More and more people are choosing to cut down on dairy products – and not just for health reasons. Increasingly, it’s a matter of lifestyle preference or concern for the environment.
Eileen Walsh, who stars in the comedy series Catastrophe with Rob Delaney and Sharon Horgan, is keen to find out more. No stranger to a healthy lifestyle, the actress, who lives in north London with her husband, Stuart, and daughters Tippy, nine, and Ethel, six, is a spinning devotee who eats well and keeps herself in shape.
How will she fare when she swaps to dairy-free products from Oatly for three days?
Day one
On the first morning, when we eat Oatly-soaked porridge oats with fruit compote, Stuart and I agree that Oatly is far more palatable than soy milk. Ethel has never liked cow’s milk, but she happily pours Oatly on to her cereal and Tippy, who is a big milk drinker, adores the Chocolate Oat Drink.
Once the girls are at school, I head to Finchley Road, where I co-run the Spinn-off spinning studio with Mairead Bergin. I make lattes for the class using Oatly Foamable; everyone loves them.
In the evening I make pasta, adding Organic Creamy Oat to the sauce.
Day two
Lunch on the second day is a huge hit with the girls; I make sweet and savoury pancakes and serve freshly baked scones, straight from the oven. Like most children, my daughters will eat biscuits all day – but if we prepare homemade goodies they are just as enthusiastic for those.
In the evening I make a veggie chilli: the Organic Creamy Oat is so lovely, so I add a little to the mixture. I also bake a batch of soda bread with nuts and seeds; using Oatly makes the consistency much lighter than if I’d opted to bake with buttermilk.
Day three
I travel to Newcastle on the third day of the challenge, to prepare for my role as Ariel in the Tempest, which moves to Oxford in October. To sustain me on my travels, I eat more soda bread for breakfast, topped off with my neighbour’s homemade blackberry jam. (I also take the bread into rehearsals to share with the rest of the cast.)
I have already noticed a change by day three: I’m experiencing less of an energy drop in the afternoon. The director, Phelim McDermott, uses a method called instant acting, where you record your lines with the cast and then listen back to the recording repeatedly, so it’s useful to have so much energy. In November, I’m playing Ratwoman in Richard Eyre’s Little Eyolf at the Almeida, so I’ll need plenty of energy for the rest of the year. After rehearsals, I drink a strong mocha, made with Oatly, then go for a brisk walk on the coast.
Switching dairy for Oatly proves an easy exchange – partly because there are so many different options to experiment with. It’s certainly something I’m going to carry on with: as a busy working mum, I’m right behind anything that keeps my energy levels high, tastes good and makes family life more fun. It’s a definite winner.
Oatly strives to create products with maximum nutritional value and minimal environmental impact. Its dairy-free alternative to milk is made using 100% Swedish oats, and tastes just as good. Try it next time you reach for the milk.
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