Nutrition

Recently I have been trying very hard, and eating plenty of these:




















But it's not all bad - last week I went a bit mad for a couple of packets of these:




















And this week I had some 'fun' with the kids baking these (and then eating them, which was true fun):















Having increased my fruit intake to try to eat some everyday, I was somewhat miffed when I woke up last Sunday with a sniffle. Isn't fruit supposed to ward off germs and colds? Luckily it was only a slight cold, and after sneezing and sniffing my way through Sunday and Monday, I felt a lot better. It did cause me to miss a run and a bike ride though, grrr...

A few years ago I started keeping a food diary as I tried to improve my diet. It was more an attempt to be healthy than a bid to lose weight, and I aimed to list at least 5 fruit or vegetables a day. (For Non-UK residents, the government here has been telling us for years that we should eat a minimum of 5 fruit and veg a day). I did pretty well for about a year, had lots of apples, and ate plenty of other fruit and veg. And funnily enough, I noticed that I didn't get a cold for most of that time. It really seemed to make a difference. When I did eventually catch a cold, it was a real humdinger, though. Yuck.

I couldn't work out whether the apple a day really did keep the doctor away, or if it was the combination of fruit and veg, but I was convinced - all those vitamins were doing some good.

Since then I have often fallen off the fruit-and-veg barrow. I'm a big fan of vegetables, but I'm really not keen on much fruit. I tend to stick to apples, grapes and orange juice most of the time, and there are so many tastier snacks, such as crisps, biscuits and cake to name a few. Now I'm trying to be better, because it really shouldn't be that hard to eat at least 2-3 portions of fruit and 2-3 portions of veg each day.

I don't know much about nutrition, and I don't find it all that interesting, because for me, food is a great source of pleasure, not something to be analysed. But for the moment, I'm hoping that a few more apples will keep me reasonable healthy, and I'm also including copious helpings of my favourite fruit portion;