Welcome to The Healthy Hunter Blog!

I started this blog to share the delicious food I create at home with others that might be in need of a little inspiration. I also started it to motivate myself. I think looking after yourself is hugely important and that it really does start with food. I love food. A lot. Maybe too much (not true, there’s no such thing). This means that I love to eat out at the fantastic array of cafes and restaurants Melbourne has to offer… so therefore when I’m cooking for myself I tend to keep it as healthy as I can, because life is all about balance!

This blog is as much about motivating myself to keep eating and enjoying healthy, wholesome, real food as it is about showing others how delicious and easy doing that can be.

I like the food I make to be good for me and try to use whole, natural, real ingredients whenever possible. I love vegetables and cook lots of vegan and vegetarian meals – but I am not vegan or vegetarian! I don’t have many food restrictions either, however I have a bad response to large amounts of foods high in fructose due to very mild fructose malabsorption, so you will not see any apples, pears, agave or honey in my recipes. You’ll also notice in savoury foods I rely heavily on spring onion as my onion of choice – that’s because I can tolerate the green part of this type of onion way better than any other kind. Seeing as onion is very hard to avoid when you’re eating out I try to avoid eating it at home as its high fructose content kills me! Everyone is different though so play around and adjust any of these recipes as you please. I am not a trained nutritionist or dietitian and if you have any worries about your own nutrition I think it’s definitely a fantastic idea to talk to professionals and use everyday people like me for ideas and inspiration.

I think that these days it is sometimes difficult to know what to eat when you’re trying to eat healthily or even what that means. There’s so much research and so many different schools of thought and much of it is contradictory. I love reading research (nerd alert) and try to stay as well informed as possible while keeping my diet true to who I am and not adopting ‘a fad diet’ approach to food. I’m saying no to diets and instead approaching food in a mindful way that focuses on including a range of seasonal and (whenever possible) local food prepared in many, many different ways. Some of my sweet recipes do include alternative sugars, which at the end of the day are still sugars so if you are trying to cut down make sure you treat these foods as what they are – treats. But treats that I have attempted to include whole grains, fruits or vegetables in to up their nutritional value. I have a sweet tooth and I still eat sugar but I do try to stick to 6 teaspoons or less of added sugar a day as a maximum and have days where I don’t eat any. I do not count the sugars in whole fruit or vegetables towards this. I’m not afraid of fat especially the good ones (hello avocado my good friend) and do not count calories. I make the choices that work best for my mind and body because in the end I just want to be healthy and happy!

I have an ‘I’ll try anything’ approach to eating so I try not to cut any foods out of my diet (that I don’t have to) and include as much variety as possible. This collection of recipes should hopefully reflect that.

Enjoy.

HH. x

Images used courtesy of Elyse Hamilton.