Snack attack

I don't know about you, but I need some snacks during the day. Apart from being just plain hungry, it's not wise to starve yourself between meals so that when you do get to eat you're so ravenous you inhale the breadbasket and eat nine kilos of pate before your main meal.  But there are snacks and snacks. I make a few rules for myself in this department otherwise it can all unravel very quickly.

First, I don't eat more than 150 calories for my snack, and preferably less. Now that instantly counts out around 80% of the manufactured garbage that is presented to us as ‘healthy snacks', which brings me to rule number 2. As much as possible I avoid refined snacks. Food that has been heavily processed has usually had all the nutrients carefully removed leaving some chemically flavoured offering with the nutritional value of one of my Adidas runners.

So here's my top ten faves...and my top ten crapolas...

The best of the best

A 200 gram of low fat yoghurt with a sprinkling of untoasted muesli on top, or a couple of strawberries or blueberries. Around 100 - 120 calories.

Six 1.7 gram seaweed or sesame rice crackers with half a tablespoon of cottage cheese on each one. Around 110 calories.

My favourite - a medium sized raw carrot (about 140 grams) dipped in ricotta cheese with each bite! (no more than three tablespoons of ricotta though.) Around 120 calories.

A small punnet of strawberries (around 250 grams) – YUM! And only 85 calories!

Ditto for blueberries – a 150 gram punnet, only 85 calories! And don't tell me they're expensive, even at five bucks a punnet they are way cheaper than a coffee and a muffin!

Another fave – the ultimate Aussie snack! Three Arnott's sesame wheat crackers with half a teaspoon of Vegemite on each. Around 110 calories.

Three slices of 200 gram apple about a centimetre thick each topped with a tablespoon of low fat ricotta cheese and a mint leaf – around 120 calories the lot.

The legume snack attack! Ten snow peas, ten snap peas and ten green beans. Just 50 calories the lot.

Protein shake. Get yourself a good quality whey protein isolate, or a soy protein isolate if you're lactose intolerant. Forty grams of powder with water is around 160 calories, or half a cup of skim milk and just twenty grams of powder, which is around 140 calories.

Two celery sticks spread with 3 tablespoons of low fat ricotta, 120 calories of yum!

And now the snacks that'll put the junk straight into the trunk...

Muffins, popularly referred to as 'bran' muffins so we get sucked into thinking they're healthy. At 400 - 550 calories each girlfriend, trust me, they ain't healthy...

Krispy Kreme donuts. Just one of those crème filled chocolate suckers will chalk up around 350 calories on your scorecard. Over 50% of the calories are derived from fat. Yecht!

McDonalds McFlurry. Nearly 400 calories. Just one McFlurry is around a quarter of an average girls total daily calorie intake.

Gloria Jeans regular skim milk hot chocolate with whipped cream, over 310 calories. That's as much as a regular healthy meal in just one hot drink!

A couple of Monte Carlo biscuits - over two hundred calories.

A Starbucks grande iced white chocolate mocha - over 300 calories. And that's with skim milk and no whipped cream!

Banana bread. They call it bread so that we think that it's healthy. In fact it's cake. Even Sumo Salad's breakfast banana bread is 400 calories per serve. It could be worse though - McDonalds McCafe's offering is an unbelievable 580 calories per serve!

KFC snack box, crispy strip. Nearly 400 calories. Fast food manufacturers call some of their products 'snacks' to suck us into thinking that they're OK to eat between meals. Yeah.

I've left the best till last. One slice of McDonalds carrot cake (that's gotta be OK - carrots are good for you, yeah?) Try 715 calories. And we wonder why we're fat...