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🐞🚪Ladybug Larder: APPLES! 🍎 🍏 Exciting! 😂 Wait… they actually do much more than you think. They’re cheap, easy to find, easy to carry around, there’s very little waste, and they’re one of the simplest snacks you can grab when you’re heading out the door.

No fancy packet. No prep. No container.

Just an apple. 🍎

They also give us **fibre**, especially when we eat the skin, plus vitamin C and other naturally occurring plant compounds.

And they’re much more useful than just being something you chuck into a lunchbox.

Slice them into yoghurt or oats. Add them to a salad. Roast them. Bake them. Pair them with cheese or nut butter. Use them in savoury meals.

That’s why apples have earned their place in this week’s Ladybug Larder.

Simple. Seasonal. Useful.

And this week Chef Laz has created **four new apple recipes** for Premium Members, showing just how far one very ordinary apple can go.

Mrs. Ladybug 🐞🌸

Beef, Beetroot And White Bean Borscht With Dill Quark. 🍲 When Laz first put a bowl of this strangely coloured soup in front of me years ago, I was more than sceptical.

These are liquid colours I’m used to seeing in my art studio — not in a bowl. 😂

But my goodness, the flavour. 💗

It’s rich, slightly sweet, slightly sour, and every spoonful has a different texture from the beetroot, cabbage, beef and beans. It is genuinely one of my favourite dinner soups now.

And making enough for lunch the next day in a Tupperware? Even better.

Nutritionally, one portion gives us:
70% protein
50% fibre
26% magnesium
16% calcium
8% omega-3

The beetroot starts the story, but the beef, white beans and dill quark build the wider nutritional picture.

Premium Members: you’ll find the full recipe in your Chef Tab until Thursday. Save it to My Cookbook so you can find it again.

Mrs. Ladybug 🐞🌸

I’ve been talking to my husband about my bowel movements for years. There. I said it. 😂 Or lack of bowel movements, more accurately.

“No pasta for me tonight.”
“Give me the root veg.”
“Have we got anything with more fibre?”

Very glamorous conversations in our house!!

But looking back, all those little conversations were part of something much bigger. 🐞 While I was trying to understand what was happening to my body, what I could do to feel better, and what I should actually be eating day to day, Laz was listening — with his chef / solutions-based brain working quietly in the background.

Somewhere along the way, all those chats about fibre, protein, calcium, magnesium and what was on my plate started becoming Ladybug.

So if talking publicly about something as unsexy as constipation helps another woman in her 40s think, “Oh! Maybe there’s a reason this is happening to me too”, then every awkward conversation was worth it…

Although I am cringing inside still. I’ll get over it! For you x

Mrs. Ladybug 🐞🌸

Constipation in your 40s? Yep, that can be part of perimenopause too. Has keeping your gut moving suddenly become something you actually have to think about? Welcome to another glamorous side of perimenopause. 😂

Yesterday we talked about constipation, fibre and why beetroot has earned its place in this week’s Ladybug Larder.

But knowing you should eat more fibre is one thing.

Standing in your kitchen holding a beetroot and wondering what on earth to do with it is another. And if you’re not particularly creative in the kitchen — hello, me 👋 — this is exactly where Chef Laz comes in. 👨🏻‍🍳 This week he’s created four new beetroot recipes for Premium Members, designed to help you turn that ordinary beetroot into an actual meal.

Because knowing what your body needs is one thing. Knowing what to pick up in the supermarket this weekend for next week’s meals is much more useful.

Premium Members: Pop into your Chef Tab to discover this week’s recipes and save your favourites to My Cookbook.

Mrs. Ladybug 🐞🌸

🚪 Ladybug Larder: Beetroot 🤰🏽**Has your digestion changed in your 40s? More bloated? More constipated? Suddenly spending far more time thinking about your bowel movements than you ever expected to?**

Digestive changes including bloating and constipation are commonly reported during perimenopause and menopause. In a recent Menopause Society study, more than half of the women surveyed reported constipation, and many said their digestive symptoms had started or worsened around this stage of life.

That doesn’t mean every digestive change is caused by hormones. Hydration, movement, stress, medications and what we eat all matter too. But it does mean that if your gut suddenly feels a little less predictable than it used to, you’re certainly not the only one.

And this is where **beetroot** earns its place in the Ladybug Larder.

A 150g serving of beetroot gives you **15% of your Ladybug daily fibre goal**. It also contributes **7% magnesium, 3% protein and 2% calcium**.

Are those enormous numbers? No.

But that is exactly the point.

Eating real food isn’t about swallowing one nutrient or finding one magical ingredient and assuming every nutritional need is covered. It’s about all the different foods you eat across the day adding their bit.

Fibre matters particularly when constipation has become an issue, alongside enough fluid and regular movement.

So this week, beetroot isn’t here simply because it looks beautiful and autumnal.

It’s here because **our bodies change — and our food can change with them.**

And if your next thought is, *“Fine, Mrs Ladybug… but what on earth am I supposed to make with beetroot?”*

Come back tomorrow. Chef Laz has been cooking. 😂

Mrs. Ladybug 🐞🌸



**Sources:**
[https://menopause.org/press-releases/digestive-health-issues-more-common-during-perimenopause-and-menopause](https://menopause.org/press-releases/digestive-health-issues-more-common-during-perimenopause-and-menopause)

[https://www.nhs.uk/conditions/constipation/](https://www.nhs.uk/conditions/constipation/)

⭐ Recipe of the Week: Sweetcorn, but make it bright, fresh and a little bit special. This week Chef Laz has paired charred sweetcorn with chilli-lime prawns, mango and avocado for a proper late-summer lunch.

This is one of those salads that does not feel like “just a salad.”

It has warmth from the prawns.

Sweetness from the corn and mango.

Creaminess from the avocado.

And plenty of crunch and freshness to keep it interesting.

It’s quick, colourful and high in protein — exactly the sort of meal I want when summer is still hanging on, but I need something satisfying.

🐞🌟 Premium Members: The full recipe is waiting in your Chef Tab until Thursday. Save it to My Cookbook so you can find it again.

Mrs. Ladybug 🐞🌸

Brunch! My favourite word! 😍

Chef Laz whipped this up at the weekend with fresh bell peppers, onions, plum tomatoes and eggs, served with a slice of his sourdough bread.

I loved it so much I asked him to teach me how to make it — so when it’s my day to make lunch, it’s not just simple scrambled eggs. Again. 😂

Do you want the recipe?

Mrs Ladybug 🐞🌸

🐞 🌽 Sometimes I don’t know what to do with the simplest ingredients. My creativity definitely lies outside the kitchen. For me, sweetcorn usually means tuna on a baked potato, a tuna melt... or eating it straight from the tin when we’re camping. LOL.

But I know I need to expand my horizons a little.

Especially because my child loves sweetcorn, and the tinned version is one of the easiest things in the world to keep in the cupboard.

No peeling.
No chopping.
No drama.

Just open the tin and you’re halfway there.

That’s why I love when Chef Laz takes a humble ingredient like sweetcorn and gives it a few more jobs to do.

Last Friday, he dropped **four new sweetcorn recipes** in the Ladybug app — including a kid-friendly one.

🐞🌟 **Premium Members:** Pop into your **Chef Tab** to discover this week’s recipes, then save your favourites to **My Cookbook**.

Mrs. Ladybug 🐞🌸

🐞 Recipe Drop: Sweetcorn 🌽 Humble little sweetcorn. Golden, familiar, easy to find all year round — and far more useful than we sometimes give it credit for.

This week, Chef Laz has created four new sweetcorn 🌽 recipes for Premium Members.

Curious?

🐞🌟 Premium Members: Pop into your Chef Tab to discover this week’s recipes, then save your favourites to My Cookbook. 🌽

Mrs. Ladybug 🐞🌸

🚪 🌽 **Ladybug Larder: Sweetcorn**🌽 Sweetcorn is one of those ingredients that feels cheerful before it even reaches the plate. It’s golden, seasonal, budget-friendly and very easy to add to family meals.

And that is exactly why it has earned its place in the Ladybug Larder this week.

🌽 Sweetcorn is not trying to be fancy.

It is not pretending to be the latest superfood.

It is just a simple, familiar ingredient that brings sweetness, colour and texture to the table.

It also brings some lovely nutrition, including:

🟢 **Fibre** — supporting digestion, gut health and helping meals feel more satisfying.

🟡 **Folate** — supporting healthy cell function.

🟣 **Magnesium** — supporting normal muscle and nerve function.

And because it has that natural sweetness, it can make meals more appealing without needing to make a big fuss.

That feels very Ladybug to me.

🐞🌟 **Premium Members:** Check your **Chef Tab** on Friday for this week’s new sweetcorn recipes.

Mrs. Ladybug 🐞🌸