So yesterday I was up for a while after posting and I found some space to try one of the desserts seeing as I only had 989 calories yesterday. The desserts arrive in a pack of 4 – Apricot Crumble – Apple Crumble – Raspberry & Apple Crumble – Rice Pudding..

The only one of the desserts which I have never had in my lifetime was rice pudding so I thought I would give it a try.

And now I know I am not a fan of it. This is the first thing I recall actually throwing away half uneaten.

Lunch – Thai Meatballs (103Cal) with Asian Coleslaw (19Cal) and Sesame Soy Dressing (39Cal) = 161

I don’t know if actual Thai meatballs would have spring onion in them but I have to say, it made them awesome – the spring onion was crunchy and gorgeous.

Snacks – Orange (55Cal)
Two Fruits Fruit Cup (76Cal)

Swapped for an apple.

Breakfast – Bacon (54Cal), Free Range Egg (73Cal) and Tomato (10cal) with Multigrain Toast (98Cal) = 235

Swapped the tomato out for half an avocado instead. Boiled the egg to eat separately.

Dinner – Chicken Tikka Masala(424cal)

No corn in this, JM :) It does have sultanas – juicy and sweet ones.

I said yesterday it takes me somewhere between 20 mins to 30 mins to eat dinner – I timed it today, just over 20 mins.

Raspberry & Apple Crumble (201Cal)

Coincidentally this was on the menu today as a surprise. It turned out to be AWESOME. I think there was custard, sultanas and apple in there too. You can order this in a pack of 4 on its own.

The thing is, I am not exactly a sweet tooth. I would prefer cheese and crackers sometimes, for a treat.

Lunch & Breakfast calories = 728
Dinner – 424
Total – 1152

So a little bit of time and effort last night, and I have got the calories done for every breakfast and lunch this week..

I sent my maths over to Sephy for a double check. Somehow I’d missed out adding all the tomatoes into the calculations, lucky I did send it! I failed maths in school, and even with an iPhone calculator I still fail it now, lol. :)

I have to tell you something.

The longer I stick with Lite N Easy, the less hungry I am. The smaller meals are ok. The larger meals make me feel so full. It takes me a good 20-30 minutes to finish the entire dinner. That is a good thing.

Now for the bad news. Whenever I eat the bread it makes me feel enormously bloated and it isn’t short term, it lasts for hours. I am beginning to think I have a bread allergy, or something in the bread anyway.

I am going to look for low calorie gluten free bread alternatives next time I am at the supermarket, something that would work with Lite N Easy. I can swap out the bread and see if maybe that makes me feel any better..

I honestly know zero about gluten etc, so I might have to do some research into this. Wouldn’t it be great if Lite N Easy did it for me? :(

Lunch – Curried Egg Spread (84Cal) and Baby Leaf (13Cal) on a Long Multigrain Roll (197Cal) = 294

I had been looking forward to this, I love curried egg. It was wonderful even despite my bread thing I mentioned above.

Red Apple (75Cal) (Missed – too full)
Seasonal Fruit (76Cal) (Mandarin – Missed – too full)

Potato Crisps (76Cal)

I love my potato chippies. These are not the same but hello, they are still potato, in chip form. I would find it very difficult to describe what these are actually like – the thing that comes to mind is potato air.

Dinner – Fragrant Thai Chicken (382Cal)

Still a great fan of this. I do wish now, having had the other rice with egg etc in it, that this appeared with that rice. I’m not sure how well it would go though.

Breakfast – Pikelets (113Cal) with Fig & Berry Compote (82Cal) and Honey Yoghurt (42Cal) = 237

This was my last meal for the day (If you have been reading for a while you know, I eat breakfast at night time because I don’t have time when I get up nor does my stomach like to be bombarded with food so early – if there is a cereal I will eat that before going to work) so it was like dessert. I have never had fig before and I am surprised to find I like it. I added the yoghurt to this as you are supposed to and it was incredible – last time I ate the yoghurt separately. Definite re-order. And I am sitting here having eaten this over an hour ago, soooo full!

Breakfast and Lunch total plan calories = 758
Dinner calories = 382

Total for today = 1140
Minus missed items = 989

Wow, I did not realise I missed so many calories. I wish I could say that at some point today I could have added them back in but I just didn’t have the space in me to fit in any more food.

Today is the first day of the new summer menu. You can view the entire Lite N Easy Summer Menu here.

I have left the calorie counts in from todays earlier post. Though it would be a lot of effort, I might try and put these in more often..

Almond Toasted Muesli with skim milk* (138Cal)

Its muesli which you may already know I am not the greatest fan of. It was quite tasty with all the fruit and the almond bits in there. I enjoyed it but it would probably be 3rd on my list of cereals supplied by Lite N Easy – berry bites being my fave, followed by fruit n bran.

Roast Chicken Tender (84Cal) with Beetroot & Baby Leaf Salad (24Cal) and Garlic Lemon Vinaigrette (48Cal) (=156)

Awesome as always, though they sent me balsamic vinaigrette instead of garlic lemon. No big deal, I liked it just as good. I love the beetroot in any format but this grated form is especially nice.

Small Multigrain Roll (88Cal) with Butter (36Cal) (=124)

I am loving this butter. I first saw it last week, they officially announced it in this weeks esky with this flier. It is new, and it comes in this funny package. You used to get spread instead – I think it was some kind of Flora margarine. Who would have thought a little bread roll could be so tasty. It was lovely.

Peaches with Raspberry Sauce (63Cal)

What a terrible photo! It looked ok when I took it.

This is quite zingy. I like it but I would have thought pears might be a better fit for this sauce. Be very careful though, this sauce will stain anything you happen to spill it on. It could do with straining out the seeds. I am not a huge fan of sauces with seeds in them.

Citrus Sultana Oat Biscuit (98Cal)

These are always nice. Perhaps could be a little more citrussy or have a couple more sultanas.

Dinner – Sweet N Sour Chicken (428cal)

WOW. I think I have a new favourite dinner. The rice had little bits of egg in it. There was plenty of sauce to make the rice saucy as well. There was breast chicken and bits of baby corn and pineapple. Truly gorgeous. If you were served this in a restaurant you would be perfectly happy with it. Epic win, most definite reorder. In fact I think I could easily spend an entire week eating this dinner.

Multigrain Toast (98Cal) with Plum Jam (38Cal) (=136)

I spent much of today looking forward to this plum jam. It did not disappoint. It was everything I hoped for and more.

Orange (55Cal)

I’m doing a special note about the orange. I commented on this post over at La Dolce Vita. Jo Abi is also doing Lite N Easy – and seems to be picking exactly the same things I am which is quite unusual. Jo mentioned that her orange was very juicy which kinda inspired me to do my usual cut it up and put it in the mineral water trick. This time I thought I’d post the process.

Cut the top and bottom off the orange. This will make it so you can easily sit the orange on the chopping board, ready for the choppery!

Start trimming the peel off the orange. This is a delicate process because you want to keep as much of the orange as possible.

Continue trimming off the peel and pith. Keep going until you have done the whole orange. Then flip the orange over, you will likely have left some extra pith/peel on the bottom. Trim off any extra pith/peel

Halve the orange, being careful to cut in between the sections.

Quarter, and trim out the central column. You can then put the orange pieces into your mineral water – I like to make them a little smaller so I can fish them out in bite size pieces with a fork.

This was probably one of the smaller oranges they have sent me but it was so tasty.

In other news, I picked one of the zucchinis today. Here is is pictured on a full sized cutting board. Impressive, no?

The Question –

when i buy breakfast and lunch lite n easy does that mean all that adds up to 1200 calories <--- this question came through from the search engines today - and it is a really great question.. First things first -

Calories VS Kilojoules.

Whoever made it so that the only thing appearing on Australian labels these days is kilojoules should be tortured for the rest of their natural life. We all know calories, right? I grew up with them. I know what 100 calories means in the scheme of things. However when you convert 100 calories to kilojoules, depending on the website that you do it at, you will get all kinds of different results – mine ranged from 415 to 420KJ.

One of the first things you want to do if you want to count calories in Australia these days is get yourself a portable KJ to calorie converter. If you have a smart phone you can just do a search for calorie to kilojoule converters and find one you like.

Lucky for me, Lite N Easy still speak in understandable terms – calories. Though you will find kilojoules on a lot of the packaging you will find calories as well, and you also have access to this handy online guide which contains all the ingredients, calorie and kilojoule amounts as well as other nutritional details. Mind you, it is 49 pages long.

If you download it to your computer and use a pdf reader, you can search for specific words to find the calorie breakdown of what you are eating. It is a great shame that Lite N Easy do not put a calorie count for each item on the menu – it would make life a lot easier if you want to substitute.

The Breakdown – Summer Menu Day 1 (my choices)

Let us do the time consuming and annoying maths! :) Here is the breakdown from todays breakfast, lunch & snacks –

Almond Toasted Muesli with skim milk* (138Cal)

Multigrain Toast (98Cal) with Plum Jam (38Cal) (=136)

Orange (55Cal)

——————–
Total breakfast & morning snack = 329
——————–

Roast Chicken Tender (84Cal) with Beetroot & Baby Leaf Salad (24Cal) and Garlic Lemon Vinaigrette (48Cal) (=156)

Small Multigrain Roll (88Cal) with Butter (36Cal) (=124)

Peaches with Raspberry Sauce (63Cal)

Citrus Sultana Oat Biscuit (98Cal)

——————
Total lunch & snacks = 441
——————

Total breakfast, lunch & snacks calories = 770

You still have 430 calories left for dinner.

Dinners range from 330- 490 calories. You can see all the dinners and their nutritional details by clicking here – Lite N Easy Dinners.

I don’t do this kind of maths every day. I know pretty much that if I eat what I’m given over the course of a week it will all work out to be somewhere around 1200 calories daily.

This week for dinners for example –

Chicken Tikka Masala 424cal
Sweet & Sour Chicken 428
Maple Glazed Chicken 402cal
Fishermans Pie 457cal
Rigatoni 394cal
Tortilla Stack 484
Fragrant Thai Chicken 382cal

So if I ate the highest in calories for dinner tonight, my daily total would be = 1254 calories. If I ate the lowest in calories it would be 1152 calories.

These calorie counts are never going to be exact because you might get a smaller orange which is less calories, or you might not want the butter, or you might cut out one of the snacks because you aren’t hungry enough. I use full fat milk which costs more calories than skim, but I use a lot less milk in total than they recommend – not a fan of milk with cereal added, I prefer cereal with my milk! ;)

In general, if you stick only to water for your drinks (I go with soda water though I do have one cup of coffee per day) you are going to be pretty close to the 1200 calories.

The Answer Is –

So the answer to the question is no – breakfast and lunch do not add up to 1200 calories on their own. When you add in the dinner, that gets you to the 1200 (or thereabouts).

New foods for the second half of this week –

Seasoned Chicken with Mushroom Risotto –

Not a huge amount of mushroom risotto but what little was there – awesome. The chicken tender was beautiful as the Lite N Easy chicken tenders always are. The veg was beautiful..

Chicken Cacciatore Pasta –

Breast chicken, with mushroom, olives, tomato sauce. Almost as good as the ones I make myself.

Maple Glazed Chicken –

Saucy Breast Chicken, with walnuts, potato and sweet potato, green beans and some other veg. This was beautiful – the way the sauce soaked into the potatoes and sweet potatoes.. epic win.

Week 1 of the new summer menu arrived today – I am thinking of blogging it daily for a bit. Almost all of the lunches are new foods, and I ordered some different dinners this week – eg the maple glazed chicken seen above, as well as Sweet & Sour Chicken and Rigatoni – which I have had before but not photographed and blogged.

I also ordered 4x desserts this week to give them a try. Apple Crumble – Raspberry and Apple Crumble – Rice Pudding – Apricot Crumble.

So I’ll be back tomorrow with a daily update.

New foods this week –

Chili Con Carne –

This was awesome though it could have been a bit spicier. Will order it again..

Apricot Crumble Yoghurt –

I was looking forward to this – it did not quite live up to my hopes. Taken individually the elements were good though for the first time ever the yoghurt was a little watery. Put together, it did not sing. Not high on the list to re-order.

Roast Chicken & Sweet Potato Salad with Fetta Cheese and French Vinaigrette –

Hands down best thing I have ever eaten from Lite N Easy. This was stunning. Restaurant quality – and you would pay a lot more for it in a restaurant. There were chick peas in there, as well. It had a little pot of chicken and sweet potato which you heated in the microwave for 1:45. There was plenty of cinnamon and possibly other spices on the chicken and sweet potato. The dressing was beautiful too.

Fruit Muesli –

This had cinnamon. Other than that not a great fan of Muesli. It was ok, but I would pick one of the other cereals over this any day.

Breakfast Wrap with Egg, Sautéed Bacon, Mushrooms, Spinach and Tomato –

What a lovely idea. The only problem with these wraps is they don’t tend to stay together as well as the regular non multigrain ones.

Again a little pot of bacon, mushrooms and spinach to heat up in the microwave for 1:45.

So a few great new things so far this week and one stellar stand out. I wish I could order that salad for every lunch, it was beautiful.

When I was researching Lite N Easy, I did not find much in the way of photos of the food, so I thought I would blog my experience with it quite comprehensively with plenty of photos so that future people researching Lite N Easy could tell at a glance if it would suit them or not..

Up front I should say – nobody from Lite N Easy asked me to do this, nor did they know I was doing it, nor did they pay me to do it. I paid them for the food they sent me.

What I like about Lite N Easy –

– It Is Fairly Easy

The majority of the meals simply require microwaving and eating. The hardest of the meals I prepared required poaching an egg and then putting together eggs benedict. There is some grilling (eg putting tomato on toasted bread then cheese on top, then putting it under the grill) and quite a bit of toasting.

– Well Organised – Simple To Follow

The majority of the meals are in their own plastic bag labelled by day. Keep a copy of the menu on the fridge so you can know when you need to find a frozen item (frozen items appear in red on the menu plan) – makes it easier to know what you are looking for in the freezer.

– Choose Your Own Dinner

While breakfast and lunch are kinda set in stone, you do get to pick which dinner you eat on what day. This means if you end up going out to dinner you can just keep that extra meal for another time.

– A Lot Of Fruit

There is at least one serve of fruit a day and sometimes more. This is good to get back into the habit of regularly eating fruit and also to get into eating fruits I might not have chosen.

– It Feels Healthy

I remember seeing one of the ads where someone was talking about how it felt good to eat the food because it felt healthy (something like that anyway) and it does feel good.

– Good Limits

You know if you only eat the food you are provided, you are going to be at a certain amount of calories per day.

– Easy To Avoid Temptation

Because the food is delivered to you, you do not need to go to the supermarket, unless you are shopping for someone else in the house.

There are no potato chips in my house at the moment, which is extremely unusual for me. The other half does not like them or eat them unless I put a bowl of them in front of his face. They are my go to snack food. I want to buy them, of course I do. I know I could buy them and weigh them and make them into calorie counted snacks. But I have found other things to eat, and I am not hungry between meals & snacks, so there is no need.

There is chocolate in the fridge and plenty of it – that is not something that tempts me much. In fact I just cooked a couple of batches of brownies and I had a teeny tiny slice to try it and see what it tastes like – the rest is going to work.

– Smaller Portions More Often

Now that I am used to eating smaller portions I would find it difficult to go back to the larger portions I was eating.

What I don’t like about it –

– Too Much Bread

I am not the biggest fan of bread. I thought it was because it usually goes mouldy too fast for me to eat it but once you take away the going mouldy issue I find it makes me feel bloated and blah. I don’t mind a wrap, I don’t mind the occasional toast or muffin, but every single day seems a little too much bread for me.

– No Gluten Free Option or or Dairy Free Option

I would love to try a gluten free diet for a couple of weeks and see if I feel better at the end of it. However Lite N Easy does not have a gluten free option. I’d love to try dairy free for a couple of weeks and see if I feel better, too.

– No Vegetarian Option

While I like chicken and fish myself and very occasional red meat, I can see that a vegetarian option would be useful for people.

– No Paleo Option

Paleo is a diet which is kinda taking the world by storm and as with gluten free I would love to try it but I don’t have the organisational skills to put that together. I’ve been inspired by this blog – Naturally Minimalist and once I have a bit more time on my hands I would like to try the Whole 30.

– You Can’t Buy Extra Snacks

I think Lite N Easy are missing a trick here. They sell a few different extras like soups and mini meals and desserts, but there is no option to choose extra snacks. I’d happily buy the spicy fruit cookies and some of the other snacks to substitute in when I don’t like the provided snack.

– No Icecream

I do miss icecream and I think I will miss it even more during summer. I’ll be looking at low calorie options for icecream over the next few weeks and will keep you up to date on what I find.

I have an icecream maker and I like to make my own icecream with coconut milk/cream, espresso coffee shots or chocolate syrup. It is a bit difficult to estimate the calories on that, though. I usually have very small servings of it so I don’t think it would impact too hugely.

– No place to commune with fellow L&E peoples on the web

I am lucky because I have someone in my workplace who is following the plan and we can talk about the food. This usually consists of “Did you try X? I LOVED IT” type discussions, or “Did you order popular or optional for lunch today?” and we often compare what the other person has to eat if they chose the other option.

I am a bit disappointed that they don’t have forums where people can share their thoughts, progress, photos of the food, etc. That certainly would have made the decision on trying it a lot easier for me. It would be good to have a place where L&E peeps can go to chat with each other.

All of the above things are said not to criticise but maybe if someone from Lite N Easy is reading this, they could think about adding a Gluten Free option, or maybe the occasional ice-cream!

Weight Loss?

If you have been reading all along you know that the reason I did Lite N Easy was not for weight loss (though that would be a nice side effect) but to get into the habit of eating regularly again.

Because of the shift work and not feeling especially hungry when I would get up in the morning, I would not eat breakfast. I would not be organised enough to create any kind of lunch. If I got hungry in the afternoon I might eat chocolate biscuits, or something equally junky. I would eat a huge dinner *HUGE* because by then I would be hungry, and then I would snack until bedtime. I was having trouble going to sleep but when I did go to sleep I would want to stay asleep as long as possible.

I can tell that I have lost weight – how much I do not know, because my scales are EPIC FAIL and I need to get new ones – but my clothes are fitting better and parts of me have been re-scuplted and vanishing.

I can also tell you I feel a lot better overall. I’m sleeping better, I have a lot more energy, I find it easier to get up in the morning, I’m kicking butt at the gym 3-4 times a week, and I have felt like that since day 2-3 of starting the plan. I have an email I sent to Sephy on Day 3 –

Could it be that good nutrition is the key to everything?

Here it is only day 3, and already i am sleeping better, feeling overall much better, and my mind is a lot more quiet.

Should You Try It?

The answer to this is up to you. I certainly have plenty of good things to say about it – and no bad things at this stage.

Questions People Have Asked –

how do i heat rolls from lite n easy <--- this one came via search engines. 30 seconds in the microwave works for me, if you find it needs a little more time, give it another 30 seconds how do i cook lite n easy eggs <---- Also via search engines. You can cook them any way you like your eggs. I personally am a fan of poaching - using either cooking spray or coconut oil to grease the poaching thingies, so they fall out of them easily. You can fry them in a non stick pan - scramble them - boil them - anything you want. I do find the eggs to be *incredibly* fresh so when you boil them be careful when peeling. How to organise Lite N Easy in the fridge – also from the search engines – wrote a post on this one – How To Organise Lite N Easy In The Fridge

You can also check the Frequently Asked Questions at Lite N Easy.

If you have a question make sure to ask it below and if I have an answer I’ll reply to your comment, and update this post with the answer too.

The Wrap Up –

How To Organise Lite N Easy In The Fridge

The 1200 Calorie Delivery – It Arrived!

A quick word about cereal and fruit.

1500 Calories – The Posts –

Day 1
Day 2
Day 3
Day 4
Day 5
Day 6
Day 7

1200 Calories – The Posts –

Day 1
Day 2
Day 3
Day 4
Day 5
Day 6
Day 7

I’ll still be blogging about Lite N Easy when they send me stuff I have not tried yet, so if you have enjoyed the posts keep coming back for updates – or add me in your blog reader! ;)

Questions? Comments?

Post your question or comment below.

And so, after what seems like an eternity but was only two weeks, we come to an end of blogging daily Lite N Easy menus & meals. I’ll be posting a wrap up and some overall thoughts tomorrow..

Breakfast – Fruit n’ Bran Cereal with skim milk*

Lunch – Chicken Alfredo Pasta

Awesome. Beautiful.

Snacks – Red Apple – Crunchy Flat Bread with Tomato Kasundi Dip

Let me start by saying Kasundi dip = incredibly amazing great spice and a bit of heat. Crunchy flatbread? Nearly broke my teeth. There is such a thing as too crunchy. Not only that, but look at the mess it left behind!

The dip would be awesome with corn chips, potato chips, any kind of chips or crackers. I ended up dipping the apple in there and it was fabulous so that would be what I’d do next time – I’d cut the apple into thinner slices.

Dinner – Fragrant Thai Chicken

As mentioned when I last had this, extremely tasty.

Breakfast – Wholegrain & Oat Toast with Peanut Butter

My toasting skills kinda suck. :( Peanut butter was great, I have missed it.

Missed out on – Orange

Bonus gym visit!

So going forward from here – what re Lite N Easy will I be blogging? Any new meals that come to me as a surprise, I’ll try and get a photo and post about it.

I have enjoyed the daily blogging and I hope you have too. Not sure if I’ll be keeping a daily posting regimen but I certainly will be posting more often than never. ;) You’ll probably get some garden and chicken posts this week. Maybe something about shopping.

Lite N Easy Wrap Up Post –

Make sure to drop in and read it – this post contains my overall thoughts on Lite N Easy and also links to all the daily posts. You can find the wrap up post by clicking here.

Lunch – Asian Meatballs with Rice.

This was very flavourful. Wish there had been a little more sauce for the meatballs. I’m not sure if these were broad beans or some other kind of bean. 4 minutes in the microwave.

Dinner – Fishermans Pie

As always, beautiful.

Breakfast – Cheesy Ham & Tomato Omelette

This is one of my must orders – 2min30 in the microwave and it is like you just flipped it out of the frypan. But it has awesome stuff in the middle – ham, and like a tomato salsa.

Breakfast – Wholegrain & Oat Toast with Apricot Jam

I feel like I’ve had a bit too much citrus type jams just lately what with all the marmalade, etc. So I treated myself to some Sylt Blabar :) Blueberry jam and hello it has real full size blueberries in there.

Snacks – Mandarin – Classic Choc & Oats Bar

This was awesome though a little fall apart like. They must make these themselves I think.

Swapped the mandarin for an orange which I put in my soda water.

Missed out on – Pear Fruit Cup

Lite N Easy Wrap Up Post –

Make sure to drop in and read it – this post contains my overall thoughts on Lite N Easy and also links to all the daily posts. You can find the wrap up post by clicking here.

Breakfast – Fruit n’ Bran Cereal with skim milk*

This one had more kinds of fruit in it – dried apple and possibly some others..

Lunch – Chicken Burger with Beetroot Relish and Tomato on a Ciabatta Bread Roll

Beetroot relish – if this can be found anywhere in the world I must hunt it down and buy a lot of it. It was absolutely gorgeous and hello so much easier than sliced beetroot. I think this could be used on almost anything. I did not use the tomato.

Snacks – Banana & Apple Bread – Red Apple

The banana and apple bread is great, especially after defrosting it in the microwave and it is all warm and awesome. This could benefit from a shake of cinnamon, though.

Dinner – Tortilla Stack

Wowza. So filling, extremely tasty, just enough spice. Must re-order.

See all those chick peas? I love a chick pea. There were many more, as well as refried red beans.

Breakfast – Wholegrain & Oat Toast with Apricot Jam

The toast is quite small, but very tasty.

Missed out on – Orange

A happy moment today spotting my favourite Antony Green on the teevee.

Combined with a sad moment, that I did not have any cheesecake on hand to eat while I enjoyed his awesomeness. What a travesty!

Lite N Easy Wrap Up Post –

Make sure to drop in and read it – this post contains my overall thoughts on Lite N Easy and also links to all the daily posts. You can find the wrap up post by clicking here.