25th January 2011

You're braver than you believe, and stronger than you seem, and smarter than you think. Christopher Robin to Pooh

Yesterday I was listening to Pooh, you can beat the old bear for a bit of wisdom, and of course my favourite Pooh story is Pooh in a hole! If you’re not a Pooh fan or you don’t know the story, I’ll copy it at the bottom of this page – Pooh Rocks!

I also found an article on how to save money and lose weight, cos lets be honest everyone’s a bit skint in January, and most people are a bit skint just before payday, I often have members say they couldn’t afford to buy fresh fruit the week before they get paid because they’d run out of cash, my answer here would be buy some tinned or frozen when you get paid in anticipation of being short of cash.

So the articles first tip was to cook up a curry, An average Indian takeaway meal Chicken Madras (27pp) with rice (12pp plain rice), naan (12pp minimum) and poppadoms (4pp each) contains lots of ProPoints as you can see and costs around £10 per person. Switching to a home cooked version instead is far kinder to your wallet and your waistline. It doesn’t have to be difficult either, tandoori and tikka is so simple you just leave it all day to marinate in the fridge.

For a delicious, super fast, low calorie chicken curry simply sauté 1 chopped onion in a non-stick pan with little water and a tablespoon of Worcester sauce until soft. Add 400g of diced chicken (10pp), sauté for 5 minutes until browned on all sides then pour over a jar of Sainsbury’s basic curry sauce (only costs about 16pence a jar) (8pp), cover and simmer for 20 minutes. Serve with 100g of boiled rice (4pp). Serves 4.

Money and calories saved
345 Kcals per person
Total cost p/p: £1.25
£’s saved over 8 weeks: £10 - £1.25 = £8.75 x 8 weeks = £70
Kcals saved over 8 weeks: 1500kcal – 345 kcal = 1,155 kcal x 8 weeks = 9,240 Kcal* (Over 2 1/2 pounds!)
(*Based on swapping 1 takeaway a week for home cooked version)

The next idea was to make a souper saving!

According to the British Sandwich Association we buy approximately 1.8 billion sandwiches every year. The average sandwich costs £1.66 and contains approximately 400 calories. A Weight Watchers BLT Sandwich is 6pp, whereas The Co-Operative Truly Irresistible Chicken & Sweetcure Bacon Sandwich is 15pp. However, a recent report by the National Consumer Council has found that many leading chains are selling sandwiches that contain more calories, salt and fat than a Big Mac (13pp) with some containing well over 700 calories per pack. Eaten every working day for a week, both the cost and the calories can mount up.

For a far cheaper, healthier option make a large pan of your own healthy, veggie based soups such as carrot and coriander, leek and potato or tomato and fresh basil. Freeze individual portions then simply remove from the freezer before you go to bed, heat in the microwave the next morning and pop in a flask to take with you to work. It’s a great way to get your five-a-day and with most home-made, low fat vegetable soups containing no more than 140 calories per serving and costing less than 50p per portion your waistline and your wallet will be much better off.

Money and calories saved
£’s saved over 8 weeks: £1.66 – 50p = £1.06 x 5 = 5.30 per week x 8 weeks = £42.40
Kcals saved over 8 weeks: 400 kcal – 140 kcal = 260 kcal x 5 = 1,300 Kcals x 8 weeks = 10,400 Kcal* (almost 3 pounds!)
(*Based on swapping shop bought sandwiches for home-made soup 5 days a week for 8 weeks)

Save wine for the weekends

Winding down each evening with a glass or two of wine may seem harmless enough but apart from the extra calories (approximately 140 Kcals per glass) and the health dangers associated with regular drinking, alcohol actually increases your appetite which can lead to an even greater calorie intake. The financial cost of relying on a glass of wine to relax can soon mount up too as even a relatively cheap wine consumed at home costs approximately £1.50 per glass.

Money and calories saved
£’s saved over 8 weeks*: £1.50 x 5 = 7.50 per week x 8 weeks = £60.00
Kcals saved over 8 weeks: 140 kcal x 5 = 700 Kcals per week x 8 weeks = 5,600 Kcal* (over 1 and a half pounds!)
(*Based on consuming one glass of wine a night, five nights a week.)

OUCH that ones just hurt me!!!

Ditch the sugary drinks

If you’re partial to quenching your thirst with sugary drinks you could be doing more harm than good to your budget and your body. Just one small bottle of lemonade, cola or Ribena can contain over 200 calories and cost up to £1. Save cash and calories by switching to drinking water instead.

Money and calories saved
£’s saved over 8 weeks*: £1 x 4 per week = £4 x 8 weeks = £32.00
Kcals saved over 8 weeks: 200 Kcals per bottle x 4 = 800 Kcals per week x 8 weeks = 6,400Kcal* (almost 2 pounds!)
(* Based on swapping 4 bottles or cans of soft drinks a week for tap water.)

Sack the snacks
We are a nation of snack lovers munching our way through 6,000 million bags of crisps, 4,400 million packs of savoury snacks and spending a whopping £6 billion on sweets and chocolate every year. Cutting back on just some of your favourite high fat, high sugar snacks is a great way to save cash and cut calories. Just eating 1 packet of biscuits, a packet of crisps and a chocolate bar less a week can save £2 and reduce your weekly calorie intake by approximately 2,400 calories!

Money and calories saved
£’s saved over 8 weeks: £2 per week x 8 weeks = £16.00
Kcals saved over 8 weeks: 2,400 kcal per week x 8 weeks = 19,200 Kcal (almost 5 ½ pounds!)
Total Kcals saved = 50,840 - just over a stone in body fat!
Total cash saved = £220

Mmm food for thought I think you’ll agree, so I promised you the Pooh Story to make you smile;

Pooh always liked a little something at eleven o’clock in the morning, and he was very glad to see Rabbit getting out the plates and mugs; and when Rabbit said, “Honey or condensed milk with your bread?” he was so excited that he said, “Both,” and then, so as not to see greedy, he added, “But don’t bother about the bread, please.” And for a long time after that he said nothing… until at least, humming to himself in a rather sticky voice, he got up, shook Rabbit lovingly by the paw, and said that he must be going on. “Must you?” said Rabbit politely.

“Well” said Pooh, “I could stay a little longer if it – if you –“ and he tried very hard to look in the direction of the larder.

“As a matter of fact,” said Rabbit, “I was going out myself directly.”

“Oh well, then, I’ll be going on. Good-bye”

“Well, good-bye, if you’re sure you won’t have any more.”

“Is there any more?” asked Pooh quickly.

Rabbit took the covers off the dishes, and said, “No, there wasn’t.”

“I thought not,” said Pooh, nodding to himself. “Well, good-bye, I must be going on.”

So he started to climb out of the hole. He pulled with his front paws, and pushed with his back paws, and in a little while his nose was out in the open again… and then his ear… and then his front paws… and then his shoulders… and then –

“Oh help!” said Pooh, “I’d better go back.”

“Oh bother!” said Pooh. “I shall have to go on.”

“I can’t do either!” said Pooh. “Oh, help and bother!”

Now, by this time Rabbit wanted to go for a walk too, and finding the front door full, he went out by the back door, and came round to Pooh, and look at him.

“Hallo, are you stuck?” he asked.

“N-no,” said Pooh carelessly. “Just resting and thinking and humming to myself.”

“Here, give us a paw.”

Pooh Bear stretched out a paw, and Rabbit pulled and pulled and pulled….

“Ow!” cried Pooh. “You’re hurting!”

“The fact is,” said Rabbit, “you’re stuck.”

“It all comes,” said Pooh crossly, “of not having front doors big enough.”

“It all comes,” said Rabbit sternly, “of eating too much. I thought at the time,” said Rabbit, “only I didn’t like to say anything,” Said Rabbit, “that one of us was eating too much,” said Rabbit, “and I knew it wasn’t me,” he said. “Well, well I shall go and fetch Christopher Robin.”

Christopher Robin lived at the other end of the Forest, and when he came back with Rabbit, and saw the front half of Pooh, he said, “Silly old Bear,” in such a loving voice that everybody felt quite hopeful again.

“I was just beginning to think,” said Bear, sniffling slightly, “that Rabbit might never be able to use his front door again. And I should hate that,” he said.

“So should I,” said Rabbit.

“If we can’t pull you out, Pooh, we might push you back.”

Rabbit scratched his whiskers thoughtfully, and pointed out that, when once Pooh was pushed back, he was back, and of course nobody was more glad to see Pooh than he was, still there it was, some lived in trees and some lived underground, and –

“You mean I’d never get out?” said Pooh.

“I mean,” said Rabbit, “that having got so far, it seems a pity to waste it.”

Christopher Robin nodded.

“Then there’s only one thing to be done,” he said. “We shall have to wait for you to get thin again.”

“How long does getting thin take?” asked Pooh anxiously.

“About a week, I should think.”

“But I can’t stay here for a week!”

“You can stay here all right, silly old Bear. It’s getting you out which is so difficult.”

“Well read to you,” said Rabbit cheerfully.

“And I hope it won’t snow,” he added. “And I say, old fellow, you’re taking up a good deal of room in my house – do you mind if I use your back legs as a towel-horse? Because, I mean, there they are – doing nothing – and it would be very convenient just to hang the towels on them.”

“A week!” said Pooh gloomily. “What about meals?”

“I’m afraid no meals,” said Christopher Robin, because of getting thin quicker. But we will read to you.”