Get flipping the healthy way
Release Date 04 March 2011
Pancake Day is nearly here! Shrove Tuesday, as it's officially known, is the day before Lent in the Christian calendar when people give up things they enjoy. We celebrate by eating pancakes and this year it's on 8 March.
Traditionally pancakes are rich fare when people used up ingredients such as cream, eggs and sugar before the start of Lent. So not too healthy then! However, help is at hand from Dr Orla Kennedy, an expert in public health nutrition at the University of Reading. Orla lists some of the ways in which you can still enjoy your pancake, but with a little less of the calories.
Sweet fillings
Replace sugar and Jam with Splenda and low-sugar jam
Instead of fruit and cream e.g. berries/fruit in syrup and cream, use fresh strawberries, berries or bananas with natural yogurt
Love chocolate? Don't use melted milk chocolate, go for melted 70% dark chocolate
Don't miss out if you like honey, but use a teaspoon rather than a tablespoon.
Savour fillings
Replace smoked salmon and cream cheese with smoked salmon and cottage cheese
If you love bacon and scrambled eggs as a filling, grill the bacon and have poached eggs instead.
The Hugh Sinclair Human Nutrition Group is part of the Department of Food and Nutritional Science at the University of Reading. It has an international reputation for its research into the relationship between diet and the risk of chronic disease such as cardiovascular disease, diabetes, neurodegenerative disease and cancer.
ENDS
For more information please call Rona Cheeseman, press officer, on 0118 378 7388 or email r.cheeseman@reading.ac.uk