Hi all. I had surgery/chemo/radiotherapy 5 years ago. At that time I lost 30-35lbs. I was never obese - just on the upper end of my healthy BFP. Quite a lot of my weight loss was in fat, but I certainly lost muscle too. It got so I couldn't walk more than 10 minutes. It took me 3/4 years to get my weight back up to the sort of level my nutritionist wanted, but I know it's more in fat than muscle. I have had 2 lung operations and since the 2nd one my energy and exercise levels have seriously reduced too. Lazy. Tired.

I have been told that on the chemo I'm starting in 10 days, I can expect to lose 2kg (about 4-5lbs) a session - 6 sessions one every 3 weeks. I need to fight hard to keep/gain weight in between, and I am particularly concious that I need to gain muscle, and I need to improve my protein intake.

For various reasons, I cannot cope with meat like I used to, or fish. My partner is a die-hard meat eater, the fattier the better, generally roast. Just the smell makes me have to leave the room - or deep fat frying. We just cannot share meals most of the time. I have become a very uninspired and lazy cook - most of the time I really do not know what to eat. My diet consists of far too much cheese/dairy product and pasta/potatoes. I'm generally fine with green vegetables, carrots etc. - well, not bad, but I really need to change my protein intake method.

Could any of you suggest some EASY-COOK non-meat protein rich recipes, please? Sadly I also have problems sourcing meat-replacement products such as tofu etc. - I have discovered to my dismay that there is no vegan/vegetarian shop near where I live, and French supermarkets havn't discovered the concept yet! So mostly it's going to have to be nuts and pulses, but can't be too dry for saliva reasons. Eggs are ok although for some reason I don't use them often.

Or protein supplements? I don't know anything about them - they gave me some protein enriched pasta to try a few years back and it was yukky.

I do have high cholestoral - I used to have a very healthy low fat diet, but since I was working on putting weight on, I switched to high fat, high dairy product intake - and sugary things which I never used to eat much of either - lurve my choccy biccies and Magnum now! But the chemo consultant encouragingly said 'Something that might make you ill in 20-25 years time is absolutely not something that you have any need to worry about'. Yay.

Many thanks for all suggestions!