Hi everybody!

I'm doing the Rosemary Conley GI Jeans diet, but as I am vegetarian there are limited recipes for me in the book and I'm getting a bit bored... Does anyone know where I can get tasty low GI recipes which are also very low fat? Most GI recipes I've found are not particularly low in fat.

Thanks for your help!

Have a look in the UK recipe thread, YP is a born again veggie, so a lot of the meals in there fit the bill.

It's quite easy to create low GI veggie recipes, because legumes are low GI, (chickpeas, lentils, red kidney beans) to keep the GI down, it's best to soak and cook your own. The canning process increases the GI of beans. You can get away with them, especially if your recipe includes tomatoes or other acidic foods, as acid brings the GI down.

I know what you mean though, very often low GI recipes include alot of oil, but you can substitute it out or reduce it down.

I use loads of olive oil in most of my cooking though, so I don't know whether it will be what you're looking for.

Hi there. I do low fat and low GI and have been a veggie for years! Have also used Rosemary as a starting point.

I'm still with nothing over 5% fat - once you've dropped it from your diet, you don't miss it, so why bring it back? Those olive oil spray cans are handy, if you want to use oil. I just dry fry in a very good quality non stick balti type pan, which I use for most things! If I must use oil, (rarely) I use a pastry brush and just paint on a thin coating. You can get plenty of your 'healthy fats' as I'm sure you'll know, from nuts and seeds, etc. I put 'Yorkshire Shelled Hemp Seed' in almost everything! That's possibly a better way of getting healthy fats than using olive oil.

So basically, if you have a Low GI recipe that has oceans of fat you can no longer stomach - just cut it out and dry fry, or use a spray if it's essential to the taste! You can do a good curry from scratch, without any fat - again just take any conventional recipe and dry fry. If you make one from scratch using spices you can use a can of tomatoes (no salt or sugar added ones) for the base, and you can get low salt organic veggie stock cubes, which work in many things!

I'd also look out for Rosemary's other books, and in her older ones, simply substitute wholegrains.

Another good source of veggie no fat recipes I discovered is the lovely Gillian McKeith. I make a lot of her stuff and it fits in fine - organic, veggie, no fat, good GI. You can always double check the GI of ingredients in any recipe, cook it sans fat, making any modifications you need to, or modify Rosemary's other recipes. The ones in her magazine by Dean Simpole-Clark are really lovely recipes - he does all sorts, Chinese, Indian, you name it... really lovely stuff that is low GI and less than 5% fat.

I'm doing low GI but I'm not a veggie. I used to be before I met the current Mr Sarah and I still enjoy a veggie meal or two each week. I started with research on the internet. There are a few websites with low fat, low GI recipes. I also bought the Anthony Worrall Thompson recipe books which have been useful.

Mainly, though, I find the best way of finding new recipes is to just experiment. Usually I start with an old favourite and change some of the ingredients to convert it to low GI (and take out as much fat as possible) or mayble I'll read a new recipe which is totally unsuitable and think how I can change it - maybe take out the fat, sugar or salt - perhaps sub low fat greek yoghurt for cream, sub animal protein for veg or pulses (or vice versa), add a few different spices or some fresh herbs - maybe change one ingredient I don't like so much for something else that I do like. In fact its a very unusual thing for me to follow a recipe exactly.

I had a great vegetarian meal the other day based on an Ainsley ? recipe I once read on the back of a packet of his expensive couscous. It was a hot and spicy tagine kind of dish with dried apricots in it - but instead of chicken I used a pack of mixed beans (rehydrated) instead - I also toasted some Moroccan style spice seeds and chucked them and a few sunflower and pumpkin seeds in to some plaini couscous for some crunch - served with a green salad - it was gorgeous.

Pulses are great they really bring down the GI of an entire dish. Since I started this way of eating and in order to get in some variety, I road test one new ingredient each week - some have been great, some have been absolutely revolting, but it makes meals more interesting.

Thanks for the info guys!

I have got some ideas from the recipe thread (mmm) and I will look into the books by the people mentioned!

Try looking at pulses books - I have Easy Beans and it has proved very useful in lowering my current meat intake - and that of the DH!

I have a range of GI/GL books and use the beans book to increase variety!