Christmas Challenge, day 2, about chestnuts and a product review

Good evening, everyone, and welcome to my Christmas Challenge, 2024 where I try to give as much festive vibe to my everyday food as I can with the aim of staying on my healthy Mediterranean focused meals so that weight gain is minimal and I remain healthy.

I looked up chestnuts on the SW site, seeing as I am likely to eat a fair number this month.  It told me that I need to count them as one syn each and seven for a healthy extra B,

I looked up calories on Nutracheck and they are 176 calories for 100g
(for the kind I have which is Merchant Gourmet vacu packed)

Then I asked Google if chestnuts were 'healthy'.  Yes, they are, said Google.
They contain lots of vitamins, minerals and fibre and are helpful in stabilising/reducing levels of 'bad' cholesterol in the body and their comparatively high levels of potassium help to lower blood pressure.  They contain very little fat.

All in all, a festive package that really delivers on the health front.  Great!

What I ate today:

Baked oats using the mince pie porridge oats - absolutely scrummy!

Half a healthy extra B for 20g oats

I changed my mind and decided to save the festive chutney for dinner.  Instead, I used marmite with the cheese (delicious) and made it open rather than a toastie.  Blimmin' gorgeous!!

One healthy extra A, one healthy extra B and two syns for salad dressing.

Later on, I had three small easy peelers.

So here's dinner - I made the chestnut, potato and parsnip patties by softening some chopped onion and adding it to mashed potato and parsnips, crumbling in three chestnuts, adding some nutmeg, some black pepper and a pinch of chilli flakes plus a little bit of Seriously Lighter cheese spread to bind and spray frying the three patties it made. and served with a tbsp festive chutney on top.  So tasty!

Half a healthy extra B for chestnuts, two syns for the cheese spread, two syns because the potato and parsnip were pre cooked and contained some syns and two syns for a little blob of butter on the veg before they were heated.

And that was filling enough not to want any moe.

.Summary:

one healthy extra A

two healthy extra Bs

(the wrong way round but it's OK)

eight syns

Tomorrow's meal plans:

B:  mince pie overnight oats 🎄with fruit and yogurt

L:  smoked salmon 🎄 pate, hm melba toast, salad; fruit

D:  bean and olive pasta bake, veg; fruit

Exercise:  groove and a walk there and back.

The Extra Bit:

I thought I would do an occasional product review this month, as and when.
I'm starting off with this Festive Chutney that I got from M&S.  Reading the label, it does sound very seasonal and evocative and the list of ingredients show plenty of the good stuff and nothing that would lead one to think ultra processed.  So that's good.

If you like a sweet chutney, you would like this.  It is strongly reminiscent of mincemeat; one could almost use it for mince pies, were it not a rather expensive way of making mince pies!!

The sweetness hits first with the cinnamon strongly to the fore but there's a lingering spiciness after the initial sweetness that is good.  I think I would prefer more spice up front and it would have been nice to have some cranberries included in the mix but it is very palatable for this time of year.

It was very tasty teamed with applewood cheddar and a seeded cracker and was absolutely delicious on the patties for dinner as the heat of chilli flakes in the patties was well balanced by the sweetness of the chutney.

Would I buy this again - yes, I think I would.  It wouldn't go with everything but. carefully partnered, it is very tasty indeed.