Gut-friendly Easter feast

Easter is just around the corner and there's nothing we look forward to more than the legendary Easter egg hunt and a delicious Easter snack! Some favorite ingredients simply can't be missed (delicious Easter pancakes, for example) - but we still have plenty of ideas for a real taste explosion. To create a few surprises, we have come up with a spiced-up Easter snack for you - it not only tastes great, but also fills your belly with healthy vitamins and fiber! The latter in particular will also make your gut bacteria happy. We'll explain why and show you our simple recipe - you don't even have to cook!

Breaking with tradition?

The long wait was worth it, Lent is over. Now we can finally break our fast and enjoy a wonderful Easter snack with ham, hard-boiled eggs, pine nuts and lots of vegetables. ? But not all fasts are the same - have you ever heard of Intermittend Fasting? This healthy trend involves taking a break from eating for 14 - 16 hours. All foods are allowed and your health benefits immensely. Find out more about the many benefits and why you could fast all year round here !

But now for our delicious recipe: don't worry, we're not taking anything away from the traditional Easter snack! We're just adding new delicious and crunchy ingredients. This not only spices up the Easter snack, it also makes it much healthier! Have you ever thought about how many vegetables go perfectly with Easter ham and eggs? Our crunchy vegetable salad makes the Easter snack even more exciting and reinvents it.

Apart from the taste experience, the colorful vegetables have many benefits for your health. The more different types of vegetables you use, the more varied the range of fiber, vitamins and trace elements. Your gut microbiome needs precisely this variety! To keep your gut bacteria fit and your microbiome balanced, as many different bacteria as possible need to work together. This only happens if you offer your bacteria different nutrients and fiber, because every little roommate feeds on something different. So if you eat a particularly colorful diet, you also have a colorful and healthy microbiome! This is exactly what we want to achieve with our cheerful Easter snack. (1, 2)

But it's not just your microbiome that benefits from more vegetables in your Easter snack. In addition to valuable fiber, our salad also contains many important vitamins. Carrots, for example, provide plenty of carotene, the precursor of vitamin A, and beet is rich in folic acid, which is particularly important for pregnant women. But itamins B, C, D and K are also present in our vegetables and eggs. As you can see, it's a vitamin bomb! (3)

Last but not least, the Easter snack is very balanced overall and provides your body with all the nutrient groups it needs. A good amount of protein is provided by eggs, ham and curd cheese (replacing butter). You shouldn't underestimate the importance of getting enough protein - not just for sports enthusiasts, but for everyone! But wholemeal bread also contributes to balance, because you shouldn't miss out on carbohydrates that keep you full for a long time (thanks to the wholemeal content!). (3)

Ingredients

For 4 people
Preparation time approx. 15 mins

• 500 g Easter ham (preferably organic and from the butcher - it tastes particularly good that way!)

• Horseradish (grated)

• 4 large eggs

• Colorful vegetables: radishes, spring onions, carrots, beet, green salad, radish, celery stalks... whatever you like!

• 1 bunch of chives

• 1 lemon and olive oil

• 250 g curd cheese

• 4 Easter rolls

• 4 wholemeal buns

• Salt and pepper

Preparation

You don't even have to cook properly for this simple recipe - except for the eggs... But does that even count? Rather not. Depending on how hard you like your eggs, you should boil them for 8 - 10 minutes. Once cooled, carefully peel them and cut them into nice halves.
In the meantime, prepare the ham and cover. Cut the Easter ham into not-too-thin slices and serve at the table with horseradish, curd cheese, pine nuts and wholemeal bread.
Now we come to the last step: the salad. Here you can let your imagination run wild - use whatever vegetables you fancy! Wash the vegetables thoroughly and peel thin slices with a vegetable peeler. This will create wafer-thin slices of beet, carrots, radishes and whatever else you use. The only exceptions are young onions, chives, radishes and celery stalks. These are simply finely chopped. Finally, mix all the vegetables together in a large bowl and season with a little lemon juice, olive oil, salt and pepper.

That's it - just arrange it nicely at the table and the happy Easter snack with the whole family can begin! Our favorite is a wholemeal roll with curd cheese, horseradish and Easter ham, served with a hard-boiled egg and lots of salad. Simply delicious! We wish you and your family lots of fun and a Happy Easter!

Note

This article is intended for informational purposes only and should not be construed as medical information or instructions. The recipes are intended for inspiration and are not intended as therapeutic measures. If you have any health problems, we recommend that you contact a doctor or other expert immediately.

References

1. Zmora N, Suez J, Elinav E. You are what you eat: diet, health and the gut microbiota. Nat Rev Gastroenterol Hepatol. 2018.

2. Makki K, Deehan EC, Walter J, Bäckhed F. The Impact of Dietary Fiber on Gut Microbiota in Host Health and Disease. Cell Host Microbe. 2018;23(6):705-715.

3. Münzing-Ruef, Ingeborg: Kursbuch gesunde Ernährung. (7. Auflage) Wilhelm Heyne Verlag GmbH, München 1991.