Today’s episode covers all of my favorite savory snack items I eat and keep on hand now that I am on maintenance. I share tips on where to get them from grocery stores like Aldi, Fresh Thyme, Pick n Save/Kroger and more. I also cover recipe ideas and how I used them to make filling flavorful food.
Thanks for listening! Feel free to reach out at links below
Today’s episode covers all of my favorite savory snack items I eat and keep on hand now that I am on maintenance. I share tips on where to get them from grocery stores like Aldi, Fresh Thyme, Pick n Save/Kroger and more. I also cover recipe ideas and how I used them to make filling flavorful food.
Thanks for listening! Feel free to reach out at links below
Hi I'm Thomas welcome to the parachute advice. My life has taken a lot of twists and turns and on this podcast I will dive into those. The goal is to help everyone listening learn from my experiences and hopefully avoid some of the mistakes I've made welcome to today's episode of the parachute advice podcast I'm your host Thomas, so far we've talked about lean protein starches support items fruits and vegetables. Today I thought we would get into what I keep around the house for salty and savory snacks and the ones I enjoy most, first off I kept very few if any of this in the house during my actual Diet phase I just didn't want the temptation. I also still track these fairly closely what do I mean by fairly closely well since I'm on maintenance calories and I don't factor in, the daily calorie needs of all the working out I do I'm not too worried about getting perfect on my calorie tracking so for example 110 Cal portion of pretzels is 28 grams if I measure it out. I still will measure it out but I might end up with 35 grams in the bowl or I might have a few well I'm measuring it out, this is not something I would track to that detail anymore. Back when I was on my diet I would have logged exactly 35 grams of pretzels but now I'll simply put down a portion is 28 grams even though I might have eaten, 30 or 35 or even 40 grams now obviously you have to be careful here don't get out of control and don't ignore what you're eating but you don't have to be exact when you're on maintenance. Here's my primary snack list salty snacks pretzels are one of my primary go Toots and I have them on hand all the time. I just enjoy pretzels and I find that they make a great basic snack to satisfy that savory and salty craving, I'll often also get the all these version of dots pretzels they're called they're pub-style but I don't get these often because I find it too easy to overeat on these, while a few extras not the end of the world I have done this trick to see just how much snacking I do when I'm not logging from time to time how do I do this, something I'll do from time to time to just verify how much I'm actually consuming especially in something like all these pub-style pretzels which I know I can tend to overeat or over snack on is I will write the date on the bag when I open it, and then when I'm done in the bag is empty I'll go back through my login MyFitnessPal and see how many times I logged in. So what have I seen sometimes I have a 10 serving bag and I look back and I see I only logged it five times. That tells me that I ate an extra 500 calories over that time frame that I didn't track. Do this often enough and you will put weight on I've also seen where I've logged it nine times and finished a 10 bag survey. So really that's not a big deal because it's 100 calories but over several days. That might have been a simple as the bag was short or maybe I was off by a grammar to here and there. The next time you look at a package notice how often it will say a serving size is X about. It might say about four servings or about five servings that's because they're not exactly filled to the Limit. I personally don't see a time I won't weigh in track my snacks just to be sure I'm not overdoing it. Back to what pretzels I buy though some of my favorites are the all these mini twists, the Old Dutch brand butter spindles and honestly all of Meijer brand I love Schneider of Hanover pretzels but they're getting a bit expensive with inflation lately so I'll only get those when they're on sale at a good price, I also prefer smaller pretzels because eating 20 bytes for 28 grams, in a portion is better than one large pretzel both from a calorie point of view and a volume point of view there's just something more enjoyable, about eating 20 little B then one big bite or one big portion, also if you do like me and have a habit of walking past the bag say on your way out the door or just when you're walking around the house board grabbing a few pretzels here and there it's a lot harder to overdo it. When 10 mini twists is 55 calories versus One pretzel being 110 Cal think about that if every time you walk past the bag you grab let's say five or six pretzels well that's 25 calories, but if every time you walk by the bag you grab one pretzel and that's 100 calorie pretzel that's a big difference to that point, I often keep my snacks tucked away so it's harder for harder or less convenient to just quote grab some when walking past I also love the flavors of Snack Factory pretzel crisps but like most things be careful because these can be all over the place in calories depending on how they're flavored and sees it since I'm on maintenance I don't stress about a few calories here or there I'm more concerned about the big picture so if the pretzels are 110 calories or 120 calories per serving I'll usually just use the same. Value that I have saved my fitness pal and log 110 Cal version of pretzels that said. If it's 130 Cal pretzel snack I'll log that as 130 calories per potion Most states, again I've based my maintenance calories on low to no physical activity even though I lift weights two to three days a week and I run between 10 and 30 miles a week depending on where I am in my training plan. And I still don't eat right up to my limit each day so if I have an extra 20 or 30 or hell. If I'm off by 100 calories in a day it is not the end of the world unlike when you're in a full-fledged diet plan and you need to know exactly how much you're eating. Another one is pre-made popcorn this is a great snack I was only making popcorn, for a long time but I found this to be much easier and not a huge calorie change here are my favorites, top is all these brand sea salt at 130 calories per 28 gram serving for all these popcorn examples I'm going to give you their all 28 grams servings. Valley Pop Brand which I think is somewhat somewhat of a local brand here in Wisconsin is my second favorite there popcorns about 150 calories per serving but the flavor of their butter flavor is so close to movie theater style popcorn, without going crazy and calories that it's great to have on hand from time to time they also have flavors like garlic parmesan and cheddar those are about 140 calories per serving and have great flavor I often portion out two servings of the butter sea-salt Valley pop and smuggle that into the movies for my popcorn versus that they're extremely high calorie movie popcorn. With the basic versions like sea salt or buttery flavor I'll even sometimes add kernels brand popcorn ceasing to change things up like a little nacho cheese or bacon cheddar. Keep in mind though anything that has flavor probably has calories but again it's not the end of the world while you're on maintenance plan I do from time to time way out how much seasoning I'm using just to know and make sure I'm not overdoing it. Another great season option is nutritional yeast for a Parmesan cheese like flavor. Microwave popcorn this is one I get mainly one brand up and that is the Jolly Time healthy pop 100 both sea salt and kettle corn. Each bag is 110 calories and I love that warm fresh out of the microwave texture and flavor. Watch when you're buying these though I just recently discovered that they come in two versions one serving per bag version and a 2.5 serving per bag serving size. There are the same number of calories per serving it's just when you go to poppet you're going from having one 110 calories serving 22.5 of that 110 Cal serving so if you're like me and you sit down and eat the whole bag that's a big difference. Another favorite of mine is just simple air popper popcorn, it's a great low calorie way to make popcorn the only struggle I've had here is getting the salt and seasoning to stick to air popped popcorn my trick is a little bit of olive oil cooking spray or a little bit of I Can't Believe It's Not Butter spray then sprinkle on either butter flavor seasoning salt, or popcorn season of your choice just remember both of these say zero calorie but you're adding calories in the form of fat. Another tip for all popcorn is sprinkle a little bit of MSG on it. I know MSG gets a bad rap but I'm telling you a light dusting of MSG on your popcorn, will satisfy that salty craving and make it taste like one of those highly processed snacks. Without it being highly processed full of fats and other bad ingredients. Sometimes I like to just do a little bit of salt and black pepper on my popcorn that's a great one as well. I also have a microwave air popper it works the same as a traditional air popper you just use a container in the microwave. Just be careful here I have accidentally overcooked my popcorn in the microwave using my air popper so badly that I had to run the entire thing under water for fear of it bursting into flames. Yes you can burn popcorn that bad in the microwave and God will your house smell for days. As a result I will use my microwave air popper in batches doing small batches and then combining it together. Another trick I recently Learned was stovetop popcorn which I used to love but I was under the impression that you had to bathe the kernels and oil to get that stovetop popcorn flavor. Well turns out you don't I measure out The Popcorn Place it in the pot and then I spray it with a little bit of cooking spray to lightly coat it and then cook it like normal again there's much less fat in this method, but it comes out really good it almost reminds me when you season it up another way I'll do stovetop popcorn is with butter Crisco that's my favorite Ray. I don't do that often because of the amount of calories from the fat and yes I do log the fat from the Crisco, my rule of thumb is if I put in one portion of Crisco which is about 100 calories I'll log it as 70 calories because at the end of the day some of the oil stays in the pan, but I am still logging it but the nice thing with that method is the popcorn salt and seasoning sticks rate when it's done. How do I season my popcorn I've mentioned a few ways but let's give him a little bit more detail I like to use I Can't Believe It's Not Butter spray or olive oil cooking spray to help get the popcorn coated so that it's seasoning or salt will stick to it as I've mentioned I will use often kernels brand popcorn seasoning, for flavor butter salt and even some cracked black pepper. All right crackers or something I rarely keep around the house if I do it's usually the cauliflower sea salt and cheddar ones from Aldi's I'll tell you right now. They taste like vegetables they're made with vegetables they taste like vegetables but that said I love the texture and it only 100 calories per 28 gram serving, it's a great snack for that crunchy cracker like texture after after a meal chips what do I say about chips well honestly I don't have chips in the house I haven't bought chips in over three years. I might from time to time have tortilla chips but that is extremely rare at the end of the day I have yet to find a chip option that. Low enough calorie or hard enough for me to not overeat. The biggest reason is because so many of these are 140 to 150 calories per serving and it's only a small dish think about that for the same G 28 G portion. And 110 calories you can have a bowl of pretzels or 150 calories you can have a small bowl of potato chips now listen if you love potato chips have potato chips. But I just don't I do like some of the chip Alternatives that have come on the market my go-to here is popcorn or sea salt flavor, sometimes their buffalo chicken protein ones if I can find them but they've been hard to find lately and they're not exactly cheaper affordable. I do love those because they're both of those products because there are 120 calories per 28 gram serving and you get a large bowl because they're so puffy a great snack here. Is to take 120 calories serving of pop corners some fat-free cottage cheese mixed with hot sauce and eat that as a dip. You have a 200 calorie snack with 15 grams of protein with only 2.5 grams of fat. What's great with pop corners is due to the size and volume of portion if you grab a couple chips while you're walking through the kitchen on your way out the door it's not a diet Killer versus a Lay's potato chips, another snack I really enjoy from time to time is low calorie low carb toast with light I Can't Believe It's Not Butter. Simple as that I really love for this snack the Aldi keto bread lightly toasted and then spread a little I Can't Believe It's Not Butter light on there and maybe a Sprinkle of salt or I might make the toast with light I Can't Believe It's Not Butter and an onion sandwich, this is a weird one I know but something I grew up having it was a favorite of my grandparents and my mom and often it would have been mail, which I still do from time to time with light Hellmann's mail which is the same calories per serving as light I Can't Believe It's Not Butter. But oftentimes I'll just use light I Can't Believe It's Not Butter thinly spread on toast, with a thin slice of onion or two maybe a Sprinkle of salt and make a snack out of that beef jerky snack bars because of the cost I prefer the Jack's links version of these versus some of the other bands, some of the other brands that are supposedly better quality like epic bars or Chomps or 4505 while the quality of the ingredients might be a bit different like grass-fed beef or the nutrients, at the end of the day when you compare the packages what I found is that the fat protein, and salt is nearly identical between the high-end versions and the Jacks link yet the cost is drastically different, I get both the beef and chicken ones in multiple flavors both are about 70 or 80 calories per bar. Depending on the flavors I love both the Savory beef and chicken jerky snack bars and. Fiber One bars which I'll cover in the Suites episode as a great snack to throw in my pocket for when I'm on the go and concern about not having access to healthy food options. For example when I go for a motorcycle ride I'll throw some of those in my saddlebags I don't get tempted to eat unhealthy food on the road all right vegetables another great snacking option. Cucumbers for me have become a nightly snack it's a great filling snack and honestly they don't tell you this it's a great way to hydrate after a workout because cucumbers have so much water content after a long sweaty run cucumbers with a ton of salt is a great hydrating snack thing about that you're getting both liquids and sodium. How do I like to eat my cucumbers well I like to slice them I season with salt and pepper and then sriracha and yellow mustard. I don't know what it is but something about the flavor Play Between the yellow mustard and I don't mean fancy mustard, plain yellow mustard and sriracha sauce is just great I'll also slice them and then mix sambal Olek or garlic chili paste with soy sauce or fish sauce and use it like a dip with sliced cucumbers. If you want to get really creative here adding some chopped herbs to carrots is another snack I use, I like to season this with something like Lowry season salt and sit there and snack on those while I'm watching TV, I get both the baby carrots which I bet you didn't know aren't actually baby carrots they are ugly and damaged carrots cut down to look like baby carrots or I'll just grab a whole carrot wash it and eat it, I oftentimes won't even peel it I just wash it off I'll just bite the end off and dip it in salt or seasoned salt from a dish. I'll do the same with broccoli or cauliflower but less frequently just because of the ease to cut and clean carrots versus broccoli and cauliflower I hope all of these options help you come up with some low calorie healthy snack ideas for both maintenance and while you're on your diet again. Variety and not completely limiting or excluding items will make this process so much easier and you'll be that much more successful thank you for listening please join me again for future episodes. You can contact me at parachute advice podcast at gmail.com again that's all one word parachute advice podcast at gmail.com. You can also follow me on Instagram at parachute advice again thank you for listening and please like And subscribe wherever you get your podcasts. Music.