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Feels like a long time since the start of the new year, doesn’t it? It’s easy to make changes to your diet after the excesses of the cold, dark festive season, but – week by week – these can slip and you’ve lost those great habits you developed in January.

What if we looked at things from a different angle
…and suggest that you start afresh with every new season? That means that you can overhaul your diet every three months, keeping the good habits that have stayed and introducing a few new ones to keep life interesting.

Spring Cleaning
Spring is a great time to begin. The natural world around us is starting to waken up and there’s a new optimism in the air. Typically, a time to clean the house from top to bottom and throw out half a wardrobe, why not give your eating habits a spring clean too!

Spring time, Spring portions
It’s time to readjust your plate. We’re not eating for long nights and cold days, so keep an eye on your portion sizes. If you feel that this might be a little too much too soon, why not swap out your carbs for an extra portion of veggies?

Slow it down
Busy modern lives mean that we often have to eat in a hurry, but eating fast can become the norm and not the exception. Mindful eating is very of-the-moment but the concept has been around for ever. It’s called savouring your food. Enjoy your hard work and chew every mouthful, taking in the different textures and flavours of your dish. Turning a 10-minute meal into a 20-minute meal will help you to eat more slowly – you’ll feel full sooner and you’ll know when to stop, instead of clearing the plate and then feeling sluggish.

Drink More
You can stop drinking alcohol any time. It doesn’t need to be in dry January. You can drink less coffee and you can cut out fizzy drinks whenever you want. These are all amazing things to do for your body, but it’s only half the story if you don’t up your water intake.

Every organ in your body needs to be hydrated. Water helps to circulate oxygen and detoxes you every day. A slice of lemon, lime or orange can make it more interesting if you struggle to drink a lot of water.

Clear out your cupboards
You work through your wardrobe, so work through your kitchen. We’re not talking about throwing out good food, but there may be things that are out-of-date or that may not do you any favours. Bin the old stuff and maybe pop the rest to a local food bank.

Is your kitchen in balance or do you have a big goodie cupboard full of crisps, biscuits and chocolates and an empty fruit bowl? Spring is a good time to take stock – literally.

Has #MeatFreeMonday fallen by the wayside?
Going without meat once a week is a very easy way of lowering your risk of heart disease, stroke and diabetes. There are simple changes that you can make to your meals that would make them meat free but just as tasty. Why not consider a Lentil Bolognese or a Cauliflower Jalfrezi?

Try these little changes and you’ll be ready to spring into Summer!

Veganuary may have sounded a bit unusual a few years ago, but we are getting more and more used to seeing plant-based products in our supermarkets. Non-dairy milk ranges are expanding and it doesn’t feel as strange as it once did to pop an oat or coconut milk in the trolley.

It can be hard to argue against moving to a plant-based diet – evidence suggests that it’s not just better for us, but that it is better for the planet too. However, making the move can be harder than you think. You can’t count on the staples that you’ve become so used to cooking with and you’ve still got to live within your household budget, but is there middle ground that might help you to eat less red meat without compromising on taste?

Chicken and turkey provide great alternatives to beef and pork but finding ways of making them exciting on a daily basis can challenge even the greatest cook, until now…

Welcome to the JD Seasonings Top Tips to make your chicken and turkey tastier:

Change up your casserole – ditch your porkies for chicken sausages. While chicken sausages may not have been the stuff of dreams in times past, brands, like Heck, are now producing stunning sausages made with chicken.

Boost Your Bolognese – Turkey mince enveloped with a rich tomato sauce, simmered with the JD Seasonings Bolognese blend will take your family favourite to new levels of tastiness.

Crying out for a kebab? – Follow our recipe for our lamb doner, but swap out the lamb mince for turkey or chicken for a doubly guilt-free FakeAway evening in.

Blissful burgers – Burgers are the ultimate in easy dinners but they get a bad rep for being unhealthy. A basic burger isn’t that bad and, if you add flavour through your seasoning, then you can keep your toppings to a simple salad, without compromising on taste. Try it with a turkey or chicken mince to give beef a break.

Taco your chances with chicken – Super simple swap! Just change your beef or pork mince for chicken or turkey and tuck in!

Sur-pie-sing suppers – Cottage Pie has got to be one of the best and most comforting meals on the planet, but you can make a big difference by using turkey mince instead of beef. You may also want to add another carrot and reduce the amount of meat going in. Just as tasty, just a bit healthier.

There’s no need to compromise when you’re trying to eat more healthily, but there are still choices to be made….

…which one are you going to try first?

Has your time in the kitchen been reduced to getting the food on the table quickly? Do you long for a time when you can truly benefit from the therapeutic value of peacefully peeling, chopping and slicing?

At JD Seasonings, we’re here to help you pack as much punch into your food as you can, without relying on fats, salt and sugar, but we know that our easy-to-use blends, rubs and meal kits are also amazing when it comes to time-saving kitchen hacks – but our blends can be used for long, slow cooking as well.

It ain’t what you do…
… it’s the way that you do it.
You might be cooking with your hands, fingers, eyes and nose but you can give your brain a break when you’re in the kitchen and make your cooking more mindful.

When you cook, are you still caught up in an earlier conversation or thinking through a work problem?  Are you making plans or thinking through your busy schedule? If you’re thinking about the past or the future, then you’re not in the present.

Cooking gives you the perfect opportunity to simply attend to the task at hand and to park your stresses, strains and distractions for a while. Thinking about what you are doing as you do it can improve your appreciation and sense of gratitude for the food you are about to eat  - and this allows you to re-connect with the food that you’re eating which may even mean that you’re ready to eat less.

Give the kitchen radio a break, pop your phone somewhere else and focus on making your meal.

Pay close attention
Look at what you are doing as you do it. Listen to the hiss of the gas as you turn it on or watch the sizzle as your food hits the pot or pan.

Super sensory
Your dish changes as you add new ingredients to it. Instead of watching it to make sure that it looks as it should, try looking at how the different ingredients move and come together or how adding the JD Seasoning blend unites the different elements. How hard is your nose working to take all of these changing scents on board? What’s that doing to your stomach? Hungry yet?

Emosh
How does your mood change as you cook? Do you get more anxious as you get closer to serving or are you happy to have produced another meal bang on time? There are no right or wrong answers, but just something for you to be aware of.

Putting the Me in TiMe
Time for your food to go in the oven? Instead of rushing to put a wash on or mop the floor, why not – just once in a while – sit down and relax in your kitchen, mindful that you are waiting for your food to be ready. Give yourself time to work through all the different smells you can spot and listen to the hum of the oven. Breathe slowly in and out and give yourself permission to simply be.

Ready?
When you’re ready to sit down and dine, you will see your food in a whole new light. We know that you don’t have time to do this every day (or even every week) but, if you could cook like this once a month, you’d see that a little goes a very long way.

At JD Seasonings, we know how to look after our loyal fans – and the run up to Christmas is no exception.

Not only are we giving you the chance to buy 2 Luxury Christmas Boxes and giving you one absolutely free of charge, but we’re here to help you through the cold, dark days of winter.

Start now

The first step’s simple – just order your boxes and dream of the amazing dishes you’ll rustle up. Step two is – surprisingly – just as simple.

Winter can hit us all of a sudden and, before long, we’re finding it harder and harder to make healthy food choices. Add Christmas to the mix – the extra tipples, a chocolate here and there, eating big meals in the middle of the day – and you’ll find yourself hitting January hard.

It is much simpler for weight to creep on that you might think. It’s not all about looks but, if you find your clothes are suddenly a little to close for comfort, then the chances are that your heart and soul are as equally down in the dumps.

Don’t wait, just walk

There’s nothing worse than the post-Christmas ads. Gone are the jingly bells and cosy fireside scenes, to be replaced by holiday ads and ways to lose weight. Either way, the pressure’s on for summer.

The solution to Blue Monday (the dark day in January when the bills arrive) starts now and guarantees that you’ll smash January – let’s try walking for 10 minutes a day and see what happens.

Let’s get rid of the barriers first

‘I don’t have time’ – it’s only 10 minutes. Find them, it’s for you.
‘I don’t have the kit’ – if you have shoes, you’re ready to go.
‘I’m not up to it’ – yes you are.
‘I just don’t want to do it’ – the hardest, easiest barrier of all. Don’t think about it – just pull your shoes on, open the door and walk. Don’t give it thought, your brain will give you a million reasons why you can’t. Ignore it.

Love You
Hug your heart. Walking will reduce blood pressure, regulate blood sugar and lowers cholesterol. These are all risk factors of heart disease so pass this on to your brain as three good reasons why you’re going to get walking.

Better Brain
Walking clears the mind, it improves concentration, focus and your attention span. Exercise increases the level of brain-derived neurotrophic factor, which not only preserves the health of existing neurons but it creates new ones.

Bash the blues
Walking is amazing – it releases endorphins chemicals in the brain, which make us feel good.

Breathe Easy
When we walk, we need more oxygen which means that our lungs have to work harder to deepen and quicken the breath. The more we ask of our muscles, the stronger they get. Same goes for our lungs. Regular walking increases lung capacity and makes breathing easier.

Mindfulness Up, Stress Down

Walking activates our senses. We feel the sun, the breeze on our faces, notice nature’s scents and appreciate the world around us. With increased endorphin levels in the brain, we also lower the stress hormone (cortisol).

Gets rid of Pains

Many aches and pains come from underuse, not overuse. When muscles and ligaments don’t get used, they get tight. This is what causes a lot of pain, especially the lower back and joints. Get flexible with a walk round the block.

Pull on your shoes and give your body, mind and spirit an early Christmas present.

Is turkey a once-a-year thing in your house? If so, you’re missing an absolute taste sensation that you and yours could be gobbling down (do you see what we did there?).

Ditching all meat for a vegan existence might be a step too far for many of us, but what do you do when you run out of things to make with chicken? Well, let’s call on our seasonally adjusted friend, the turkey. While it tastes (pretty much) like chicken, turkey also has a much deeper, richer flavour that could lift your midweek meals all year round.

The secret lies in the type of turkey that we’re talking about. Far from the is-it-too-dry, is-it-cooked-yet Christmas experience, turkey mince is an affordable and very versatile alternative to beef or pork mince.

So, let’s get the tricky bit out of the way first – turkey gives a chunkier mince so it doesn’t make a tidy Bolognese but it does make a helluva tasty one that’s rich in protein and low in fat. Not only does turkey help you limit your fat consumption, but it’s a super source of iron, zinc, potassium and phosphorus and not forgetting vitamin B6 and niacin, which help you produce energy.

If you can learn to love turkey and eat it regularly, it could help to lower cholesterol levels and it can help keep insulin levels stable. Low-GI, it’s perfect for those who have to work at blood sugar levels.

Can it get any better?

Oh, yes! Turkey contains an amino acid known as tryptophan. Tryptophan produces serotonin, which keeps our mood up, and plays an important role in strengthening the immune system. A source of selenium - essential for thyroid hormone metabolism - it boosts immunity and acts as an antioxidant.

What can I do with my turkey mince?

Anything you can do with pork or beef mince. You can use it in a Cottage Pie or boost your Bolognese with some turkey mince, but it can make a fabulous Chilli Con Carne. Today’s turkeys are a descendant of the wild turkey native to northern Mexico, so it’s no wonder that it makes an amazing pot of hot chilli.

If you’re overwhelmed with a stack of dry, sliced turkey on Boxing Day, you’ll be pleasantly surprised at how easy it is to transform in into a Mexican masterpiece! Simply chop your slices into small pieces and fry with a spray of oil and a chopped onion. Then you can build your chilli from there, adding our Chilli Con Carne seasoning to get your flavours right, a dash of water to add some moisture back in, tinned tomatoes, kidney beans and maybe some fresh coriander.

Ariba!

The UK’s favourite curry is *drumroll* the Jalfrezi. Sitting at the top of the pops since 2011, the Jalfrezi’s fiery, green chilli has captured our hearts and our tastebuds. With Madras in second place and the creamy Korma dawdling in 4th place, we turn our attention to the UK’s third favourite curry – the Rogan Josh – to see why it has trounced the Tikka and take a look at its history…

Rogue, rojo, rua, red - rogan
While rogan means ‘oil’ in Persian, it means ‘red’ in Hindi. Similar to the word for ‘red’ in many languages, including French, Spanish, Irish and English, the rogan josh does indeed have a richly red coloured sauce. Josh means ‘heat’, ‘hot’, ‘boiling’, or ‘passionate’, which means that Rogan josh signifies a dish cooked in oil at intense heat.

Rogan josh was brought to the Kashmir region of India by the Mughals, whose own cuisine was influenced by Persian cuisine. Beaten into submission by the unrelenting summer heat of the Indian plains, the Mughals would relocate to the cooler climate and higher altitude of Kashmir.

Traditionally, rogan josh is a meat dish and most cooks begin by browning the meat, usually lamb. The seared meat is then removed while spices are added to the hot oil in stages. The spices include garlic, ginger, whole black pepper, cardamom, and bay leaves. The warming heat of the rogan josh comes from the addition of the aromatic heat of cloves and cinnamon. Chopped coriander and red pepper are then added to the hot oil before the meat is returned to the pan. A dollop of plain yogurt goes in and the pan is covered and cooked over low heat until the meat becomes very tender.

Although the name suggests a fiery, hot curry, the rogan josh is instead a deeply flavoured, warming curry that makes a great option for anyone who wants to make a break from the world of chicken tikka but doesn’t want to overdo things on the spice front.

Can a curry be good for you?
Although rogan josh is closely connected with cooking in oil, there are ways that you can make sure your curry is doing you good.

Curry sauces, in themselves, tend not to be very calorific although the oil used in cooking can be. Using a cooking spray takes care of cutting most of these calories out. Traditionally a lamb dish, swapping red meat for lean white meat, like chicken, or even vegetables, such as aubergine and tomatoes, will drop the calorie count dramatically.

To max out your benefits, go easy on the sides – maybe go for naan or rice?  - and you will be benefiting from all the goodness a rogan josh can bring:

·         Diabetes: Cinnamon can reduce glucose levels in people with type 2 diabetes.

·         Poor digestion: Cloves stimulate the secretion of digestive enzymes that reduce flatulence and relieve other digestive problems.

·         Eye problems: Vitamin A, found in paprika and cayenne pepper, helps to prevent vision problems like macular degeneration.

When we think of sitting down to a curry, we often think of it as a treat food. A once in a while food. However, have we been overlooking a really easy way in which to make your curry healthier than ever?

Lean meat – check
Spray oil – check
Added vegetables – check
JD Seasoning curry kit – check
Fluffy white rice (mound of) – check

You see where we’re going with this, don’t you.

White rice is the usual curry staple but there are other alternatives out there that could really transform your curry from a once-in-a-while treat to one of your healthiest dishes.

Quinoa
How can you eat something you can’t pronounce. It’s KeenWa. There. Sorted. Now, quinoa is a grain that you rinse and boil. It’s a little nutty and adds an extra dimension to your rogan but quinoa is amazingly gentle on your digestive system and really helps fibre-wise, if you catch the drift. Quinoa has the second most protein of any grain and contains all of the essential amino acids. Naturally gluten free too!

Cauliflower Rice / Broccoli Rice
Give you cauliflower or broccoli a blitz in a food processor and then roast it with a tiny bit of spray oil. Cauliflower is much lower in carbohydrate than rice but it also gives you a day’s worth of Vitamin C in one portion. Broccoli rice is also low carb option, with plenty of fibre, iron and a great source of plant-based protein.

Brown Rice
Not ready to make such a big leap? You can make a simple swap to brown rice, which has plenty of fibre and is good at keeping you feeling satisfied. If you’re a lifelong white rice fan, you could make a gradual change by starting with half white and half brown rice. Give it a go.

Couscous
Made from wheat, couscous isn’t a million miles away from pasta so it might be a good alternative to begin your food exploration with. Rich in calcium, couscous also gives you a healthy dose of the Vitamin Bs.  

Freekeh
Get your freekeh on! This supergrain has even more fibre and protein than quinoa

Bulgur Wheat
With a reassuring quarter of your daily fibre, bulgur – or cracked – wheat is another great source of plant-based protein.

Taking a chance on something new can feel daunting but most supermarkets have pouches that are ready-made. This is a great way to sample ones that you fancy trying and to get a great idea of how they should look and taste before trying to make it for yourself. There’s nothing to lose and everything to gain, like extra fibre, vitamins and minerals.

Our orange American cousin! While we were bending knives as we cut out eyes from turnips for Halloween lanterns, our friends over the pond were carving through pumpkin flesh like it was butter.

We’ve now adopted the pumpkin in the UK, as out go-to lantern of choice but we haven’t really got the hang of what to do with the leftover pumpkin flesh quite yet. There are some people who may be able to whip up a quick pumpkin pie or a pumpkin mash, but – and hands up on this one – how many of you have had great intentions to be more adventurous with pumpkin leftovers, only to sweep them into the bin when no-one is looking? It’s alright. No judgement here. We’re all busy people but it can be tricky to know what to do with it and transform this mass of orange pumpkin into something tasty.

Let’s see what’s out there…
Spiced pumpkin soup - yes, an easy one to start off with. It’s perfect for this time of year. The nights are long and we could use something a bit more warming. You can go for something plain or add your own touch.

Pumpkin Lasagne – Great for families who are trying to cut down on their meat in take too. As with mince, you can use the JD Seasonings Bolognese rub to infuse your lasagne with a bit of traditional Italian flavour and throw in some spinach for a bit of added iron.

Pumpkin Curry – Would you believe it! Pumpkin works really well in a curry, especially the more aromatic curries that don’t go large on the heat. While pumpkin will work well with a mild curry, it can make a really good alternative to spuds when it comes to Bombay Potatoes. A great side, it can complete a curry banquet but it can really lift a mid-week meal with a grilled chicken breast and a green salad.

Pumpkin Chilli – Saved the best to last! Could there be anything more warming that chilli-spiced pumpkin with garlic, onions and a mix of beans to get you through the late autumn? This dish really has it all – it’s meat-free, it’s got added fibre and protein from the beans, it’s kind on your pocket and it makes the most of your pumpkin cutaways. This Chilli Con Pumpkin is hard to beat.

Now that we’re reached the end of what we can (reasonably) do with a pumpkin, it’s only fair to share a few of the scare stories that didn’t make the list: Pumpkin hummus, pumpkin vodka, pumpkin salsa and pumpkin crisps.

What a horror show!