Healthy Pizza

Everyone seems to have this odd perception that pizzas are one of the most fattening, unhealthy meals you could possibly ever eat. If you order one from a late night takeaway, this may well be the case, but there are a few simple tricks that you can put in place to make sure that your own homemade pizzas don’t add inches to the waist:

• Difficulty: Easy
• Serves: 4
• Prep: 30 minutes
• Cook: 15 minutes

Ingredients:

• 250g strong white flour
• 250g wholemeal flour
• 1 sachet dried yeast
• 2 tsp salt
• 2 tbsp olive oil
• 250ml luke warm water
• 4 tbsp tomato purée
• handful chopped ham
• handful spinach
• handful cherry tomatoes, halved
• handful sweetcorn
• handful cheddar, grated

Method:

1. Put the flour, yeast and salt in a large bowl and mix together. Stir in olive oil and water to form a soft dough.
2. Turn out the dough onto a well floured surface and knead for approximately 5 minutes. Leave to rest in a warm place for roughly 1 hour.
3. Once the dough has risen, roll it out to a 30cm circle and bake in the oven (220°C, 200°C fan, Gas 7) for 5 minutes to crisp off.
4. Remove from the oven and spread over the tomato purée. Top with as many ingredients as you like but remember not to go overboard with the cheese! Bake for another 10 minutes.

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No More Tantrums at the Till

The campaign has named Asda as one of the worst offenders, displaying over thirty different types of sweets at the checkout.

Major supermarkets are being targeted by a new campaign to stop unhealthy foods and drinks from being displayed at the checkout.

The Children’s Food Campaign, coordinated by Sustain: the alliance for better food and farming and funded by the British Heart Foundation, has launched Chuck Junk off the Checkouts to provoke Government action and bring an end to the marketing of junk food to children.

Malcolm Clark, the campaign’s coordinator, said: “What we want to see is actual proper regulation and government stepping in so that this isn’t just left to the whim of supermarkets and when we move on to the next issue, the supermarkets just switch back to their old bad habits.”

Although some supermarkets are responding positively towards the campaign, many are choosing to remain silent on the subject. Lidl are now ensuring that at least one in seven of their checkouts is completely junk-free, while Morrisons have released a statement saying they would only be willing to remove unhealthy foods from their checkouts if it was recommended by the Department of Health’s responsibility deal.

The Children’s Food Campaign is relying on the public to support Chuck Junk off the Checkouts, encouraging people from across the country to lobby supermarkets and help put a stop to the promotion of unhealthy food to children.

Catherine Dimmer, mother of two and campaign supporter, said: “I don’t like the way [supermarkets] try to make money out of people at any opportunity whatsoever and it’s the fact that it’s not particularly healthy for the children either is it; the chocolates, it’s going to ruin their teeth [and] make them fat.”

Here are a few ways to get involved and help Chuck Junk off the Checkouts:

• Action 1: Sign Up – sign up to support the campaign and be kept up-to-date by visiting www.childrensfood.org.uk
• Action 2: Wall of Shame – take a picture of the checkout at your local supermarket and post it to the campaign’s Facebook wall (www.facebook.com/childrensfood) or tweet @childrensfood.
• Action 3: Checkout Test – if you are unhappy with the checkouts at your local supermarket, make both a verbal and written complaint.

For more information on Chuck Junk off the Checkouts, please visit: www.sustainweb.org/childrensfoodcampaign/chuck_junk/