Karmen the Foodie Dietitian

17/08/2020

In light of the restrictions that have been imposed on Victoria and other states across Australia, it goes with saying that the disruptions to normal life this year has been detrimental for the mental health of many Australians. This includes myself where I have struggled with my own mental health this year when faced with the uncertainty of my career as a new graduate dietitian in a world turned upside down.

The good news is that the Minister for Health, Greg Hunt has recently announced more funding to assist with the increased burden on service providers during this challenging time.

With this being said, I want to strongly advocate the importance of nutrition on our mental health as well. The worse we feel mentally, the less inclined we want to eat well. The poorer the quality of our diet, the more negatively it affects our mood.

This is why it is more important than ever that we stay on top our healthy eating and lifestyle habits:
✅Choose wholegrain foods whenever possible.
✅Aim for 5 serves of vegetables and 2 serves of fruit a day.
✅Choose sources of healthy fats such as nuts, seeds, vegetable oils and oily fish.
✅Increase gut loving probiotic foods e.g. yoghurt, kefir, kimchi, sauerkraut, tempeh
✅Aim for 150 minutes of moderate intensity OR 75 minutes of vigorous intensity physical activity/week
✅Aim to get at least 8 hours of sleep/night.

20/07/2020

Too often, people struggle to achieve their weight loss goals because we are surrounded by temptation everywhere. One of the biggest culprits to overeating is eating when you’re not hungry at all!

Here are my 8 tips to reduce mindless eating/snacking:

✅ Reduce distractions during mealtimes - that means avoid the TV or phones. However, talking to family or friends during mealtimes actually helps slow down our eating, so eating socially can be beneficial.

✅ Choose smaller/single serve packaging or serve a smaller portion into a separate bowl/plate.

✅ Keep a food diary for several days. It’s helpful to identify when, where and what triggers us eat as we often do it without thinking.

✅ Take note of your emotions. We often turn to eating when we are bored, sad, stressed or even happy. Identify if you eat in response to these emotions and find helpful distractions like going for walk or talking to a friend instead.

✅ Out of sight, out of mind. Our snacking and eating behaviours are often triggered by visual cues. Try to keep your snacks in a cupboard or pantry rather than on the kitchen counter or the coffee table.

✅ Or don’t keep them in the house at all. Make the effort not to stock up on your favourite not so healthy snacks on your routine grocery shop. Yes resist those special offers! 😅If you really want them, you will need to go out and buy them on a separate occasion.

✅ Understand craving vs. hunger. Cravings are usually emotionally driven, occur for a specific food and usually subside after half an hour. Hunger is a physiological response to having low energy so you would be open to eating almost anything. If you have identified that you’re having a craving, try to wait it out or find a helpful distraction.

✅ Schedule in meal and snack times. This can help especially if you’re typically a grazer, as creating structure for yourself is a great way to reduce mindless eating throughout the day.

Feel free to DM me if you want to find out more about intuitive eating!

13/07/2020

Save this recipe👇.
Air fryer roast chicken
🥗 🍗 🥬
I continue to be amazed by the versatility of my air fryer ever since I have gotten it last year.

I was able to prepare this roast chicken and all the trimmings in about 45 minutes (minus marinating time). What’s even better, is that you get nearly 4 serves of veg with this one meal!

Ingredients
Serves 4
1 whole free range chicken (quartered -
2 Maryland’s, 2 breast & wing pieces)
1/2 cup marinade (I highly recommend for a fairly healthy option)
3-4 cups of veg (I used 2 capsicums and 1 cup kale)
2 cloves garlic crushed
Salt and pepper
1 tbsp olive oil

For salad
8 baby potatoes
Big handful of green beans (about 100g)
12 pitted olives sliced
60g (small bag) baby spinach
1 small red onion finely chopped
1 lemon zested, juice of 1/2 lemon
2 tbsp mayonnaise

1. Rub marinade over the chicken and refrigerate for several hours or overnight.
2. Place chicken leg pieces (Maryland’s) into the air fryer and cook at 195C for 15 minutes. Meanwhile, prepare and chop your veg, toss with the garlic, olive oil, salt, pepper and other spices of choice.
3. After 15 minutes, turn chicken legs and place remaining breast pieces into the air fryer and cook for another 20 minutes at 195C.
4. Whilst the chicken is cooking, boil the potatoes until tender and quarter them. Blanch green beans in the potato water for 1 minute and cut in half. Combine all ingredients for the salad and set aside.
5. After the 20 minutes of cooking, flip the chicken one final time and toss over the raw veg. Finish off in the airfryer for 10 minutes at 200C (yes it’s going to be very full!)
6. Serve everything together family style!


@ Sydney, Australia

11/07/2020

I know this isn’t something we often find in our western style supermarkets but we do still have plenty of products that make ridiculous claims. I saw this today at my local Korean grocery store and thought it was a great example of health halo marketing.

Diet culture is huge in Asia so I’m not surprised products like this exist. It also shows the power of marketing and how easy it is to fall into the trap of purchasing highly processed foods under a thinly veiled guise of calorie control.

Truth be told if you swipe 👉, you will see that this is simply good old fashioned shortbread. Nothing weight loss friendly about it at 325kcal/serve. They used margarine instead of butter🤷‍♀️.

So this is a friendly reminder to choose balance, have a variety of whole foods and of course, enjoy the occasional treat. No need to get sucked into diet friendly or worst still, “all natural”, “free from” $$$$$ health foods that are so prevalent in the market.
@ Sydney, Australia

07/07/2020

Making a change and maintaining it is often difficult. That’s why in our dietetic practice, we recommend our clients to set SMART GOALS😎.

Smart stands for:
S: Specific
M: Measurable
A: Achievable
R: Relevant
T: Timely

For example,

I currently eat out 5 times a week and I know this is setting back my progress for weight loss.

Now compare these 2 goals:

1. I want to eat out less often.
2. I want to reduce eating out to 3 meals per week this month.

I am more likely to achieve goal 2 because not only have I told myself specifically what to do, it is achievable for me and has a timeframe so I can check back on my progress at the end of the month.
✨
You can set SMART goals for anything you want the change in life. For example, you might want to reduce your screen time, get more sleep or even try a something new.
✨
I hope this can serve as a useful tool if there’s something you want to work on. Feel free to share a SMART goal you want to set yourself in the comments below!

19/06/2020

Save this recipe! 👇

To celebrate whole grain week , I decided to spotlight a super little grain, FREEKEH. This is a wonderful ingredient commonly used in Middle Eastern and North African cuisines. It is a type of wheat and because it is a whole grain, it comes with all of their benefits:
- Provides us with insoluble fibre, B vitamins and minerals
- Excellent for our gut health and keeps us satiated for longer
- Frequent consumption (3 serves a day) reduces risk of Type 2 diabetes, CVD, stroke, some cancers and all cause mortality

Why freekah is different:
- Great source of iron
- Higher in protein
- Lower in kJ

Freekeh can be used in salads, soups or as a simple starchy side. It has the same satisfying chewy texture of barley and a delicious nutty flavour. There are 2 kinds of freekeh available - cracked and whole.

The cracked variety cooks up quicker (1 part : 2 1/2 parts water for 20 minutes) whereas the whole kind takes longer (1 part : 3 parts water for 40 minutes). For best results, follow the instructions on the package!

Freekeh is not gluten free, so it’s not suitable for coeliacs or those with a gluten intolerance. It’s also not suitable for those with a wheat allergy.

Check out my recipe using freekeh. This salad can keep well in the fridge for a few days (just don’t add the dressing) so it’s great to make ahead of time or for meal prep.

Hope you will try it out!

Freekeh salad with seasonal vegetables

Serves 4-6

4 stalks of kale (remove stem and finely chop leaves)
1 large carrot grated
1 fennel (or 1/2 large) thinly shaved
4 sprigs of dill roughly chopped (include stem)
2 cups cooked freekeh (about 2/3 cup uncooked)
1 1/2 tbsp toasted sesame seeds

For the dressing
2 tbsp neutral flavoured oil
1 tsp sesame oil
1 tbsp soy sauce
2 tbsp lemon juice
Salt and pepper to taste

Serve with protein or choice

1. Start with the dressing. Whisk all ingredients together until emulsified.
2. Toss all ingredients with the dressing and let the salad sit for 10-15 minutes to soften the kale.
@ Sydney, Australia

18/05/2020

More proof to show that change really needs to come from the top down. The government and industry plays a substantial role in our food supply and this ultimately affects our own choices. It’s time to stop blaming the individual!!!

A new study found junk food is more heavily marketed in lower income suburbs, health advocates accusing big supermarkets of putting profits before health. Su...

15/05/2020

👇👇👇Save this recipe!

Easy stovetop frittata - 🍳 🧅 🍅 🥒 🥬 There is plenty of veg in the recipe to help you get your daily 5 serves!

I made this for 1 with a mini cast iron skillet - so cute! But feel free to scale this for as many people as you’d like.

Ingredients (serves 1)
2 eggs
2 tbsp evaporated milk (in place of cream)
1/2 cup any chopped green veg (I used 1/2 a grated zucchini)
3-4 cherry tomatoes halved
1/4 red onion sliced
Salt and pepper
Olive oil

Make sure you used a well seasoned cast iron skillet so it doesn’t stick! (Or non stick if you don’t have one😉)

1. Whisk eggs and milk in a bowl. Add the salt at the last minute before you pour the eggs into the pan.
2. Sauté vegetables (except for tomatoes) in a tsp of oil. Season with salt and pepper.
3. Turn the heat to low and pour in the egg mixture into the skillet. Stir constantly to distribute the vegetables evenly.
4. Drop in the cherry tomato halves evenly throughout the frittata.
5. Finish in a 180C oven until set (roughly 10 minutes).

Serve alongside a side 🥗 and🥖. Yum!

💡 Crumble a bit of feta instead of salt.

06/05/2020

5 ways to get your 5 serves of veggies

Yes, 5 serves of veggies are a lot to have in one go. But with just a bit of forward planning and thinking outside the box, it might not be as hard as you think.

The latest data (National Health Survey 2017-2018) shows that only 7.5% of Aussie adults are meeting the daily recommended 5-6 serves of veg, with young adults getting in the least. Whether it’s due a lack of enjoyment, or that it’s just simply too much to get in, it’s a pretty hard (veggie) pill to swallow.

Remember, 1 serve of veg =
🥦 1/2 cup cooked veg
🥗 1 cup salad/raw veg
🍅 1 piece of veg e.g tomato
🥜1/2 cup legumes e.g beans
🍠1/2 potato

Here are my 5 tips to becoming a veggie eating champ and you’ll be well on your way to smashing your 5 serves before midday.

1. Have a savoury breakfast. Think veggie omelette or beans on toast.

2. Have veggie snacks. No I don’t just mean carrot and celery sticks. How about:
- a handful of cherry tomatoes
- half a roasted sweet potato (cooled) or cob of corn
- homemade kale chips
- veggie frittata
Get creative and find something you can enjoy. Having veggies in amongst a healthy grazing platter can be a lot more manageable.

3. Sneak in your veggies. Whether it be adding a handful of spinach to your smoothies or throwing extra veg into your stews, hiding veggies in things you already enjoy will make you forget that you’re even eating them. Try black beans in brownies or zucchini bread.

4. Use veggies as part of the starchy component in your meals. For example, add peas, beans, lentils or grated cauliflower to rice. Or shredded zucchini to pasta.

5. Try some veggie based recipes for a change. Veggies no longer have be an an afterthought. Instead, let’s celebrate them and make them the star of our dish. The site has some amazing veggie based recipes. (Link in bio)

I hope that this post will serve as a reminder for all of you, that eating vegetables can be both enjoyable and achievable!

03/05/2020

Part 2 of my dietary fats series now live on YouTube!

Today, I'll be talking about the recommendations to eating for a healthy heart and how to put our knowledge of dietary fats to practice. Heart Foundation pos...

30/04/2020

🍝 15 minute pasta recipe

Following on from my dietary fats video (link in bio), I wanted to show how I like to incorporate healthy fats in my cooking. This is a super easy pasta recipe that you can whip up in no time, whether it be for a quick wfh lunch or a speedy weeknight dinner.

This is one of those recipes that changes every time depending on what I have or what I feel like. You can definitely make it your own as well!

Ingredients (Sorry, I don’t have quantities for this one because it’s so simple. I just go with my gut! 😅)

Spaghetti
Passata or fresh chopped tomatoes (whatever is available)
Drizzle of extra virgin olive oil
Normal olive oil
Clove of garlic smashed
Whole chilli scored
Olives/canned tuna, sardines or mackerel
Salt and pepper to taste
Fresh herbs/grated parmesan

1. Start off by cooking the spaghetti.
2. 3-4 minutes from finishing the pasta, heat the garlic and chilli in a bit of olive oil in a separate pan. Add in as much passata as you like and season with salt and pepper.
3. Add the pasta directly from the pot along with a bit of pasta water. Cook for 2 minutes until all the liquid has absorbed.
4. Add in olives and/or a tin of oily fish (drained).
5. Finish with basil, parsley or parmesan to your liking.
6. Finally drizzle over a bit of extra virgin olive oil to finish.

Enjoy!!!

28/04/2020

Check out my latest video on fats this week!

See time stamps BELOW! In this week's video, I'll be going through all the different types of dietary fats and their effects on our health. Spoiler alert: no...