Weekly Dinner Plan #2

I’m a nosy person by nature, and a lover of all things food, so it’s no surprise I’m always intrigued to know what other people eat. For anyone who eagerly questions colleagues every morning “so what did you have for dinner last night?” like it’s some hot gossip, this ones for you. Here’s what this weeks Dinner plan looks like:

Monday Steamed salmon fillet with roasted asparagus spears, steamed spinach and grilled tomato.

Tuesday Tofu, pepper and cherry tomato skewers with a big side salad.

Wednesday Lentil bolognese served with brown rice penne pasta and steamed broccoli florets.

Thursday Cod fillet dressed in lemon juice served with steamed broccoli florets, butternut squash and roasted red pepper.

Friday Sweet potato fries with homemade chickpea veggie burgers and kale.

Saturday Out for dinner.

Sunday Out for dinner.

• Since about March, I’ve slowly been adding different varieties of fish back into my diet. This week we decided to go for cod fillets dressed in lemon juice with a colourful selection of roasted vegetables. I’ll probably make a big batch of these roasted vegetables and use them in a wrap with houmous for lunch the next day.
• Even though my Mum insists she hates lentils, her favourite dinner is a lentil bolognese sauce, which tastes oddly like beef bolognese. Unfortunately lentils don’t agree with my system too well, so we only have them once/twice a week. 
• Friday night is usually always chip night in our house. To get an extra portion of my 5-a-day in, I like to cut sweet potatoes into fries and season with cinnamon and paprika. If we’re running short of time, we’ll probably pick some up some pre-made veggie burgers rather than make our own out of chickpeas.

What does your weekly dinner plan look like?

K

Almond Butter Blueberry Cookies

Now I wanted to start this post tastefully. I'm currently "surfing the crimson wave". Some might say, "birthing a blood diamond". Or I'm attending "arts and craft week at Pantry Camp", if you get what I mean.

Yes, I totally googled: polite things to call your period. 

Too much information, I know. But the point was that this week I’ve been craving sweets, cakes and biscuits like crazy, and this is where these Almond Butter Blueberry Cookies come in.

Not only are they free-from dairy, eggs and gluten, but they are also free from refined sugars. I try and avoid processed sugars around this time of the month because my skin is usually already suffering with the unbalanced hormones and I don’t want to make it any worse. These cookies are sweetened naturally with maple syrup and vanilla extract, but still smell and taste delicious warm out of the oven to keep my cravings at bay.

 

Makes 20 Cookies

Ingredients

150g Oats

100g Buckwheat Flour

1 TSP Bicarbonate Of Soda

90ml Olive Oil

90g Tahini

250g Almond Butter

120ml Maple Syrup

75g Blueberries

Preheat the oven to 180 degrees celcius/Gas Mark 4 and line and grease a large baking tray.

In a blender or food processor, blend the oats down into a fine powder and then stir together with the buckwheat flour and bicarbonate of soda in a large bowl.

Over a low heat, melt the olive oil, tahini, almond butter and maple syrup and stir until  smooth and combined.

Pour the warm liquid mixture over the dry ingredients, along with the blueberries, and fold until all the ingredients are combined.

Roll the cookie dough into 20 golf-sized balls and flatten down with the palm of your hand on the baking tray.

Bake in the oven for 10-12 minutes (don’t overcook them or they will become dry). The cookies will still be a little soft, but they will start to firm up as they cool down. After a couple minutes transfer to a wire rack to cool completely - or just eat the whole batch before then!

If you too are “riding the cotton pony” so to speak, make a big batch of these and put your feet up with a cup of tea. 

K

Weekly Dinner Plan #1

I’m a nosy person by nature, and a lover of all things food, so it’s no surprise I’m always intrigued to know what other people eat. For anyone who eagerly questions colleagues every morning “so what did you have for dinner last night?” like it’s some hot gossip, this ones for you. Here’s what this weeks Dinner plan looks like:

Monday Steamed salmon flaked over a bed of sliced new potatoes, spinach and broccoli florets. Served with a honey and mustard dressing.

Tuesday Quick pasta arrabiata served with brown rice spaghetti (from Deliciously Ella Everyday Cookbook).

Wednesday Tortilla pizza base using the leftover arrabiata sauce, topped with roasted courgette, peppers, red onion and mushrooms. 

Thursday Steamed salmon fillet served with brown basmati rice, pak choi and fine beans, drizzled with a homemade sweet and spicy chilli tamari sauce.

Friday Out for dinner.

Saturday Quick black bean and spinach tomato pasta sauce served with brown rice spaghetti.

Sunday Either leftovers or whatever we fancy.

• I like to make sure we’re having a portion of oily fish, like salmon, at least twice a week. The omegas found within salmon are essential fatty acids that are so important for our brain and nerve function, as well as helping to lower the risk of heart disease and supporting our skin. Our favourite dish at the moment is simple steamed salmon (we do ours in foil boats in the oven for around 10-15 minutes) drizzled with a homemade sweet chilli tamari soy sauce and served with rice and greens.
• On Tuesday we're celebrating my Brother’s birthday and I wasn’t getting in from work until late, so we opted to make a quick arrabbiata with brown rice spaghetti. I use the leftover arrabbiata sauce to top my tortilla-base pizza the next day with roasted vegetables, or you can freeze the leftover sauce for even quicker mid-week meals.
• Sunday mornings usually call for a run with my Dad, so we like to make another quick tomato pasta sauce we can leave in a slow-cooker for dinner Saturday night. It’s full of black beans for plant-based protein and served with brown rice spaghetti which are great carbs for energy reserves.

What does you weekly dinner plan look like?

K

Willy Chase's Fit Corn

Fit Corn is like the equivalent of MTV’s “I Used To Be Fat” in the snack world, and here’s why…

The other week I received a very generous package from Willy Chase for the attention of “Popcorn Manager” (which is now a title I’m adding to my CV and LinkedIn page, fyi), filled with their healthy and delicious new Fit Corn that I couldn't wait to try out!

Now I’ve never really considered popcorn as a healthy snack and rarely consume it anywhere but in the cinema where it’s heavily laden with sugar and salt. So it came as a big surprise to me that it’s actually a wholegrain food. Not only that, it’s high in fibre and also high in polyphenol antioxidants (which helps to protect our skin and cells from environmental and free radical damage!) However, most commercial popcorn is loaded with unhealthy ingredients that cancel out all thats great for our bodies about popcorn.

But not Fit Corn. Fit Corn spent a good few months whipping itself into better shape. 

Seeing as plain popcorn isn’t too tempting, Willy Chase have gone out of their way to produce this gourmet snack collection without all the unnecessary ingredients, all the frying in oils and instead created this “cleaner, greener, fitter popcorn” air-popped by hand. 

Here’s a couple more reasons why I love Fit Corn:

• They don’t outsource. All the popcorn is air-popped in their kitchen in Hertfordshire, and all the flavourings are made using natural ingredients and super foods! 
• All their products are free from gluten, wheat, peanuts, MSG and GM, and some are even free from dairy and egg!
• Not only are they a delicious treat to sneak into the cinema, they can also be incorporated into your everyday diet! 
• And if you needed anymore convincing, their packaging is incredibly pleasing on the eye!

Click here to find out more about and how to buy Fit Corn.

My favourite flavour is the Smoky Bloody Mary, because one can at least pretend she's having a nice drink with friends when she's really slaving away at her laptop on a Monday afternoon. 

K

May Favourites

First, a little note on progress that I've realised in May:

“Great things are done by a series of small things brought together” Vincent van Gogh

Sometimes it's necessary to take a step back and view your progress over a series of months. For a long time I've felt as though roots have been grounding me down in one place, and that I wasn't moving forward in my life. And I cannot tell you how incredibly disheartening it is to look upon someone else's life, as they achieve and do amazing things, to feel as though you are stuck in one place. However, those little day-to-day changes I made, so minor and insignificant but constant, built upon each other like red bricks. When I took that step back, I saw that it had formed a magnificent structure, and that my life could not be more different than it was at the beginning of the year. 

So whatever your goal may be, don't monitor how you have changed since yesterday or since last week. Look back at how you've changed in a much bigger picture and you might be surprised to find you haven't been wading through black treacle this whole time.

Onto the favourites: 

Does anybody else suffer from that post-amazing-read depression, where you feel like no book could ever quite compare to the one you've just read? After I finished A Thousand Splendid Suns, I thought I'd never enjoy another book again, but The Girl In The Red Dress exceeded all expectations. It's a truly unique and page-turning read. I snuggled up many an evening in May with this book and a mug of Bluebird Tea Co's Honey Bee Beautiful tea - an antioxidant rich tea with sweet honey notes, and skin calming ingredients like camomile.

Typically my foundation ran out this month and pay-day seemed like an age away, so I started using the Revlon 24 Hour Colorstay Foundation, which is a great dupe for Nars Sheer Glow. I've been using a combination of this Crazy Rumours 100% natural lip balm in Mocha (which smells incredible), with MAC's Morange layered on top for hydrated, bright summer lips. And then I set all my make-up with the Smashbox Primer Water, a product I swear by and have used everyday since December to keep my make-up from melting off my face. 

An amazing discovery in May was this Sweet Pea Pantry Grainy Brainy Pancake Mix which is full of amazing ingredients for the body and mind, like buckwheat flour and flaxseed. Not to mention it contains absolutely nothing artificial and no added sugars or salts. Another discovery was the Grown Ups Read Things They Wrote As Kids podcast (not pictured), which is hilarious and makes me feel slightly less embarrassed about my own tragic pre-teen years. 

And lastly, I haven't stopped wearing these Sweaty Betty Urdhva palm tree print leggings, mainly because I like to pretend I'm actually sitting on a beach in Bali sipping from a coconut when I'm wearing them, not in the stock room at work - a girl can dream.

Low-Sugar Green Smoothie Bowl

I refer to them as a “smoothie person”. You know the type of person I’m on about. That colleague that bundles into work full of energy, boasting about their positively glowing skin, carrying their empty nutribullet cup. Self-righteously listing off more superfood powders in their morning smoothie alone than you think you've had in your entire life, and how they’ve “already had 4 of their 5-a-day and it isn’t even 9am yet!”

Yeah, I’m not one of them.

And that’s not to say I don’t want to be one. I’ve always wished I was a “smoothie person”. I’ve tried countless recipes, but in all honesty, I don’t find them satisfying, satiating or even that great tasting. That is, until I tried my first smoothie bowl. Now whose amazing idea was it to blend a smoothie so thick you have to spoon it out of a bowl like yogurt?  

Packed with 16g of plant-based protein and heart-healthy fats, this low-sugar green smoothie is a perfect post-workout meal. And with only 9g of sugar, it makes a great everyday alternative to the smoothies you can pick up on the high street that can punch a hefty 26g of sugar per serving - that’s equal to a can of red bull! Just don’t be scared off by the addition of turmeric powder, you can’t taste it, but it does serve as a great natural anti-inflammatory.

Serves 2

Ingredients:

250ml Oatly Organic Oat Milk (or milk/milk alternative of your choice)

30g Almond Butter

100g Spinach

1 tsp Cinnamon

1 tsp Turmeric

20g Pulsin Protein Raw Sprouted Rice Protein

1/2 Ripe Avocado

1/2 Frozen Banana

Topping Suggestions:

• Raw Buckwheat Groats
• Fresh Fruit (raspberries, blueberries, kiwi and grapefruit are great choices as they are low in fructose)
• Nuts/Nut Butters
• Desiccated Coconut
• Sunflower Seeds, Pumpkin Seeds, Chia Seeds
• Cacao Nibs

Place all ingredients into a blender, adding liquids and softer items first and then the harder items like your frozen fruit last. 

Blend for a couple minutes until it is all combined and a thick creamy mixture. You may want to add a dash of water in at this point to loosen it up, depending on personal preference. 

Spoon into a bowl and top with whatever takes your fancy.

Now dig in you “smoothie person” you.

K

Save yourself on the sugar-bomb (you're sweet enough already).

Chocolate Swaps For Safe Highs

Life has a little rule; things we aren't supposed to have (or do) will always give us the greatest pleasure. And maybe that's why takeaway pizzas taste so much better cold the next morning, or perhaps why the thought of kissing someone you really ought not to, seems too linger a little longer than it should. 

But out of everything, one thing seems to bring us all more pleasure than anything else.

Something that seems to steer even the most head-strong of us off the track.

Chocolate.

I know I'm right.

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It's always the first thing to be thrown out when we're making an effort to be healthier, but always the hardest to actually give up.

Denying yourself of something makes you want it 10x more, doesn't it?

Makes you think of it every other second of the day.

And before you know it, you're actually considering digging that bar out of the rubbish bin.

So I say don’t.

Don't give up chocolate (and don't go bin diving, ever.)

If you’re not giving it up, you’re not thinking about the fact you can’t have it. And it all comes down to lifes little rule; once you're allowed something, it really doesn't give us as much pleasure. 

*

In a balanced diet, there's always room for a little treat. But before you reach for that KitKat Chunky, think about swapping in these nutritious chocolate products for a safer chocolate high:

Sunwarrior Chocolate Protein Powder

If you fancy a milkshake, try blending one scoop of this raw protein powder with 1 cup of milk and 1/2 a banana - the 16g of protein will help to satiate you until lunchtime, and won't spike your blood sugar levels like grabbing one from McDonalds.

Pana Chocolate Sour Cherry & Vanilla

Swap your Snickers chocolate bars and indulge in one of these raw chocolate bars. They are full of amazing antioxidants and nutrients that get destroyed when processed.

Raw Chocolate Co. Chocolate Covered Mulberries

Justifying sugar-laden milk chocolate because it's coating raisins? Stop. Try out these raw chocolate covered Mulberries which taste just like little, chewy caramels.

Nakd Cocoa Delight

This 4 ingredient, raw fruit and nut bar, is cold-pressed to help retain all it's goodness, and flavoured with only natural flavourings. Counting as 1 of your 5 a day, these little bars make a great post gym snack that won't ruin all your hard hustling.

Sweet Freedom Choc Shot

Ditch the high sugar hot chocolate powders before bed time for this 100% natural liquid chocolate. With only 14 calories per teaspoon, and sweetened with only Sweet Freedom Fruit Syrup, it also makes a great topping for yogurts, ice creams, pancakes and even to replace your nutella on toast.

Naturya Cocoa Nibs

Replace chocolate chips in your trail mixes and cookie doughs for the bitter, nutritious chocolate crunch of cocoa nibs. As they are left to dry out under the sun, they retain the flavanols and antioxidants that make actually make chocolate great for our skin.

Aduna Super-Cacao Blend

Big fan of chocolate brownies? Swap out the cocoa powder for cacao powder, which retains more of it’s health benefits due to cold pressing and isn't sweetened with refined sugars. 

Save the dangerous highs for kissing the bad guys you probably shouldn’t.

K