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{{label}}Rebecca Harding - 5 min read
28 August 2018
How to make this mid-week favourite – and a few others – a little healthier.
Hands up if you love spaghetti bolognese. Well, my hand is high in the air because it’s my favourite food in the entire world. As in, I would eat it for breakfast, lunch and dinner if I could handle that much pasta. But unfortunately, I can’t.
Recently, I’ve found dried pasta hasn’t been sitting so well with me. Devastating, I know, but it doesn’t mean I need to completely cut it out of my diet.
Instead, I’ve started to reassess all of our favourite weeknight meals and how we eat them. I’ve found pasta is a vessel for bolognese sauce, rice is a vessel for chicken curries and tortillas are a vessel for fish tacos. It turns out all my favourite foods are ones that you might stop eating if you were wanting to opt for a healthier and lighter meal in the evenings.
So, how do I have my cake (and by cake I mean bolognese, curry and tacos) and eat it too? I incorporate healthy and fun substitutes that still let me enjoy my favourite foods and flavours. After all, it’s about moderation and the subtle changes, right? To begin with, my (well, it’s actually “ours” due to my partner Andy and I combining both our family recipes) bolognese sauce is already fairly healthy. I load it with fresh veggies, use an organic tomato passata that’s low in salt and use organic, free-range minced pork and veal from our local butcher.
And when it comes to the pasta, we switch it out. We began by switching out half of our pasta with half a bowl of fresh spinach or rocket, then we moved to zoodles and spinach and now it's whatever substitute to dried pasta we have in the fridge. Spelt is another wonderful substitute that we love. Add some chopped fresh herbs and chilli on top for more flavour (meaning that you don’t need as much parmesan) and – voila! – you have yourself a delicious spag bol that is both satisfying and healthy.
See my zucchini Bolognese recipe below. It doesn’t take long to make, it’s delicious, and it’s healthy too. Enjoy!
Zucchini Bolognese
Serves 6
Ingredients
Sauce
Method
Here are some of my other healthy mid-week meal hacks.
Indian take out
No one can go past a good take away curry, but why not make it slightly more nutritious with some easy switches and additions?
Mexican take out
Mexican is one of my favourites, and although it is a traditionally lighter cuisine, there can still can be some hidden cheekies in there.
Rebecca Harding is a Melbourne-based model, AIA Vitality ambassador, wellness advocate and pasta lover.
Disclaimer:
The information in this article is general information only and is not intended as financial, medical, health, nutritional, tax or other advice. It does not take into account any individual’s personal situation or needs. You should consider obtaining professional advice from a financial adviser and/or tax specialist, or medical or health practitioner, in relation to your own circumstances and before acting on this information.
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