Beautiful beans

Once again Pod have come up trumps with a super healthy and hearty winter lunch. Their new Bengal bean curry, served with mixed rice, is super healthy and filling. It's gluten and dairy free, vegan, with no saturated fats and plenty of fibre. One of their mini portions with a sprouted bean side salad makes for a perfectly balanced lunch.

It also makes it easy to tick off one of the habits I'll be keeping up from bootcamp - that is having a daily portion of brown rice and pulses.

These two foods are the cornerstones of the macrobiotic diet (along with vegetables) and it's easy to see why, Both are low in fat, high in fibre and rich in vitamins and minerals. The fibre in both will keep you fuller for longer, maintain bowel regularity and can help clear cholesterol and circulating hormones from the body keeping both in balance.

Pulses are also a good vegetarian source of protein and the amino acids missing from pulses are present in rice so they compliment each other perfectly.

If you, or those you cook for, don't like either, they're fortunately easy to hide in other dishes. Pulses can be easily hidden in stews and soups, whilst brown rice is easily disguised when served with anything with a sauce as is the case with Pod's hot dishes ... so there are really no excuses!