a little bit of red food colouring as they like pink yogurt) (another 2)

Total of 8 - I was really pleased

The kids do far better than me as I'm not a big fruit eater whereas they have loads. They aren't so good on veg though - only really eat peas or carrots and tomatoes (usually in pasta though).

I'm veering more to 10 than 5.
The fruit&veg guy who delivers to us says I am his best customer.
I just love it all.

Dead easy

Banana,OJ and muesli in the morning

Sandwich with salad for lunch

2 apples and 2 oranges (or similar) in the day

Hot dish with veg and/or salad in the evening

I can easily eay 500g of spinach at a sitting.

(Still overfond of wine though.....Does that count seeing as it's only grapes???)

I often have 5 portions just for breakfast. Dp sometimes refers to me as "the fruit slut." I cut up 3 or 4 different fruits and have them in a bowl with cereal and raisins.

If you don't like fruit, how about raw veg cut up with a dip? Soup is a good one to hide a few different types of veg in, especially if you liquidise it and add a little cream.

What don't you like about eating it? The taste, or texture?

I think for me it's just that we didn't each much fruit as kids (as I recall anyway) although we did eat veg. Hence I'm big on veg and love it but not so keen on fruit - it does taste nice and I love strawberries but would never think 'oh I'll have an apple' if I'm hungry - it would be more like chocolate or biscuits! Eeek! And that's not because we had that as a child either because we didn't.

I think my kids are into fruit because they've always had it - they were weaned on fresh fruit purees and I've always given them fruit as snacks. Today they've had banana, white and black grapes, strawberries, apple and raisins. They've also had a pure juice drink. I've eaten no fruit whatsoever though dinner has tomatoes adn brocolli in it. I'm rubbish.

I read that actually we should be aiming for 8-9 portions a day but the government campaign realises how unrealistic it is to set that as a target.

i aim for 8-9 a day. it's not too hard if you eat fruit or carrots in between meals. i.e. fruit with cereal at breakfast. maybe with fruit juice too.

salad or carrot or veg soup at lunch with sandwiches. then fruit.

2-3 portions of fruit as snack during day. (easy when i'm at work as i just take a load of fruit in.

couple of portions of veg + maybe some salad with dinner.

I could deffo eat sticks of carrot, celery, cucumber etc with a dip - maybe I should start doing that while I'm on here rather than scoffing biscuits.

In the summer I can do fruit more but not in winter - I need chocolate!!

i supplement the fruit and veg with ample chocolate, cheese, wine, carbs etc. probably ruining the good effects of all the fruit and veg.

Gobbledigook. Yes I don't think of fruit as a snack either, even though I expect my children to. I don't like apples, oranges, bananas or grapes (unless made into wine!)which is why it's so hard during winter.
Think I'll have to do the disguising thing as suggested, perhaps smoothies for fruit.

Frannyandzooey - J D Salinger fan? Me too, although I haven't read his books for years.

kama,I feel sluggish and grey.
Really crave green things especially.

TMI alert....

I am always amazed at people who don't have a poo every day and/or those who suffer from constipation.

Don't know the meaning of the word (or PMS come to think of it...)

I find it easy to eat at least five. If we have a dinner we will have carrots, peas, broccoli, beans, sprouts, potatoes, parsnips/swede. Seems excessive but we love our veg. Probably have 5 pieces of fruit a day too. Add in veg in sauces or soups, or salad stuff and we do rather well.

I cannot go a day without fruit and veg. Just feel sluggish.

Still manage to eat crap though and as for the wine... (Am currently trying to lose weight so am being very good I hasten to add.)

I struggle every day to eat 5 portions of fruit and veg. I don't really like fruit but make myself eat an apple and a banana every day at work. I don't eat it at the weekend because there are far more tempting things to eat in the cupboard. In the evening I don't have time to do anything other than eat a ready meal for tea (unless dh is at home and feels like cooking - which is not often) but I try to get the ones which include veg.
I do need to encourage my sil to give her ds more fruit and veg. She proudly anounces that he eats chocolate biscuits, flavoured custard, tinned pasta shapes in tomato sauce, chicken nuggets etc... He's only 8 months. We can't seem to get her to understand that these things are not good for him and not very nutritious.

Gill your kid won't eat good food unless he sees you doing the same.
That is shocking sludge (no other word for it) not fit for an animal,let alone a baby.
Bleeurghhhhh!

sorry..not your kid I see.
It's still horride.
You can see the effects of bad food in the faces of people.
Nothing more tragic than seeing a lovely little healthy kid gradually acquire that doughboy face.

Apples and bananas are quite dull, though, especially supermarket apples. I would recommend a trip to a farm shop or market selling local fruit when it's in season. Otherwise get whatever fruit you can afford from overseas (yes I know we should only be eating local stuff, but there isn't much around now!)

Mercy, yes, I love Salinger, especially F + Z.

Well, you have all shamed me into eating fruit for lunch (apple and grapes). I too always have fruit for the kids, but don't eat it every day.

I probably get more than 5 veg a day - I should really, as I'm vegetarian. I made a big pot of stew - all the veg in the house, beans, lentils, pearl barley and marmite - yesterday and ate it at every meal except breakfast.

I'm pg at the moment and have to admit to a slight craving for Mars bars, too- I had one with breakfast this am.