Take the Wholegrain Goodness challenge: testers can win £250 – NON TESTERS: chance to win £150. NOW CLOSED

[AnnMumsnet]

Try something different for your new year's resolutions this year - take part in the WholegrainGoodness.com challenge and be in with a chance of winning supermarket vouchers worth up to £250.

Here's what WholegrainGoodness.com, a not-for-profit campaign aiming to inspire people to eat more wholegrain, say about the challenge: "Most of us know it's important to eat at least five portions of fruit and veg every day, but did you know you should be eating more wholegrain to keep you healthy too? Nutritionists encourage eating at least three servings of wholegrain a day. But despite the nutritional benefits, national surveys show that 95% of adults don't do this, and almost a third don't eat any at all. So take part in our wholegrain challenge to help us inspire mums to get more nutritious wholegrain into their family's diet and we'll enter you into a prize draw"

The challenge is to include wholegrain in at least ONE meal or snack for the family per day for two weeks and then to add your feedback here by Sunday 9th February to be entered into a prize draw.

• "Official testers" (already selected) can win a £250 supermarket voucher of their choice

• "Non-official testers" (open to all UK MNers with at least one child aged between 2 and 16 living at home) can win a £150 supermarket voucher of their choice

You can use the variety of wholegrain foods available, such as wholegrain breads, breakfast cereals, pasta, rice, flour and even popcorn. And feel free to take part if you and your family already eat wholegrains. Visit WholegrainGoodness.com if you need help finding out what wholegrains are and to see what a serving of wholegrain looks like, as well as to get recipe ideas for inspiration and some top tips. If you have any further questions about wholegrain, ask their independent registered dietitian or go to the wholegrain FAQs (frequently asked questions) page, which we'll keep updating. You can get a free recipe booklet and sign up to their e-news alerts too.

Please add your feedback here on the following:

~ Let us know what you think of wholegrains and if you knew about the benefits already or not

~ Have you tried out any WholegrainGoodness.com recipes? How did you and your family find them?

~ Please add any other comments, recipes, tips or ideas you have too - we'd love to hear from you at various stages of the challenge

Thanks
MNHQ

Please note: comments made on this thread may be reproduced by Wholegrain Goodness (AHDB)

I try to eat a healthy, low GI diet as I'm diabetic so I'm used to eating wholegrain foods and looking out for them.

Sadly I'm not a tester for this challenge but it was great to discover the wholegrain website and I have tried a few recipes on there already (and have bookmarked several others). I did the Vegetable & Salsa Verde Scone Pizza although I adapted it slightly, using olive oil instead of the rapeseed oil and left off the chives as I don't have any fresh this time of year. I also used frozen spinach which I cooked in a pan first (to defrost it). My husband wasn't mad keen on the base but ate it all!

I think it is quite easy to incorporate wholegrains into your diet, we buy very few processed foods.

~ Let us know what you think of wholegrains and if you knew about the benefits already or not. Yes I did know about the benefits and used to eat more ie always ate the pasta (never white) and bread. Have started to eat it more again with this challenge and it's fine - soon adjust to the taste of brown pasta and get used to it.

~ Have you tried out any WholegrainGoodness.com recipes? How did you and your family find them? Not properly yet but have started having porridge for breakfast more often (used to be once a week or so before the challenge) and added flaked almonds instead of ground (got the idea from one of the recipes)

~ Please add any other comments, recipes, tips or ideas you have too - we'd love to hear from you at various stages of the challenge. Porridge I have always added things too - usually sultanas, cinnamon and honey - makes it really nice. I usually prepare the porridge the night before so put oats, sultanas and cinnamon in a pan with the cold water in it - this means its ready to just cook for 5m the next morning and the sultanas and oats are nicely swollen. I quite often add a dollop of greek yoghurt to serve - my toddler loves it.

First of all thank you for choosing me to take part, and for the voucher. Not done a full weekly shop since I recieved the voucher, but have already made some conscious decisions to choose wholegrain products when topping up with buys. Have bought wholegrain bread (which I do buy sometimes anyway, but this challenge has encouraged me to choose it more often!!), chosen Shreddies instead of some of the sugary cereals my children like me to buy (I had actually forgotten how good Shreddies are!), and have chosen wholegrain rice and pasta rather than the white variety. Will be doing a full shop later this week/early next week, so will make most purchases then :-)

Tester here

Thanks for the voucher. Using it I bought wholegrain bread, wholegrain spaghetti, wholegrain fusilli, porridge, wholegrain sandwich thins and brown rice.

~ Let us know what you think of wholegrains and if you knew about the benefits already or not

I did generally know that wholegrains are better than processed white foods but had also heard - and I don't know if this is true or not - that wholegrains are not a good idea for babies / toddlers as they have too much fibre. Be great to know if this is true. So I usually buy them 50:50 bread.

~ Have you tried out any WholegrainGoodness.com recipes? How did you and your family find them?

Yes - the baked onion soup is absolutely gorgeous, very rich and hearty. And a surprising addition of stealth wholegrain flour. The kids loved the lamb and quinoa "burgers" and the Oaty Pork in Cider is really delicious.

~ Please add any other comments, recipes, tips or ideas you have too - we'd love to hear from you at various stages of the challenge

Haven't tried any yet but High Fearnley Whittingstall had some oat recipes in the Guardian recently www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/2014/jan/17/oat-recipes-hugh-fearnley-whittingstall

so many new posters since i last checked in! whenever i see someone reaching for the wholegrain option in the shops these days i'd like to think that they're taking part in the challenge as well. it's been somewhat frantic over here because i got loads of work now. i'm freelance and it seems to be either feast or famine and the challenge then is to make sure that it doesn't become famine for the whole family... we're doing good on the wholegrain front though. i find that once you replaced all the white bread etc. with the wholegrain stuff it becomes a non-brainer, really.

last night we had the carrot soup with farro - i shall not be making this again, something went terribly wrong and we ended up with orangey-brown stuff the consistency of old play-doh surprisingly it tasted ok though. DH has come up with a way of making the most of stale wholegrain bread: blitzing it in the food blender gives you wholegrain breadcrumbs, yeah! and blackeyedsusan i remember reading somewhere that you can do the same with oats to make oatmeal, haven't tried it though, so wouldn't konw if it really works.

that would be helpful cutted up grape. the oat meal was v expensive compared to the value oats.

maketeanotwar, I wonder about that with giving brown rice or pasta to my children as well, so what I've been doing is mixing white pasta or rice (using up what is in the cupboard) with the brown stuff about half way through the cooking time. I find it a bit tastier than the heaviness of brown rice or pasta.

By the way, good Scottish recipe to use up some oatmeal as you celebrate Burns' Night tomorrow. Of course, the vast amount of cream etc might cancel out any wholegrain related goodness!

allrecipes.co.uk/recipe/2852/raspberry-cranachan.aspx

non tester here. i always prefer wholegrains, i don't eat much pasta or rice though. i like wholemeal bread and also i switched to wholegrain porridge a few months ago and found it was much more filling and had a better taste.

i haven't yet checked out the recipies. the main problem i find with wholegrains is the cost - plain is simply much cheaper. for the porridge you can get a massive bag for 75p in tesco, but for wholegrain its £1.99 at least ( although often 2 for £3) so it is hard on a budget.

We eat whole grains every day as I had to start eating in a more low GI way to get pregnant and never really stopped. Since I'm the main cook, I generally tend to cook things I would want to eat!

I do notice the difference when we do eat too many non-wholegrain products, such as at Christmas when there's a lot of 'treats' around. We all seem to get hungry quicker and everyone's bowels seem a little out of sorts...

ok DS actually prefers wholemeal bread ao that is a good start. But have made more of a concious effort to buy it.

DS has been sampling some other cereals too which he is more than happy too but think he went a bit overboard as it was shooting straight through him, ahem!

We plan to have some meals this weekend going to use some recipes form the book we got with the voucher.

Everyone has had wholemeal bread this week and DH and I have been having the muesli.

DH is a white bread ham sandwich man but have a sneaky feeling he will enjoy the meals this weekend!

I also think it's annoying that some things cost more too.

Will report back again after the weekend when we've tried more!

We have swapped to wholegrain bread, wholegrain cereals which have gone down great and we have decided that these are going to stay!. We tried the pasta but wasn't convinced at all :(

~ Let us know what you think of wholegrains and if you knew about the benefits already or not

We try to avoid wholegrains to be honest. I have Crohn's and it is aggravated by fibre so we don't have too much in our diet. I encourage my daughter to eat more than me, but she eats most of her food at nursery and they include lots of wholegrains so it's not really a problem.

~ Have you tried out any WholegrainGoodness.com recipes? How did you and your family find them?

No - see above.

Wholemeal pitta for lunch again. Have just made a new batch of oat & blueberry muffins for the next 3 weeks breakfasts and this time made them with rapeseed oil so will see how those go down next week.
Dh and I had baked Camembert with wholemeal baguette which worked just as well as white. I tried to get some farro in Booths but couldn't find anything.

We are away this weekend so will be harder to find wholemeal food. Have bought wholemeal bagels in aldi and we've got more cheese scones from the booklet. Not sure we will find much eating out though

We've really been enjoying our meals since we swapped to whole grains. I made enchiladas last night and used whole grain seeded wraps. All agreed they improved the taste. Tomorrow's whole grain will partly come courtesy of haggis, as well as our cereals and whole meal bread sandwiches.

The only fail so far has been grape nuts. I found them okay, but the DDs were repulsed.....

I always used to feed the little darlings wholemeal bread, but now they're teenagers they've decided that sliced white is the way to go - yuck! I'm putting my foor down and have decided to start making my own bread again - half white & half wholemeal for now. I've also started mixing brown rice with white rice, but you've got to get the cooking times right with this!
I agree with other posters though - the wholegrain products are more expensive.

We already eat quite a lot of wholegrains - we have porridge made from wholegrain oats most days, we buy wholegrain bread, and we have wholegrain couscous. For this challenge I have also bought wholegrain bagels, wholemeal pasta, and quinoa. I looked up the wholegrain challenge recipes and have made the burgers and the lamb and quinoa patties.

The kids (5 and 2) loved the wholegrain bagels although I noticed they fill them up more; whereas I would expect 5yo usually to eat a whole bagel and 2yo to eat half, they didn't eat as much either day we had them. I'm wondering whether for the kids this is a good thing - for me the more filling nature of the wholegrains definitely is a benefit!

They didn't seem to notice the difference between the wholemeal pasta and our usual white. I did notice a difference but quite liked the extra chewiness and flavour of the wholemeal pasta - I didn't think it would be so nice with a creamy sauce though.

The burgers went down very well - the lamb patties are tomorrow so we'll see! I have had quinoa before but never cooked it myself, I am enjoying looking up lots of recipes for using it.

Like others the one real downside seems to be the cost, I noticed the difference between my usual buys and the wholegrain alternatives and there do not seem to be so many offers. But on the other hand oats, lentils and barley are cheap as chips and if a handful of barley in a shepherd's pie makes the meat go further and makes it a bit healthier then it's all good...!

So far have just made a few changes. When you look around its quite interesting that alot of things i was buying already were wholegrain but just hadn't taken much notice before.

Some of the recipes looked good so hoping to try a couple of those this weekend.

Porridge in the morning we all eat it, I have mine with honey.

Tried a whole wheat multigrain bread, but it hurt my teeth, so Im going to our local baker for his Low GI bread, its fairly yummy & I cant remember why we went back to white last time.

Ive aslso in a moment of enthusiasm bought some quinoa flakes, any one any idea what I do with them?

In some ways the challenge has been straight forward in the sense that we eat a lot of wholegrains already in wholegrain bread (our local baker sells an excellent one packed with whole grains and lots of seeds too), wholegrain crackers and wholegrain cereals. So that easily covers one meal a day that way.

But then beyond that I really wanted to try new things too and that's when i realised how unsure i was of what was wholegrain. So I'm going to look up some more ideas on the wholegrain website so we can make things a bit more interesting this coming week. I'd like to try quinoa as we've eaten that before but haven't had it for ages.

Also oats are great to use in recipes so will make more of that.

I definitely think that the benefits of wholegrain are very 'real' and noticeable. Our son needs to eat low GI food as he gets very hungry every two hours and it makes such a difference if he eats a wholegrain cracker or wholegrain bread vs white bread or plain white crackers. It helps him feel fuller and stops him getting grumpy with hunger.

End of week one (nearly), swapped the white bread and half and half bread for wholewheat, which the kids have taken too surprisingly easily, made some black bean soup for tomorrow's lunch, been having porridge for breakfast coz it's been so easy in the slow cooker, and made a great peach cobbler with the oats. Going to make a dish tomorrow for supper which involves chicken breasts, wholewheat spaghetti, the usual condensed cream of chicken soup and a slow cooker, which I couldn't live without. Finding that wholegrain has slotted unnoticeably into our diet, and I'm surprised just how much fun we're having trying new dishes, rather than the same ones on a cycle. Looking forward to next week!

I love wholegrains. I switched from refined foods about 17 years ago because I had IBS and it was such a huge improvement, I haven't looked back. There have been times when I've tried a gluten free diet but was pretty grouchy and low on energy, and so i do prefer and feel I need some wholegrain foods and will almost always buy wholegrain and unrefined foods over less nutritious choices.

Last Saturday: porridge for family breakfast. Wholemeal rolls and soup (with bulgar wheat and oats) for lunch. Popcorn with DVD in the evening.
Sunday: wholemeal bread at breakfast. Bacon sandwiches in wholemeal rolls for lunch. Wholemeal pasta with dinner. squidgy Chocolate brownie made with wholemeal flour for pudding.

Monday. Flaked/cracked/rolled quinoa with dried fruits and nuts etc in home made breakfast muesli. Wholemeal sliced bread with egg for lunch. (DD comes home for lunch). Oatcakes available (and eaten) as after school snack all week. Wholemeal whole couscous (Merchant Gourmet) with chicken and vegetables for dinner.

Tuesday: Wholegrain cheerios at breakfast time. Oats and yogurt at breakfast; Wild, red and wholegrain rice with stew for dinner.

Wednesday. Wholemeal pasta in tuna pasta bake (dinner). Home made oaty chocolate bars for pudding.

Thursday. Quinoa with spicy chicken casserole.

Friday. Wholemeal bagels for breakfasts.

Saturday (tomorrow) Wholemeal pitta and dips for lunch (with cheese, salad, etc.)
Sunday: Planning on making wholemeal scones, biscuits and wholemeal pizza bases. Porridge for breakfasts.
Monday: wholemeal bagels for breakfast, wholemeal bread with eggs for lunch. Hope to try out the barley risotto recipe for dinner.
Tuesday: chicken curry with veggies, wholegrain rice and pitta bread.
Wednesday: grainy yogurts for breakfast, and choccy oaty breakfast bars.
Thursday: Pumpernickel and cream cheese for breakfasts and after school snacks. mackerel and wholegrain rice fishcakes with wholegrain couscous for dinner.
Friday: Chili con carne, wholemeal tortillas and red rice.

Yesterday we had wholemeal bread sandwiches with extra raw veg on the side for lunch - we like the "value" Sainsburys and Tesco bread as it isn't too dry - Asda 2 for £1 wholemeal loaves, I find are unbelievably dry and not even very nice for toast. We had lentil, spinach and potato curry with brown rice for dinner, we all like brown rice anyway so that was easy.

For lunch today, my daughter and I had soup with a wholemeal part-baked baguette - I had not seen these in the supermarket before, we always buy the white ones (despite normally eating wholemeal bread). I was keen to see what it would be like as we love the white ones. My daughter and I both really liked it - I didn't find it any heavier or drier than the white and I would definitely buy the wholemeal version again.

We have made a few changes recently, using wholemeal pasta which we find is tastier and more filling, wholemeal pitta bread and more porridge for breakfast...which is easy in this cold weather. As we've been using rapeseed oil I tried the carrot cake recipe last night, its lovely! I use basmati or brown rice these days too. Every little helps!