Despite being someone who frequently bangs on about healthy eating and a desire to shift the ever present spare abdominal tyre, there is always a slight sense of bristling upon being offered unsolicited dietary advice. As such, receiving a cookery book with the tag line The Slimming Foodie last Christmas had the potential to give rise to some mild offence.
It needn’t have. Because when the inevitable new year urge to eat less and rot move move came in to flush out all the seasonal excesses, I found myself with a spare hour and a new book to read (obvs way more appealing than a January gym trip). Enter: The Slimming Foodie, Ultimate Comfort Food, by Pip Payne. Who would have thunk that a gift wrapped accusation of being flabby could actually turn out to be an absolute banger of a home cook book?
First off, I would like to qualify exactly what is being pushed as ‘healthy’ in this particular tome. Don’t expect any macro exclusion, heavily processed ingredients or bundles of whey isolate in this guide. It’s all painfully sensible stuff- whole ingredients, lower sugar and fat defaults, and an injection of fruit and veg wherever possible, with a limit of 600 calories per serving on everything. There’s plenty of chicken, oats and chickpeas in these pages. Boooooooooooooooring. Maybe. Revolutionary? Absolutely not. But tasty and achievable to your average home cook without melting the budget? All the yeses.
It’s a bulky offering, 250 pages of recipes separated out into chapters giving lunch vibes, budget winners and, of course, sweet treats. But Ultimate Comfort Food? This is where this girl gets sceptical, as I would currently define my ultimate comfort dinner as a stack of cheeseburgers served on the abs of a Heated Rivalry cast member (I honestly don’t mind which one, I know you’re all busy). So what are we calling ‘comfortable’ here? I’d be more inclined to say ‘hearty’. Think fragrant tray bakes, punchy curries and bright, textured salads which don’t shy away from the carbohydrates. There’s cookies and burgers too, all tweaked to hit that calorie goal without making it too obvious that you’re trying to be healthy. Plus each recipe has a subtle page note to let you know exactly what you’re getting per serving in terms of calories, protein and fibre. My only objection to this is found in the orgasmic Raspberry & White Chocolate Yoghurt cake- a life affirming, bouncy baked good that is listed as 161 calories per slice but seriously no one is ever having one slice of this stuff. It’s amazing. Buy the book just for this. Seriously, do it now.
And before dessert? I’ve made the sumac roast chicken thighs enough times in three months to not need to look up the ingredients for the shopping list- this is a wonderful, rich and zesty tray bake, backed up with spuds and roast carrots which is rapidly becoming our Saturday night-in dinner of choice. Other favourites in this house are the keema curry (hands up, I think this one should have an ‘inspired by’ tag line), peanut miso ramen, and penne siciliana. I have a long list of salads to get to as soon as the temperature gets consistently above 12C every day.
On the other hand though it is important to consider: do we really need another diet book? Is the concept of healthy eating cancelled in the Mounjaro universe anyway??? That’s probably a rabbit hole to fall down another day. We know what we should be avoiding to get thinner, but recent research and a long overdue adjustment across much of the wellness (ick) industry is pushing us towards what we should add to our diets, rather than what to avoid. It’s easier in the mental battle of reasonable food choices to start with what you can have, to focus on adding rather than restricting, and I find this book is very much in the world of hey, look at all this great food to eat, rather than drop the carbs and give me twenty, you fat f*** approach. 2026 is about positive vibes for this greedy girlie, and that’s why I’m taking the time today to shout about this book for easy (and a couple of fancy), filling options without any sense of deprivation. You’re going to get your fibre and boost your protein from so many pages in this book, and you know what? If you go over the serving amounts you’re loading up on the good stuff, not rage binging an entire tub of Ben and Jerry’s after another day of psyllium husks and sadness.
There’s an entire section on family friendly recipes, so you don’t have to project any calorie goal sufferings on to those you live with either, and due to how easy most of the prep is, many of the recipes are perfect to make with the kids. See the earlier mentioned Raspberry & White Chocolate Yoghurt cake for one.
For the time poor among us, there are a ton of traybakes (one that relies heavily on HP sauce which I may try this very afternoon). For my girl dinner goblins- an entire section on sides, nibbles and dips. Peri ladies with any kind of gym goals will find oodles of protein boosts here (6g per ‘serving’ of that cake, just so you know). There’s a recipe for garlic bread, for the love of Jacob!!!! Good luck sticking to a single serving of that bad boy.
And for those genetically blessed folks who don’t care about calories or fibre goals, this does live up to the Comfort Food tag, without expensive or exotic ingredients, and so is a worthy addition to any cook shelf- with the exception of anyone living completely plant based. There’s enough to make it worth the buy for vegetarians but vegans should look the other way (aren’t you guys already skinny anyway?!?) .
The Slimming Foodie, Ultimate Comfort Food is from Octopus books and available in the usual places for real books, as well as an ebook version. Just google it, I don’t get any affiliate kick back from this.
Food. Boom. 