10 ways to boost your fibre intake
Time to re-visit one of Jones’s favourite subjects - FIBRE. This time we offer some practical points to help you increase your fibre intake with easy tips.
Fibre doesn’t get digested by your stomach – it makes it through to feed and sustain your gut biome. It’s so important to keep everything moving. It passes through relatively unchanged and is made up of the indigestible parts or compounds of plants. In basic terms you need lots of fibre to push food through the digestive tract.
Growing evidence shows that adequate fibre may benefit your digestion, reduce your risk of chronic disease and help you lose weight.
Intestinal bacteria have enzymes to digest fibre. They feed the good bacteria in your gut, and this has many positive effects on your health.
We are aiming for 25-30g of fibre per day. I’ll give you an idea of the fibre content on certain foods as the article progresses.
1. Switch your bread rice and pasta from white to brown.
White bread one slice 0.6g fibre. Brown 2g fibre
White rice 100g – 0.4g fibre. Brown rice 1.8g fibre.
White pasta 100g – 2.5g fibre. Brown pasta 6.5g fibre .
Such a simple and easy way of making an immediate impact and improving your fibre intake. Feed those microbes and help your digestion along.
White rice has the bran and germ removed which are the most nutritious part of the grain. If you really want to put rocket boosters under your nutrition then try purple rice, or black rice as it is also called. It goes slightly purple when cooked. It is a nutty rice with a real bite. A simple switch from white to brown isn’t too taxing or expensive, and it is actually more enjoyable to eat.
Bread and pasta – white bread and pasta is highly processed, and also has the bran and germ removed. This cuts out valuable nutrients and fibre. It is all about feeding those microbes, so think whole food and you won’t go far wrong.
2. Porridge in the morning? Oats are an amazing source of fibre. Now the weather is starting to change from summer into autumn, a lovely cosy bowl of warm porridge is much more appealing. Having said that, porridge shouldn’t be dismissed on the warmer days – with a bit of night before thought the most scrumptious overnight oats can be created in the fridge. Check out our Jones recipes for some breakfast ideas.
One cup of oats = 7.5g of fibre so this is a quick, easy and delicious win.
3. Chickpeas, black beans, legumes, peas, lentils and so many more.
These all range from 6g – 8g of fibre per 100g portion.
Don’t forget these food heroes – it is very easy to lose these little blighters in the dark corners of the pantry. Bring them back into the light !
Soups, stews, add them to your chilli, or throw them on your salad -it doesn’t have to be a complicated time consuming recipe! Check out our poke bowl – something colourful and diverse to satisfy those friendly bacteria.
4. Add in fermented foods – yes, we would say this I hear you cry, but at Jones we set out on a mission to help people improve their gut health, which in turn will help people with their general health and well-being. We have come up with a range of krauts and slaws with ADDED FIBRE in the form of natural chicory root. A 100g portion of one of these will give you an impressive 6g of fibre. I challenge you to find a more tasty way of adding in a daily dose of fermented food and a dose of fibre to boot.
5. In at no.5 – vegetable skins. Yes, this a good one for the time constrained ones amongst us. Put away the veg peeler and keep those veggies as natural as possible. Make your own chips (skin on) keep those carrot and parsnip skins firmly on too. Whilst we are on the subject of potatoes these gems pack a fibre punch, so no carb-cutting here. It’s all about balance, one large potato gives 6.3g of fibre, so these definitely need to stay on the menu.
6. Add in an extra portion of veg. Over the course of a week this will make a massive difference. Look at your plate - are you meat and vegetables or vegetables and meat ? As simple as it sounds, re-train yourself to eat in this way and the benefits will quickly start to show on your waistline, and in your day to day wellbeing. Great extras include broccoli (3g fibre per 100g), spinach (4g per 100g), (I always keep a bag of frozen) and the humble carrot (2g fibre per 100g.)
7. If you like a snack, switch out the naughty ones for popcorn – big kids and small ones alike. Popcorn is a fantastic source of fibre at a whopping 13g per 100g, and the best thing is that the kids won’t complain! Obviously the more naked the better in terms of keeping your sugar content down, but this snack is a no brainer switch for us Jones.
8. Bananas – coming in at about 3.1 grams of fibre per small banana – it’s a quick easy win. We all have our favourite variation of yellow, but on the greener side is always a better choice. Green bananas are high in starch, whilst yellow ones are mostly sugar. The starch turns into sugar as the banana ripens. The greener bananas are very low on the glycaemic index making them the ideal snack for those who need to lower their blood sugars.
9. Raspberries – this one always surprises me ,but since I learnt this little fact I always have a frozen bag of raspberries in. Amazingly, we are looking at 7g of fibre per 100g. Fantastic little berries - great at breakfast, stirred into porridge or live yogurt. Alternatively for an after dinner treat, warm over a good quality vanilla ice-cream.
10. Chia seeds – now these are funny little blighters but boy they are so fibre rich. A whopping 34g per 100g! You need to go steady on these little gems though, as too much fibre all at once isn’t advisable. The best way to start introducing more fibre into your diet is slowly. Bit by bit so you can adjust – we don’t want to be causing any blockages! With chia seeds you only need a small portion of 28g (two tablespoons) or so, and they can be used in many different ways - smoothies, chia pudding, add to a stir fry, in a dressing, baked in bread, added to yogurt, stirred in jam and many more.
Hopefully this has given you some easy and practical ways of adding fibre rich food to your diet. It really is a matter of consciously thinking and making small positive changes. There are so many fibre rich foods available, and we have only touched on a few here. We will keep coming back to this subject to help educate and support everyone in their journey to better gut health.