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In a shiny, sun-filled basement kitchen in Battersea, Amelia Freer — bestselling author, well-being guru and nutritionist to the stars — is talking me through her “hero toppings”: goats cheese and tomatoes; sardine and cucumber; loaded green hummus. Apparently we should ignore wellness warriors’ scare stories about bread: “You can have a healthy, balanced meal on toast”, she insists.
Which is surprising, given Freer’s reputation for helping A-list singers and supermodels shed the pounds. She has long been declared the woman to go to for a (conscious) detox: Boy George and James Corden both lost up to four stone after following her plan; Victoria Beckham says Freer taught her to “fuel [her] body correctly”; and Sam Smith shed 14lb in two weeks thanks to her debut anti-fad bible Eat. Nourish. Glow.
Freer’s third book, Nourish & Glow: The 10-Day Plan, was an instant number one bestseller and she hopes the next one will be a worthy rival: Simply Good For You was released on Boxing Day.
The recipe collection is a record of everything Freer’s been feeding her family for the last two years — her daughter, Willow, was born in 2017 — and the focus is on “taking the pressure off” healthy eating: 100 quick, nutritious recipes for a tight budget with minimal ingredients “because that’s how most of us eat most of the time,” says Freer.
Like many mothers, her approach to eating and cooking has changed since giving birth. Half the time she ends up eating with one hand and her focus is now on getting energy “fast” rather than spending hours in the kitchen. Her recipes reflect this: “instant soup” made from tins in the cupboard; “lazy dahl” for speedy Indian dinners; a slow-cooked “bottom-of-the-fridge stew” when you don’t have time to get to a shop.
The book isn’t just for families: it’s for anyone who needs to eat fast, says Freer — whether it’s a single woman in her twenties or a city exec who gets home late at night. “Amazing culinary experiences have a place in our lives, but the majority of us just need to eat three times a day and need a wide variety of nutrients to help our bodies be at their peak health,” she says, outlining her not-so-secret formula for building a balanced meal: “choose a protein, choose some vegetables, choose some healthy fat and some flavour. If possible, always make it colourful.”
Her hope is that readers can learn five 15-minute recipes “that they know they can be eating by 8.15pm when they’re back from the gym”. Her book has sections on healthy eating on a budget (batch-cook, embrace frozen foods, find a veg market) and time-saving hacks. Her golden rule? “It’s all in the chopping,” says Freer, so invest in a good knife and study a five-minute chopping skills video on YouTube.
Positive nutrition, as her ethos is known, is all about focusing on what we need, “not what we need to avoid”. For her, the key is variety — “getting a wide and diverse abundance of different plants and foods” — and long-term commitment, so she is wary of month-long diets like Veganuary.
She warns that such short-term commitments should be treated with care. Many clients fall short because “they’re focusing on what to remove, not what they need to eat.” Instead she advises people to only make changes they can imagine themselves doing in a year’s time, whether it’s eating more plant-based meals or cutting down on booze — and if you are going to try a vegan diet, try it in spring instead “when there’s an abundance of UK plants available”.
Freer puts her success stories down to this approach: she still checks in with clients a couple of times a year. What does she tell them? “Be gentle,” says Freer. “January is a very empowering time when people see the new year as a new start but I always say start small and do things long term.” The first small step? Buy her book — and invest in that knife.
Simply Good For You by Amelia Freer is out now, Michael Joseph, £22
