Please note, this post contains affiliate links. It won’t cost you anything extra to use the links and opinions are all my own.

Vegan pancake recipe ingredients:

• 120 g (or 1 cup) of self raising flour
• 1 banana (the riper it is, the sweeter the pancakes will be)
• 250 ml (or 1 cup) of water
• 1 tbsp of apple cider vinegar
• A little coconut oil
• Optional topping ingredients: cinnamon and fresh lemon

Method:

1. Put one cup of self raising flour in a bowl.
2. In a separate bowl mash a banana?.
3. Whisk the banana with 1 cup of water.
4. Then add 1 tbsp of apple cider vinegar to the water and banana mix.
5. Slowly add the liquid to the flour, mixing as you go.
6. When the mixture is ready melt a little coconut oil in a hot (but not too hot) frying pan ?.
7. Wait a couple of minutes, then ladle in dollops of the mixture.
8. Leave them to cook for a couple of minutes on each side and then serve freshly cooked.
9. Optional: Serve with a sprinkle of cinnamon and a squeeze of lemon?!

What to do with excess vegan pancake batter

If you make too much batter, I like to do one of two things.

1. Either I freeze the batter to use another time.
2. Or I make it into pancakes and freeze the pancakes to use at a later date.

You can keep the batter or the pancakes in the fridge to use the next day. But I find that it is easy to forget to use up the leftovers before they go off. In the freezer you don’t have to rush to use them.

Tip: to make it easy to use up the leftovers a bit at a time, freeze the pancake batter in icecube trays. Then you can defrost it as needed. If the pancakes are already made, open freeze them. This means lay them out so that they aren’t touching anything other than a tray in the freezer. When they are frozen store them in an airtight container in the freezer. This prevents the pancakes from sticking together and being difficult to separate once frozen.

Want some more vegan snack ideas? Check out these healthy homemade vegan and zero waste snacks!

The post You will love this simple, delicious, vegan pancake recipe appeared first on Eco Thrifty Living.

Vegan YouTubers that are budget friendly

Rachel Ama

Over half a million YouTube subscribers watch Rachel share her journey of living a vegan life, her vegan recipes and food reviews. I love her enthusiasm. She shares some amazing looking Carribean recipes. Rachel has a series of £1 easy vegan student meals. She also has another series where non vegans try vegan food, which is a great one to watch if you are a meatlover or if you know a meatlover. Seeing people try vegan food and not being able to tell the difference can make meatlovers curious about trying it. Sometimes she mixes a recipe in with some vegan beauty / exercise/ day in her life.

View her vegan YouTube channel here

Cheap Lazy Vegan

A channel all about vegan food, from budget friendly recipes to her challenges. There is lots of Asian food on this channel. This vegan YouTuber has 700K subscribers.

View her YouTube channel

Madeleine Olivia

Over half a million subscribers watch her cheap and easy vegan recipes as well as her videos on minimalism and sustainability

View her YouTube channel

Comfort food Vegan YouTubers

Gaz Oakley

With over 1 million subscribers Gaz posts weekly vegan recipes, everything from vegan cheesecake to vegan gravy.

View his YouTube channel

The Happy Pear

The Happy Pear upload 1 vegan recipe a week, from deserts to curries. They come in at just under half million subscribers .

View their YouTube channel

BOSH.TV

193K subscribers. 2 guys that went vegan. British. Lots of comfort food. Older videos don’t show them in it, but the newer ones too and their video about lentils made me laugh – what words can you rhyme with lentils? Their channel is well worth a watch!

Veganism plus more!

Sustainably Vegan

With over quarter of a million subscribers, this channel is not just about vegan food but also about ethical fashion, zero waste, minimalism as well as vegan recipes. Encouraging a low-impact lifestyle

View her YouTube channel

So there you have it – 7 great vegan YouTubers to check out and get inspired by!

The post 7 Great Vegan YouTubers you need to watch appeared first on Eco Thrifty Living.

Did you know the flowers and young leaves of a courgette plant are also edible? This list includes recipe suggestions for how to use them up too.

Tip: bookmark the post so you can come back for inspiration, the next time you are in the courgette cooking mood!

Note: this post contains affiliate links, but all opinions are my own.

Savoury courgette recipe options

Vegan recipes

1. Courgette Salad – slice baby courgettes thinly and sprinkle over your salad. Alternatively spiralise the courgettes and mix with salad leaves. Drizzle over some oil and vinegar, or salad dressing of your choice.
2. Courgette Chutney
3. Courgette Pickle
4. Breaded courgettes: Coat in oil and then in breadcrumbs and then bake
5. Thinly slice and sprinkle over a pizza
6. Courgetti spaghetti/ noodles. Spiralise (I love my Oxo Good Grips Spiraliser) then steam them for 5 minutes, or fry in a little oil. Use them as a noodle base, or add spiralised courgette to salad raw.
7. Roasted. Mix with peppers (quartered), mushrooms and carrots (chopped in half if large ones) toss in olive oil and season with Italian herbs. Roast for around 30 mins at 180 to 200 degrees C (turn over the veg after 15 mins).
8. Ratatouille
9. Slice thinly and dehydrate, to either use later or eat as a snack.
10. Grate or dice, blanche in hot water and freeze to use another time.

Vegetarian recipes

1. Zuchinni pea fritters
2. Spicy courgette koftas
3. Courgette / zucchini souffle
4. Courgette lasagne Courgette lasagne
5. Creamy courgette soup
6. Courgette and lemon tagliatelle. Slice the courgette thinly, then fry in a little oil and garlic. Next add to the cooked tagliatelle (cook 90g raw tagliatelle per person), with a squeeze of lemon juice and a drizzle of oil. Add salt and pepper to taste and grate over some parmesan.
7. Melting cheese courgettes
8. Courgette risotto
9. Courgette/ zuchinni bread
10. Canneloni filling – grate the courgette and mix with ricotta or cottage cheese. Cover with a passata pasta sauce and bake
11. Pistou soup
12. Courgette and red onion bhajis

Sweet dessert courgette recipes

1. Spelt, zucchini and lemon cake
2. Gluten free courgette chocolate cake
3. Blueberry zucchini muffins
4. Courgette and lime cake
5. Courgette jam
6. Courgette lemon drizzle cake
7. Dairy free chocolate zucchini cupcakes
8. Banana zucchini muffins
9. Zucchini chocolate chip cookies

Courgette flower and leaf recipes

I have always wanted to learn how to cook courgette flowers and once I got going with it, I got a bit addicted. Most courgette / zucchini flower recipes involve deep frying them. But sometimes I tear them into pieces and sprinkle them over salads raw. I love the splash of colour they add to the salad leaves!

Always use the male flowers, unless you are picking a baby courgette with a flower attached. You can identify the male flowers because they have no courgette attached. I wait until they have closed up because the closed flower will keep the stuffing contained. Carefully pull the stem and stamen out of the flower at the bottom, leaving a circular opening. Give it a wash and then it is ready to be stuffed

1. Deep fried courgette flowers stuffed with ricotta and herbs
2. Fried courgette flowers with honey and vinegar
3. Traditional Italian Fried Zucchini Blossoms
4. Finely chop a baby courgette, mix with a dollop of houmous and a chopped up mushroom. Stuff the prepared courgette flower with the mix. Then make up a simple batter of flour and water. Coat the courgette flower in the batter and then deep fry until crispy.
5. Make a simple batter as above and cover a washed baby courgette complete with flower still attached (but pull out the guts of the flower) and deep fry.

Take it one step further and check out this article with various recipes for courgette leaves: How to cook zucchini leaves

The post Love courgettes? Feast on these delicious ways to use them up! appeared first on Eco Thrifty Living.

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In this article I’ve rounded up some delicious sounding condensed milk recipes. So if you have a can lingering that needs using up, or find yourself with a bit left over, you will know what to do with it!

Oh and if you don’t have any condensed milk yet, I discovered that you can get vegan condensed coconut milk*. Useful to know if you are on a plant based diet, or have a dairy allergy!

Condensed milk recipes which use up a whole tin

Fudge

I never realised how easy it is to make fudge until I had a try recently. We had various experiments and I can’t remember the exact recipe we used, but BBC Good Food has a popular recipe for condensed milk fudge.

You can pimp it up however you fancy. We made some fudge and added crushed up mini eggs* as a topping. I added them when the fudge was semi cool. They melted a little, but then stayed in place once it was all cooled down. I think this fudge would make an excellent gift e.g. for Christmas

You could also try this No Bake Unicorn Fudge, which is a bit different to traditional fudge, but looks like a lot of fun!

Banoffee pie

This condensed milk banoffee pie recipe from A Mummy Too looks delicious!

It has a biscuit crumb base. The recipe suggests using graham crackers or digestive biscuits. However you could take it in a slightly different direction by using up whichever biscuits you have available/ need using up. I hate waste and this is a great way to use up all kinds of biscuit crumbs!

Tip: If you want to make it vegan and dairy free make the following swaps:

1. Swap regular whipping cream for coconut whipping cream*
2. Use vegan condensed coconut milk* instead of normal condensed milk and
3. Use your favourite dairy free spread instead of butter

Caramel dulche de leche

This caramel is so simple to make and will use up a whole can or tin of condensed milk, with no other added ingredients! Check out the full recipe here: Caramel dulche de leche (it sounds much fancier than boiled condensed milk, doesn’t it!)

Condensed milk cheesecake recipe

Have you got lemons that need using up, as well as condensed milk? This baked lemon curd cheesecake sounds amazing. After clicking the link, scroll down to the bottom of the post for the full recipe.

Again if you want to make this vegan/ dairy free, you can get a vegan cream cheese substitute* and make vegan lemon curd*. It is difficult to get hold of unsalted vegetable spread, but coconut oil* is unsalted and could be used as a substitute for butter

Chocolate truffles

When I was a kid, I loved making chocolate truffles with my mum. Sometimes we coated them in chocolate sprinkles like in this recipe, but often we just rolled them in cocoa powder.

I love that this condensed milk recipe for truffles uses up digestive biscuits. Again remember that you can substitute them for any biscuits you like – make use of what you have first! Another option is to use up weetabix like in this recipe: double choc balls (scroll down for it)

To make it dairy free/ plant based, swap to condensed coconut milk* and use coconut oil* instead of butter.

Homemade icecream

This is another one of those condensed milk recipes that is really easy to make: condensed milk icecream. All you need is whipping cream and condensed milk to make this recipe! Substitute with vegan versions as required.

Alternatively you could try out Thrifty Lesley’s rhubarb and chocolate icecreams, which use half a tin of condensed milk each.

Condensed milk recipes that use up less than a whole tin

Flapjacks

We always have loads of porridge oats* at home, because we buy them in bulk . So flapjacks are an easy go to recipe for us. I haven’t tried making a condensed milk version, but this Raspberry and White Chocolate Flapjacks condensed milk recipe sounds so good!

The recipe contains unsalted butter, condensed milk and white chocolate. If you want to make it dairy free and plant based, make the usual swaps. Plus you can follow this recipe to make your own vegan white chocolate using coconut milk powder* and cocoa butter*. Or look in your local supermarket to see if they have any dairy free chocolate buttons.

Tip: I find in general that chocolate buttons are cheaper than chocolate chips. If you want them to be a bit smaller for a recipe, just break them in half or into quarters.

Thai red curry

Don’t fancy making a dessert? This Thai Red Curry, doesn’t use up much condensed milk, so it would be perfect for using up some leftover condensed milk from another recipe!

Roti

Roti’s are a sweet dish which involves making a type of flat bread, frying it and drizzling over toppings of your choice! This Roti recipe contains just a little condensed milk, which is great if you just have a little to use up!

Condensed milk doughnuts

Doughnut fans will love these condensed milk doughuts ! It uses up 3/4 cup of condensed milk. So you will have some leftover from a tin to use in another recipe.

So there you have it 10 delicious condensed milk recipes! Plus tips on how you can make some of them plant based and dairy free if needed.

Birthday cake icing

Mrs Mummypenny made some delicious looking cakes for her son’s birthday and topped them with condensed milk icing. Check out the recipe here: how to save money on a boys birthday party

For more ideas for how to use up leftover or excess foods, check out my list of ideas here: A round up of use it up ideas! Also if you have any questions about using up condensed milk or want to show off your creations, come and join my Eco Thrifty Kitchen Club (a free to join Facebook group). The group is a friendly community with the aim of helping people to waste less in their kitchens!

The post 11 ways to take condensed milk to the next level appeared first on Eco Thrifty Living.

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I usually buy kale, but my next ambition is to attempt to grow my own and then it would be very low cost and come with less packaging.

Kale crisps recipe

Ingredients:

• Washed and dried shredded kale . Dry the kale in a salad spinner if you have one, or in between two tea towels if you don’t.
• Some olive oil
• A little sea salt

Method:

1. Pre-heat your oven to 150 degrees C
2. Put your kale in a bowl.
3. Drizzle some oil and sprinkle a pinch of salt over the kale
4. Toss the kale in the oil and salt, making sure all the kale is coated in the mixture
5. Spread out the kale on a silicone baking sheet* on an oven proof tray. and put in the pre-heated oven for 5 minutes.
6. After 5 minutes take the tray of kale out and mix it up/ turn the pieces over.
7. Next, put the kale back in for another 5 minutes
8. Repeat steps 7 and 8 until the kale has crisped up to your satisfaction. You will need repeat this step a few times. It is important to keep turning the kale pieces to stop them sticking to the tray and so that they don’t burn.
9. Optional: If you aren’t in a hurry, turn the oven off and leave the kale in the cooling oven for up to 30 minutes for a final crisping.

It really is simple to make these kale crisps and they are a delicious homemade, very inexpensive snack!

Tip: to make the most use of the energy of the oven make these kale crisps at the same time as making a zero waste snack like croutons or potato peel crisps.

The post Kale crisps that you can’t stop eating recipe appeared first on Eco Thrifty Living.

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There are no specific quantities in this recipe because the idea is to use up potato peels that would otherwise have been chucked away. So it all depends on how many potatoes you peeled as to how much potato peel you have.

Potato peel crisp recipe

Ingredients:

• Clean and dry potato peels (I recommend scrubbing and washing the potatoes before you peel them)
• Some olive oil
• A little sea salt
• A sprig of rosemary (optional)

Method:

1. Pre-heat your oven to 150 degrees C
2. Put your potato peels on a silicone baking sheet* on an oven proof tray.
3. Drizzle some oil over the peels
4. Sprinkle some finely chopped rosemary and a pinch of salt over the peels
5. Toss the peels in the oil, rosemary and salt, making sure all the peels are coated in the mixture
6. Spread out the peels over the silicone sheet and put in the pre-heated oven for 5 minutes.
7. After 5 minutes take the tray of peels out and mix them up/ turn them over.
8. Then put the peels back in for another 5 minutes
9. Repeat steps 7 and 8 until the peels have crisped up to your satisfaction. You will need repeat this step a few times. It is important to keep turning the peels to stop them sticking to the tray and so that they don’t burn.
10. Optional: If you aren’t in a hurry, turn the oven off and leave the peels in the cooling oven for up to 30 minutes for a final crisping.

It really is simple to make these potato peel crisps and they are a delicious homemade, very inexpensive snack! By making them you also save the peels from the bin.

Tip: to make the most use of the energy while the oven is on, make these potato peel crisps at the same time as making kale crisps and/ or fruit leather.

For more ideas for yummy snacks that also help prevent food waste, take a look at this: 5 of the best homemade zero waste snacks

The post Homemade potato peel crisps that taste so good! appeared first on Eco Thrifty Living.

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We buy some key staples in bulk. For example porridge oats*, rice*, popping corn*, bicarbonate of soda*, cinnamon*, Italian seasoning*, sunflower seeds*, soy sauce*, shampoo* and conditioner bars*. I bought bulk salt years ago (that we are still working our way through) on a house swapping holiday to France and we pick practically a years supply of onions once a year at local pick your own farm.

What are the pros of buying in bulk?

We buy in bulk because there are lots of benefits

1. You save time doing your shopping each week. Having some basics in stock mean that you don’t have to worry about running out of those products for a while.
2. Less packaging overall. I usually buy oats in a 25kg sack. It means that we only have one paper bag to recycle after eating 25kg of oats instead of countless little boxes and plastic bags.
3. It is sensible to have 3 months salary in the bank in case of loss of income through redundancy or illness and so in. For the same reasons it is a good idea to have a bit of back up food in your home. Having that food at home buys you time. It also gives you peace of mind over having enough to eat for a while.
4. On the same note as point 3, being made redundant isn’t the only reason why it might sensible to have a bit of back up food in your home. For example, when the virus hit, for a while there were scary scenes of empty shelves in the supermarkets and it became difficult to get hold of certain types of food.
5. You can save money by buying in bulk. It is really important to shop around though and not assume as sometimes bulk buying doesn’t work out cheaper.

What are the cons of buying in bulk?

1. You have to be careful when you buy bulk food because the price can fluctuate. A good price now on a bulk product, may not be so reasonable if prices fall and you are still using up the product you bought when prices were higher.
2. You have to find somewhere to store the food, which is difficult if you don’t have much space
3. The quantity of food may be too large for you to be able to use up before it’s best before date. Either that puts you off buying or potentially food could go off.
4. You have to have the money to pay upfront for the bulk food.
5. Bulk buying has a bad reputation after the empty supermarket shelf days at the beginning of lockdown. Are you a selfish stockpiler if you buy in bulk?

Solutions to the problems of buying in bulk

1. To avoid getting caught out by bulk buying a product when it is expensive you can do two things. Firstly think seasonally. As I said earlier we usually buy onions once a year . They are at their cheapest then because they are in season. Secondly get to know what a good price is for a product over time. If you have access to old receipts for shopping either on or offline, you can do some price comparisons. If the product will last a couple of months, this may not be a major issue. But if you are planning for it to last much more than that you might want to check first!
2. Make some space to store your bulk food by doing some decluttering where possible. You don’t have to store the food in your kitchen.
3. Avoid food waste, by taking into account these 5 ways to avoid food waste when you buy in bulk. For example, only buy food that you know you can use and that will last a long time.
4. Save up the money to buy in bulk (or use the money from the items you decluttered if you were able to sell them). You can also split purchases with friends and family.
5. Are you a selfish stockpiler? It depends on how you do it. If you clear a supermarket shelf and don’t leave any for anyone else, then you are being selfish. However if you regularly buy in bulk from a place that you are meant to make bulk purchases, that isn’t selfish. Those places only sell in bulk and you aren’t depriving anyone else by shopping that way. You aren’t taking more than your fair share either. You are just buying what you need in one go, rather than in smaller amounts over time.

Is it a good idea to buy in bulk?

On the positive side: You could save money, reduce packaging, make your life a little easier and have peace of mind about having a bit of extra food in the house.

On the negative side: You need to think carefully about whether bulk is a good price or not. It could result in food waste. You would have to find somewhere to put it and it involves laying out cash up front.

So I think the answer is both yes and no! It all depends on the types of foods you eat, the storage space you have available, the effort you want to go to and whether or not for you, the positives outweigh the negatives.

What are your thoughts about buying in bulk? Do the pros outweigh the cons for you, or is it the other way around?

The post The pros and cons of buying in bulk appeared first on Eco Thrifty Living.

This blog post contains affiliate links marked with * and anything you buy through them will help to support the blog. All opinions are my own and it won’t cost you anything extra to use the links.

Popcorn – one of my all time favourite zero waste vegan snacks!

I regularly make popcorn. It is up there at the top of my list of favourite zero waste snacks. The kids enjoy watching it pop and then grabbing a bowl of freshly popped corn to munch on.

Make it lightly salted and it is a brilliant alternative to crisps. There is far less packaging overall, especially if you buy the popping corn in bulk*. It is also a very inexpensive snack to make. If you don’t want to buy it in quantity but do want it to be zero waste, buy it packaging free from your local zero waste shop.

How I make popcorn

There are various ways you can make popcorn, but I make mine in one of my Le Creuset 3 ply saucepans* . They are expensive saucepans, but if you do need to buy a new saucepan, check out my article about why I chose to buy them here: how to choose a saucepan.

My trick to avoiding burning the popcorn in the saucepan is to heat up some oil in the pan with 3 kernels of corn to start with. When they pop, I then add in the rest of the corn. The other tricks are to keep a close eye on the pan, set the heat to medium high heat and take a break half way through. I decant the popped popcorn into a cake tin usually and then add a bit more oil and carry on popping the rest. Rightly or wrongly I use extra virgin olive oil to make it, because I like the taste best.

*Update* – We now have a popcorn maker that we got for free from someone on Facebook Marketplace, so our popcorn is even healthier as it is air popped.

Fruit leather

Fruit leather is not quick to make, but you can batch cook it. It should work out cheaper than buying the packaged variety, especially if you are using up fruit that would otherwise go off. I followed this apple and cinnamon recipe recently because I needed to use up some wrinkly apples and it was really tasty. Next time I’m going to try it without the added sugar.

Melba Toast

Melba Toast is a type of cracker made out of bread. It is very more-ish and is a great zero waste snack. Check out my simple and easy recipe for how to make it here: melba toast recipe

I find it is a great way to use up a lot of bread at once e.g. a whole loaf. Sometimes we end up with a spare loaf of bread due to lack of planning or plans changing. I don’t want that bread to go to waste, so I make melba toast!

I recommend eating it dipped in houmous, plain or spread with a little vegetable spread.

Make a zero waste vegan snack from roast potatoes – potato peel crisps!

Making potato peel crisps is one of my new favourite zero waste snacks. Yes there is an argument for not peeling the potatoes in the first place, but I don’t think roast potatoes taste as good if you leave the peels on. Plus what is the problem if you can turn those peels into a tasty snack?

Get the recipe here: Homemade potato peel crisps that taste so good!

Croutons

A lot of people don’t like bread ends and will throw them out or hopefully compost them instead of eating them. Don’t do that! Make croutons instead. If your family gets through a few loaves of bread a week, save the bread ends for the end of the week and make a batch of croutons. Find out how to make croutons here: Yummy homemade crouton recipe.

They make a nice snack on their own, but are also delicious added to salads and soups.

Let me know how you get on making these snacks in the comments below or tag me on social media on @ecothrifty (Twitter and Instagram). I’d love to see your snack pictures!

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My kids love them and they are so simple to make that my 9 year old can make them himself (with a little help from me)

The obvious thing to do with croutons is to put them in soup. But they are also delicious in salads and as a snack on their own. We recently used up some homemade croutons in a ‘Harvester style’ salad, which went down a treat. The croutons in this picture are quite dark because we used brown bread.

Rosemary and garlic crouton recipe

Ingredients:

There are deliberately no quantities in this recipe. This is because you can make as much or as little as you like depending on how much bread you need to use up!

1. Day old bread (i.e. bread just past it’s best)
2. Fresh garlic
3. Freshly picked rosemary or dried garlic
4. Olive oil

Method:

1. Pre-heat the oven to 150 degrees C
2. Cut up the slices of bread into crouton sized cubes.
3. Place into a baking tray. Avoid using foil or baking paper, by putting the croutons directly onto a baking tray.
4. Either cut the rosemary finely (I recommend using herb scissors*, but normal kitchen scissors will also do the job), or you could blitz it in a blender
5. Then crush the garlic and mix with the rosemary and some olive oil
6. Drizzle the blended liquid over the breadcrumbs and mix well to coat them.  You may find you need to be quite generous with the oil as the breadcrumbs drink it up!
7. Place the breadcrumbs in the oven for around 15-20 minutes, turning them over every 5 minutes to stop them from burning.
8. Leave to cool. If you leave them in the cooling oven for up to 30 mins afterwards it will help them to crisp up further.
9. When they are completely cool and hard to the touch, store in a airtight container, like an old jar or a tin.
10. Enjoy!

How to save energy while following this crouton recipe

If you have some space in the oven while you are cooking these, you could also make some fruit leather, potato peel crisps or kale crisps at the same time. That way you make the most use of the energy.

For those of you who have solar panels, do it while the sun is shining and pay less or perhaps nothing at all for the electricity used.

Making your own croutons is very satisfying. You can feel proud that you made your own delicious croutons, eliminated food waste and saved money!

Find out lots more ways to use up unwanted bread here: 20 ways to stop wasting bread

Want more snack ideas that help prevent food waste? Check out my list of 5 of the best healthy and homemade zero waste snacks.

The post Use day old bread in this delicious crouton recipe! appeared first on Eco Thrifty Living.

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The 3 R’s – Routine, Rationing and Rules can all help to reduce snacking

Eat at routine times

Have set meal and snack times. This means that everyone should in theory be full up enough not to want to eat in between times and will reduce snacking.

Space meal and snack times with a good gap between them. Then you (and/ or your kids) won’t be so full up that you don’t want your meals.

When my kids were much younger, they would have breakfast, a mid-morning snack, lunch, mid afternoon snack and then dinner. I ended up joining in with them. We’ve all got out of that habit now that they are older, but it worked really well at the time.

This is just an example and it’s up to you how many snack slots you need in your day. Find a system that works for you and adjust it as things change.

Ration out food to reduce snacking

Put limits on the amount of snacks that can be eaten and what everyone is allocated for the day. It’s a bit like sending your kid off to primary school with a packed lunch – they can’t eat anything extra because they don’t have anything else with them. You could make a pack up at the beginning of the day with the snacks for each person to reduce snacking. The nice thing about this is that you can let them decide when to eat them and they feel in control.

Get the snack portion sizes right too. Just before lockdown I finally got round to buying some tiny tubs* to put raisins in. They are a great reusable replacement for little boxes of raisins. As well as making them easy to transport, they limit the amount of raisins eaten in one go. I bought them to give them at school pick up, but they work equally well at home too.

It is also usually cheaper to buy a bigger packet of something. Then decant the leftovers into boxes, tins or tubs to use another time. Always make sure you price check first though!

Set rules over which foods can be eaten when

Set rules over which foods can be eaten outside of meal times. You can have different rules during the week to on the weekends. I find this helpful to limit the amount of sugary and salty foods eaten. For example you could say that outside of set meal and snack times family members can only snack on fruit and vegetables. Perhaps you will only allow sweet foods on the weekends.

You might find that just doing one of these things helps. But you can do some or all of them – whatever works for you.

If you are looking for some ideas for snacks check out my list of 5 homemade zero waste snacks

The post Take back control of snack time, with routines, rationing and rules appeared first on Eco Thrifty Living.