Today’s episode covers all of my favorite sweet 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 sweet 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 experiences 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 Vice podcast I'm your host Thomas so far we've talked about lean proteins starch has support items fruits and vegetables and an end the last episode Savory snacks while today's the follow-up to Savory snacks where I'm going to cover sweet snacks first off like I mentioned in the previous episode. I kept none of this in the house during my actual diet face I just didn't want the temptation, and I also still track these fairly closely as I mentioned the previous episode fairly closely to me means if a portion is 28 Grams and I put 35 grams in the bowl I'm still just going to log in as 28 grams it's one portion. Why do I do this and how do I get away with this well for two reasons I rarely eat right up to my calorie number per day. And second of all I still have my minions College based around the idea of being sedentary with little to no exercise you know I work out five days a week so as a result, being off by a few calories here and there is not a big deal for me, so here's my primary sweet snack list Jello Raymond's sugar-free jowls and snack pack sugar-free jowls. I love Jello or sugar-free Giles has a snack to accompany my lunch I take that every day with me, I personally make sugar-free Jell-O every other week and Portion it out to pack in my lunches, one trick I use to get a firmer Jello more like what store-bought is like is I add some extra plain gelatin when I'm making my Jello so that when it hardens up it's a little firmer if I don't want to make jello for the week, I'll just get the five calories sugar free snack packs especially the cherry flavor Which is my. These are nice too because they are shelf-stable but be careful where you storm in your house I left some in a warm spot once and they all turn to liquid and guess what when they're chilled back down they don't turn back to a solid. Finally I'll get the Raymond's to these can be found at Walmart or Woodman's they have some great flavors like their tropical and then their traditional, both are great sweet snacks one of my favorites is to take Cherry snack packs break it up in a bowl and top it with fat-free reddi whip this is a great 25 or 30 calorie snack I'll put 25 Cal Cherry gels in a bowl, mash them up and top them with 4 servings of fat-free reddi whip mix and enjoy as I like to joke when you're using fat-free ready web. The little bit you spray in your mouth before you put the can in the fridge has no calories in it okay sugar-free pudding. I love this product as a snack too you can make this with milk milk Alternatives or even just water I've said this multiple times over the last few episodes skim milk, it's just white colored water so if you're making something you would use skim milk for you can use water. Will it taste is good maybe not it might be a little different especially compared to using hope whole milk or 2% milk but again it saves on calories another trick here is when I'm making my sugar-free pudding. I'll mix in some protein powder to add a little bit of protein as well as give it a little bit richer flavor, I especially like the brand I so pure zero low-carb for this because I see no reason to add additional sugar but you could use whatever protein powder you wanted for example you could use, pb2 peanut butter powder or a peanut butter flavored protein powder with chocolate pudding for a nice flavor combination, what I do is I just mix in a partial portion of Vanilla Ice appear with water and then starting to the Jell-O pudding mix and let it set up enjoy, I'll be honest I've noticed the pudding is a bit more runny than normal but it could be my water ratio the lack of milk or being sugar-free pudding. That said it's not terrible it's just a bit softer. For example for half cup servings of chocolate sugar-free pudding with one serving of I so pure vanilla and water gives you. 55 calorie portions was 7 grams of protein and 7 grams of carbs and basically zero fat. All right fat-free reddi whip I love this atop things like Jello yogurt or even a fiber 170 calorie snack bar it's just five calories per serving but know that you are likely putting four to six servings. And your dish when you spray it just so you know any whipped cream sprayed from the can directly in your mouth like I said earlier is calorie free. I'm just kidding of course but not completely this is one where you can either way the item as you add it to the dish, so place the dish on your scale and spray the whipped cream on to see how much you're using or like I mentioned in the previous episode I'll write the date on the can, when I'm done using it. I'll look at how many times I logged it and determining how many servings I was using each time on average and then going forward I will use that as my serving number all right, like I mentioned the Savory snacks episode toast with light I Can't Believe It's Not Butter but here I'll put a little bit of cinnamon sugar on it. It's the same as the basic toast recipe but in place of salt I'm using a little bit of cinnamon sugar. Depending on where I am in my diet or plan I may or may not even log the sugar I just have a Shaker with a mix of cinnamon and sugar on the counter that I'll use granola bars fiber 170 calorie snack cakes like fudge brownie and birthday cake. Where their fiber 170 calories granola bars is great there high-fiber sweet snacks I personally love the pretzel peanut butter and chocolate ones. Protein bars protein bars you have to be careful with some of these are just glorified candy bars. I like to get fiber 190 calorie protein bars as a great low calorie protein bar option I warned you the texture and taste is not great. They're not terrible. But it's not as good as some of the high in protein bars partially because the protein to calorie ratio is so good as a result there's not a lot of other things in the protein bar I love both Savory beef and chicken jerky snack bars as I mentioned in previous episodes, and the Fiber One bars as a great snack to throw in a pocket for when I'm on the go. As I mentioned the previous episode it's a great way to have a snack with you in case you don't have access to healthy food options like I said. Maybe when I'm out on a motorcycle ride and I'm jumping from place to place and I don't want to be tempted by unhealthy food on the road or get so hungry that I need to eat, I'll do that another one is frozen fruit I'll get this to mix in with yogurt or fat-free cottage cheese, I laugh because when I was a kid it seemed like only old people ate fat-free cottage cheese or cottage cheese with fruit in general and now I love it. I feel like that's a sign I'm an old person now but I hope not one of my favorite ways to do this is 140 grams of 70 Cal, blueberries thought in the microwave tapped with a few packets of stevia then mix in plain Greek yogurt or cottage cheese for protein-packed load and low-fat late-night snack right before bed to keep you full I might even top this with some fat-free reddi Whip too sugary sweet items, marshmallows these are a great sweet snack for that Sugar craving take the standard size marshmallow, those are 25 calories per each so a great little sweet snack I'll even snack on a few before and during a long run for a burst of sugary carbs. Hard baked meringues are another great sweet snack I love the crunchy melts brand for the snack I only get the sugar ones which are 220 calories per piece there's also a sugar-free version for 10 calories each but I've never tried those personally, flavored yogurts are another great one to there are so many to list that I can't cover all of them but I'll highlight some of the core ones I like in general I get low-fat or fat-free Greek yogurt ones I'll get both flavored and plane. I get these both in large tubs and individual portion cops one thing I like about plain yogurt and flavor it myself is I can control the sweetness and flavor profile. It also allows me to use it for Savory things to I'll often use plain Greek yogurt in place of sour cream, but for the purpose of today's discussion I'll focus on the sweet versions one method I love is one serving of fat-free Greek yogurt three packets of stevia and then cake batter. This is so good it's almost like birthday cake flavor I'll sometimes sprinkling some fruit, either fresh or frozen or some pb2 peanut butter powder for flavor and protein I also like to get sugar-free cherry pie filling and mix that in with either plain Greek yogurt with stevia and extract flavor of choice like vanilla cake batter banana. Or I'll get vanilla yogurt and mix in the sugar free cherry pie filling. I like to get my sugar free pie filling from Walmart their brand is good and low-cost there are other brands out there that taste a little bit better but they're significantly more expensive in some cases twice to three times the price. So honestly the cost savings and the very little difference in flavor I go with the Walmart brand for sugar free pie filling. The two good brand yogurt has recently become one of my favorites it's so rich and creamy and low in added sugar. All he has their own version of this for a great price in both plain and vanilla so I'll usually keep both on hand Kroger also makes what they call a yogurt dairy product that is low calorie low fat but it's clearly more processed. There's also the Kroger Card Master individual ones in flavors like cinnamon bun, cherry and banana pudding those are all great and I finally make a great late-night snack to satisfy that Sweet Craving and getting a little extra protein other options I like but are a bit higher in calories per portion size is the Dan and Light & Fit. The Dan and Light & Fit Sherry is my favorite one a great snack I recently discovered. Was Dan and Light & Fit Cherry yogurt with some of the Hershey zero sugar chocolate syrup it's like eating a bowl of chocolate covered cherries. For all of the Dan enlightened Fitz. They fall in the area of 70 and 90 calories per serving serving size may vary a bit based on how much fat and sugar content is in the yogurt a new even lower calorie option I've tried and. And found to enjoy but I think is a bit pricey is the Dan and Light and Fit ones that are zero sugar. My issue with these are your paint almost $2 per serving for 50 cal yogurt when you can get Kroger Card Master for 69 cents a serving. And that's roughly 70 calories per serving or you can get a tub of all these two good yogurt at about a dollar a serving. Chobani also has a zero sugar option but that's equally as an expensive I will say any time I'm buying a zero sugar item like yogurts. I don't commit and buy a ton up front until I've tried them because some have found to have a bit of a chemical like Flavor from the sweeteners they use Halo top microwave cakes are a nice little sweet treat warm treat as well. But here's a trick I discovered recently that's far more affordable, for the cost of two of those Halo tops you can buy an entire box of Pillsbury fudge brownie mix and it makes 12 portions the same size as the Halo top chocolate cake, I weigh out 45 grams of brownie mix for 170 calories 7 grams of fat and thirty eight point five grams of carbs and 1.5 grams of protein. How does this compare to Halo top well the Halo top microwave cakes are 170 calories 7 grams of fat, 33 grams of carbs and 5 grams of protein so you're missing out on a bit of protein but you're cutting down your fat and carbs you miss out on a little bit of protein but you're definitely cutting down on the fat then I'll take the brownie mix that I measured out. 45 G and I mix it with 3 teaspoons of water. And microwave it for 45 to 50 seconds to get a warm fudgy chocolate cake consistency again you can top this with some reddi whip fat-free or maybe the zero sugar Hershey syrup yes like I mentioned my method, might be a little more sugary in might have a little less protein. But if you're trying to hit macros that close that a few grams makes a difference to your success you probably shouldn't be eating cake to begin with to be honest no judgment just my two cents on that topic, I haven't tried it yet but I've read you can also do the same with cake mix as well that is next on my list to try but the cake mixes are higher in calories per gram versus brownies, so I'm not rushed out to try it and honestly the box of brownie mix is going to last me for a month or two in the fridge finally they also have a zero sugar version, of brownie mix and cake mix which saves you about 20 calories per portion. But the cost is drastically higher and I and I'm also concerned the flavor may not be as good so I've yet to try it I probably will someday but not yet. All right Snack Factory dark chocolate pretzel crisps. I warn you now these are so easy to overeat because they are so good so I only get these on rare occasions, this is one of those situations where I just accept that if the package says there's five servings in there I'm likely only going to log 3 servings and yet somehow the package is going to be empty why because a simple serving as five pieces and at often I'm having one or two pieces while I'm laying it out it's just what I've come to accept again. Because of where I am in my diet plan and my maintenance Journey not the end of the world. But this is why I tend to limit this to maybe once every other month alright konjac jowls. This is a product I love I love the brand Every Day's sweet jelly see conjunct jelly especially the grape flavor both green and regular grape, these are between 5 and 10 calories each and pack a huge boost of vitamin C. I usually get mine at H Mart but you can also get them on Amazon for a really good price as well rice cakes, I like the big ones like sea salt and playing top with different items like pb2 peanut butter a nut butter a honey butter or savory with some sardines and tuna fish but I also love to get the small mini ones chocolate and caramel rice cakes as another snack option for when I want something sweet but again I know I tend to overeat these so I limit when I have them around the house and how often I get them and I try to watch my portions closely another tip I'll give you for the larger rice cakes is. Put them in your toaster for a few seconds they get a little bit warm a little bit crispy and they have a bit of a toasted flavor and then they are even better than you can imagine, for the chocolate and caramel rice cakes, I predominantly get the Meijer brand or Ali version of those both for price and calories somehow the Quaker brand tends to be much higher in calories and far more expensive, all right Halo top or enlightened ice cream bars just be careful because some are much higher in calories and others so always read the label on these, I will also test these before committee because the sweetener they use does not sit well with my stomach and not with a lot of other people's so I've had situations where one bar in your fine. Two bars are a whole pint and you are on the toilet for the evening that said. Hilltop has recently changed the formula and I've had less of an issue with this and I also find it to be a lot creamier and better tasting so I guess double win there. All these light ice cream is a nice option but I've not gotten this in awhile because frankly the texture and flavor is not as good as Halo top. I find it to be overly firm IC and lacking in flavor but again. If you're looking for something to satisfy that Sweet Craving and you don't want a ton of calories this is a good option it's not terrible. My one of my favorites that I have virtually every day after dinner is a sweet snack is sugar-free fudgesicles this is my main go-to for a sweet ice cream snack I like that you can eat two bars 480 calories and I'll do this almost every night after dinner like I said. Also sugar-free Bomb Pops are the same as fudgesicles in calories and are a great alternative but I only get these in the summer. It's just always been my routine since I was a kid you eat Bomb Pops in the summer, they also have low-calorie dreamsicles like Blue Ribbon brand which is 70 calories per bar versus camps which is 80 per bar while it's small, the 10 calorie difference might as well save those calories for something else not a huge impact flavors just as good with both yeah so bars are another great ice cream tree and they pack a nice amount of protein as well each has 5 grams of protein per bar I don't get them often only because 400 calorie bars are five dollars while for six dollars I can get 9e calorie portions of sugar-free fudgsicles which I think is just as good or better and the deal, I will say when it comes to yasso bars I do love their birthday cake flavor as well as our sea salt caramel and their cookies and cream, they are so good and they make a great sweet treat I like their chocolate ones as well too but if I'm going to get you a sub R I'm going to go probably for a flavored one. I really want to try their pistachio brittle but I've yet to see it in stores and the only way I've seen you can get it as ordering it online from them shipped to your house and honestly that just seems like too much of a hassle for me. I hope all of these options help you come up with some great low calorie healthy snack ideas when you're craving something sweet both when you're on maintenance and on a diet again like I've mentioned before, variety and not completely limiting or excluding items will make this process and journey that much easier 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.