Working in an office 9-5 and trying to maintain a healthy diet can be a challenge. The increased temptation to snack is sometimes overwhelming: when you get that afternoon slump, if you’re working on a particularly mundane task, or when your office friends bring in cakes and sweets that are just too tempting to pass up. Let’s face it, office jobs can make your virtuous diet slip.

And I don’t know about you but I’m one of those people who, instead of just getting hungry, gets hangry.

Hangry (han-gree)

adjective

irritable as a result of feeling hungry

So rather than a) raid the vending machine or sweet/cake table, or b) erupt in a ball of hangry rage, I keep healthy snacks at work for situations just like these.

Simply Health, as part of their “creating a healthier workplace” campaign asked me to share my tips for keeping healthy in the workplace*, and I thought this was the perfect topic, so I thought I’d share with you the contents of my Emergency Work Snack Kit.

Here’s what’s in it:

Dried fruit and/or nuts

We all know everything looks better in a Kilner jar!

I keep a jar of mixed nuts and dried fruit on my desk at work. The fruit gives me a hit of carbohydrate energy and a taste of sweetness, while the nuts supply well needed protein, helping to slow the release of the sugars in the fruit.

Good because: protein and fat help lower the glycaemic load of carby food when eaten in combination.

Apple cutter and nut butter

Instant sliced apples!

I’m lucky enough to work in an office with a regular delivery of fruit to snack on. But I tend not to eat fruit by itself (for the same reasons as above) so I keep this handy little apple cutter around, along with a jar of peanut butter to spread on my neat little slices of apple.

Good because: peanut butter… duh.

Snack bars

A whole drawer full of snacks!

I like to keep a variety of snack bars to choose from, depending what takes my fancy. My go-to favourites are nakd bars (sweet and low-cal), Trek bars (high protein), Eat Natural (a more traditional cereal bar), 9 bars (topped with a delicious carob topping) and Get Buzzing flapjack bars (erm… flapjack, need I say more?). I also have a few Whitworth’s shots too, great for topping on yoghurt or porridge, or as a low-cal snack on their own.

Good because: Grabbing one of these makes for a quick and easy snack.

Urban fruit snack pack

Urban Fruit – nothing but fruit

I was sent these delicious tasty little dried fruit packs for review and found them to be a really handy snack. They come in mango, strawberry, pineapple and more but my favourite has to be the pineapple. Again, I like to pair my carbs with a protein source, so I will probably start to keep small pots of 0% fat Greek yoghurt or baby cheeses in the fridge to have with them – they last a good few weeks or more from purchase date.

Good because: individually packaged so they’re portion controlled.

Whey Hey Mini Pots

Whey Hey snack-size pots

This may seem like a bit of an odd one, but Whey Hey sent me some mini pots of Banoffee protein ice cream as a prize during Movember last year (I was a part of their team!) and when they arrived at work I thought it would be perfect to keep them there for protein ice cream emergencies… they even come with their very own spoon! Great, even if my workmates do think I’m weird.

Good because: they’re super tasty and high in protein, plus great for a hot day!

So those are my emergency snacks. Do you keep any snacks at work? If so, what do you have to hand?

*Disclaimer – Simply Health are sending me a gift to help me stick to my healthy habits as a thank you for writing this post.

The Urban Fruit packs were sent to me for review, and the Whey Hey ice cream pots were a prize.

As always, all opinions are my own and not affected by gifted items!

Georgina Spenceley