Meat-free Crunch Time

Sometimes, when you’re trying to watch what you eat, it can feel as though it’s all textureless smoothies and limp salads, leaving you longing for a bit of crunch. Now, we don’t necessarily mean a Cadbury Crunchie or a bowl of Crunchy Nut Cornflakes, although we have to admit they’re pretty tasty snacks.

Crunch doesn’t have to mean fibre and it doesn’t have to mean chocolate. Protein in the form of nuts and seeds is a great source of healthy crunch too – although there is apparently one gram of protein in a 40 gram Crunchie, so do with that information what you will.

If you don’t eat meat, adding protein-packed nuts and seeds with a bit of crunch can bring extra bite to your meals, and help you to make sure you’re still getting all the right nutrients and general goodness from your grub.

So, in this next installment of our GuaranT Good Food series, we’re showing you what to do with nuts and seeds apart from just sprinkling them on your usual salad; it’s officially crunch time.

Let’s start by going all Paul Hollywood and making some bread. Once you’ve witnessed and tasted the magic of homemade bread, there’s no going back to shop-bought. It’s the best thing since…well, we’ll leave you to finish that sentence.

This recipe from The Little Green Spoon for super seed bread is packed with almonds, sunflower seeds, chia seeds, sesame seeds and pumpkin seeds, all bringing added protein and crunch to your morning toast.

Smother with crunchy peanut butter for something extra to get your teeth into, or even some hazelnut chocolate spread to satisfy your sweet tooth, but still with added protein.

Pancakes are fluffy and light, right? Usually, but that doesn’t mean you can’t enjoy a stack with a bit more bite from time to time. And again, it’s crunchy peanut butter we need to be thanking!

These peanut butter pancakes from Dreamy Leaf are vegan-friendly and absolutely gorgeous served with your favourite spread or some mixed berries for added goodness. Tip: if you buy frozen berries, they’ll last longer than fresh, and you’ll get all that gorgeous purple berry juice soaking into your pancakes as a Brucie bonus.

Cashew nuts are a great source of protein, and they’re also naturally full of antioxidants, making them super healthy. They can often be found alongside chicken in Chinese dishes, but they’re great in veggie versions too, like this ‘fakeaway’ from Dinner Diary.

The recipe is for a mushroom, broccoli and cashew stir fry, which you could serve with rice or noodles or even just a salad, and it’s such a beautiful fusion of flavours and textures that you won’t miss the meat at all – an excellent introduction to #MeatFreeMonday if that’s what you’re after.

Nuggets and chips: a fast-food favourite and the go-to meal for busy mums who don’t have time to do anything more than shove something in the oven. But can it be made healthy? Everything can! Well, maybe not everything…Devil’s Food Cake, for example, or that Cadbury Crunchie we were on about…

Forget those though – nuggets and chips can be made much healthier than the fast food version we’re familiar with. Vegetarian Mamma has a recipe for tofu nuggets that are coated in crunchy protein-filled sesame seeds instead of the usual batter or breadcrumbs, and that are perfect served with homemade chips cooked in your Tefal ActiFry.

These nuggets are kid-friendly, and a cracking throwback treat for adults too, just without any dodgy processed chicken.

Peanut butter is so versatile. We’ve had it on our seeded bread, we’ve made pancakes from it and now we’re using it in our dinner, for these vegetable satay noodles, which just so happen to be vegan and gluten-free, from Gluten-Free Cuppa Tea.

This is a great little stir fry to cook up in your Tefal Thermo-Spot, where you’ll have plenty of space to toss your ingredients around and make sure everything’s covered in liberal amounts of spicy peanut sauce.

We recommend adding broccoli, carrot, cauliflower and mangetout for extra crunch, but you can of course add anything you like. Just maybe not that Cadbury Crunchie.