Low Calorie Snack Ideas
Sometimes when dieting, no matter how hard we try, we get hungry between meals and we get tempted to reach for the biscuit tin. If we’re strong enough to resist this we usually end up with something tasteless and boring so here’s a few snack ideas that are tasty and low calorie.
1. Sugar Free Jelly
Jelly ordinarily has quite a lot of calories due to the high sugar content but if you swap to sugar free such as Hartleys it’s less than 10 calories a serving. They come in ready to eat pots or you can make them yourselves and add pieces of fruit if you like (except pineapple because it won’t set).
2. Baked Banana
This sweet treat is fairly healthy and satisfies a sweet tooth as well. It’s also good if you’ve got some overripe bananas that you’d ordinarily throw away.
To make this you need to peel a banana then put it on some tin foil and sprinkle some brown sugar over the banana. Wrap the tin foil around it so it makes a little parcel then pop in a medium oven for 10 minutes until the banana is soft and the brown sugar has gone syrupy.
3. Hot Chocolate
If you’re really craving a chocolate fix, instead of having a chocolate bar, swap it for a low fat chocolate drink such as Cadbury’s Highlights or Options which comes in a wide variety of flavours such as mint chocolate or white chocolate.
4. Popcorn
Popcorn is full of fibre and really healthy as long as you don’t add lots of other things like butter, sugar or salt to it.
5. Fruit Smoothie
Fruit smoothies are a really good way to get your 5 a day and fill you up. Simply blend your favourite fruits along with a little plain yoghurt.
6. Houmous With Vegetables
Houmous is a dip made of chickpeas and is really tasty and nutritious. Chop up your favourite vegetables like carrots celery or even peppers into crudities and dip them for a healthy snack.
(houmous contains a lot of oil so don’t scoff the lot and try to buy the reduced fat one wherever possible)
7. Sliced Apple with Plain Yoghurt and Honey or Peanut Butter
Apples are full of fibre and these ideas are a twist on the classic healthy snack.
Core and slice the apple into wedges then add a blob of low fat plain yoghurt and a teaspoon of honey.
Alternatively add 2 tsp peanut butter to your apple slices.
8. Trail Mix
Trail mix is full of fibre and also the nuts and dried fruit in there are full of vitamins that you need. Also because the dried fruit is much sweeter you can get your sweet fix although try not to eat the whole bag!
9. Ryvita Biscuits
Ryvita biscuits are high in fibre and are low GI which means they’ll fill you up for a long time and they’re low in fat too. Spread a little low fat cream cheese and a couple of cherry tomatoes for a delicious afternoon snack.
10.Cereal
30g of cereal such as weetabix or special K (not sugary cereals) is a good way of filling up if you can’t find anything else to eat.
