Hi

Thanks for your question.

I can appreciate it's tricky to get your full quota of 5-a-day when you have various people's needs and preferences to meet - but it is certainly possible. It just takes some planning and preparation!

With fruit and vegetables, the most important thing is to include as much variety as you can. So it may be worth writing a list of all the foods you, your daughter and your dad will eat and trying to ensure you exhaust this list every week. Variety is important as it ensures you are getting a wide range of nutrients in your diet, which all have a different role to plan for health. Having a list may also help to remind you of certain foods to try when you are struggling to think any up!

The other important thing, as you have addressed, is ensuring you are getting enough portions in each day. This comes down to planning and preparation to ensure you include fruits and vegetables with every meal and snack throughout the day. Initially you will need to actively think about this, but after a few weeks it should become habit.

I have included below some tips on ways to increase your intake by adding fruits/veggies to every meal.

•   Breakfast - sprinkle berries onto breakfast cereal, chop up a banana into your porridge, add tinned peaches or pears onto muesli, add a handful of dried fruits into cereal and yogurt.

•   Lunch - have a salad, or a portion of veggies with your lunch, swap your usual dessert for an apple or couple of satsumas

•   Dinner - fill your plate with a veggie stir fry before you add anything else (add in any veg you like - carrots, courgettes, sweetcorn, mange tout etc), have a fruity cous cous salad to go with grilled fish (add in lemons, orange, limes for flavour)

•   Snacks - have carrot, cucumber and celery sticks with low fat houmous, keep a stash of fruit in your desk drawer, keep dried fruit (apricots, raisins, cranberries etc) in your handbag for a quick snack, blend a whole range of different fruit (and even veg!) into a smoothie - you can add things you don't like as much, and mask the taste with the things you do like.

With your father - if he struggles with hard fruits, how about making him a smoothie? You don't have to just use fruit, you can blend in some vegetables too for added nutrients. Homemade soups are also a great choices and will suitable for your father. Blend lots of different vegetables together to maximise the nutrient content. And maybe try to include at least a couple of portions of cooked vegetables with all of his evening meals, as these will be softened so hopefully okay for him.

With your daughter, unfortunately you can only get her to eat what she likes at this stages. But perhaps try to be creative with meals to mask the taste of other veg. So make a pasta sauce using passata and chopped tomatoes, and include finely chopped veg such as pepper, sweetcorn, courgette or green bean. Also making a sandwich with plenty of lettuce, cucumber and tomatoes is a great way to get a portion of veg into your lunch. As there are fruits and vegetables she does like, make sure you are including these regularly - at least a portion with each meal.

Remember as well that frozen and tinned fruits and vegetables also count, as does dried fruit - so think of ways you can include these into your meals too. Fruit juices can count as one portion per day, so would be good for your father and daughter if they enjoy these. Beans and pulse also count as pone portion, so you could try including these in soups of casseroles also.

The key is to be prepared, and to always have it at the forefront of your mind that you should be eating some fruit or veg at every meal. If you do this, you should see your daily totals increasing!

I hope this helps, however please get back in touch if you have any further queries at all.

Kind regards

Emma

Nutracheck Nutritionist