From lazy lady to domestic goddess (minus the neck-choking scandal)!

Mon 22 July 2013

Break– oatbran porridge with 2 blobs of Tiptree raspberry jam

Post riding snack:  original coconut water.  1/2 slice wholegrain bread with peanut butter.

Lunch – homemade guacamole on 1 x lunch slice, some brie & camambert with crackers & chutney.

Dinner

• 2 x fajitas with light sour cream and home made guacamole.
• Dukan cheesecake– no base, just low fat cream cheese blended up with low/no sugar jelly:  make up jelly with 3/4 of the water.  Once slightly cooled, mix up with cream cheese and let it set in the fridge.  Really yum, my fave is the lime flavour, but sadly I had no lime jelly.  Makes 4 portions: 1 portion = 129c which I don’t think is too bad for “cheesecake.”

After my riding lesson I usually feel really zonked.  The lesson’s themselves are 1 hour long, but from home to lesson and back again- I leave the house at 9.10am and get back home at about 1.45ish, which includes trains and buses and a sizeable chunk of walking, so by the time I get home I’m pretty wiped.  Bit lame I know, but often I spend the afternoon lazing on the sofa.  And that was how today seemed like it was going to go too.  Got home, had lunch, lounged on aforementioned sofa with hot water bottle n throws over my legs like an old granny and closed my eyes.

And then something weird happened.  I got up and did a TONNE of food making, it was like all this energy and determination came from nowhere!!  Maybe as I was snoozing I was feeling bad about all the crap I ate over the weekend and felt bad for eating so much tinned/packaged soup on my fast days.  I used to almost always cook something, or at least make something fresh like chilli avo on ryvita, but I feel like I’ve been relying too much on non-fresh food items recently for my lunches and I thought I should remedy that!

So I made one of my super amazing wraps using half a sundried tomato wrap (we have a some left from the fajitas that need using and I LOVE wraps), a load of veg, some camembert and ham- all for only 236c.  Rock on man, I can’t wait to eat this tomorrow ON A FAST DAY!  I just put anything and everything in wraps and they always taste so good, and different every time!

Handy tip so you can fill even more in them- lay them flat on cling film/cellophane, fill them up in a line down the middle, right up to the edge and roll your wrap up tight- no need to tuck the ends up- anything that falls out just squash back in the end.  Then as tight as you can, wrap it up in the cellophane.  When you’re ready to eat it, simply cut the wrap in half, and you have an awesome wrap whose filling won’t fall about everywhere cos you just roll down the cling film as you eat.  Plus, you don’t get those annoying end bits where it’s all wrap and no filling! 🙂  Ahhhh, you know you can’t wait to try it!

And I had a can of artichokes in the cupboard I bought ages ago to roast and never got round to it, so I decided to do those for my dinner tomorrow.  Was supposed to just be the artichokes and garlic, but as we’re busy this week, as well as having tonnes of fajita leftovers, we had veg in the fridge that needed using or it’d end up binned (which I hate!!) so I used them up- cherry toms, half an onion, half a zucchini, and I had practically a whole head of cauliflower so I used the stalks to roast.  They go nice and chewy!

AND with the rest of the cauliflower, the usual white bit, plus the leaves, I made a cauliflower and lentil soup!  Now the only thing left in the veg section is lettuce (which shall be used in future wraps), carrot (snap) and cucumber (snap x 2), so to sound really chavvy I am ‘well pleased’ with myself! 😛

Wed 29 May 2013– Fast Day 4: Wants me some chocolate!! :-S

Break – 6.15am – porridge – Total 144c

• 20g Oatbran = 74c
• 200ml skim = 70c
• Cinnamon & ginger = 0

Lunch –  1.10pm – Soup – Total 156c

• Woolworths Homestyle fresh soup pot (300g pot = 1 serve) – Beef and Vegetable-  = 156c

Dinner – 7.25 pm – Leftover Chorizo and Pumpkin Stew – Total 193c

• Leftover Chorizo and Pumpkin Stew = 179c
• 50g cauliflower “rice” = 12
• Diet coke = 2

Fast Day 4 Total = 493c

 

My first day using one of my new shop-bought soups.  As we were out last night I thought this would be the perfect opportunity to use one, as it’s not like I was going to bother making anything when we got back from the Thai meal!

 

Cauliflower rice, you probably gathered, is grated/food processed cauliflower, heated up.  Small white particles to trick me into thinking I have carbs whilst sneakily sneaking in more vegetable.  Is pretty good with curries, so I thought it’d be alright with the chorizo stew.  I actually have this “rice” frozen in the fridge/freezer – bought a whole head of cauliflower and quickly realised I’d never get through it all fresh as it was MASSIVE, so whizzed it all up in the food processor and froze it- now I have ready made stash of the stuff which is quite handy.

Did you also know you can freeze legumes like chickpeas, kidney beans etc?  Buy a bag of dried, prepare and boil up the whole bag in one go (cos you’ll never bother with dried beans if you do them portions at a time!), then freeze them.  Can be bunged straight from frozen into any casseroles or curries or stews.  Couple of weeks ago when I had a free weekend I did this with some mung beans and a bag of mixed beans – now I’ve got healthy proteins in the freezer ready to go.  Thrifty tip for you there! 🙂

11am – hunger pangs now!  Delightful hollow feeling in my belly….  Will try to fill it up with water and green tea!

11.52am – think it’s boredom-hunger.  This feels like the longest day ever, which is usually something that makes me want to eat!

1.30pm – Soup was nice.  Quite a decent portion size too, and a decent amount of meat in there- they didn’t stint like some soups do.  Hopefully will keep me  satisfied till dinner!

6.30pm – ok, cooking food (for the next day) that you can’t have a cheeky nibble of, that’s pretty tough, esp when it’s some amazing smelling chorizo!!!  Luckily tonight’s dinner is the leftover chorizo stew, perhaps the only thing that stopped me from scoffing some of what I was making.  I made a pastry-less quiche/frittata thing- is awesome for using up leftover veg- mine has some chives, sweetcorn, mushrooms and the chorizo in, plus a tub of low fat cottage cheese that needed using up, and sprinkled with low fat cheddar- yum!  Started making these when I did Dukan, but really love it, so have continued to cook it fairly frequently.  Great for breakfast, lunch or dinner- I often have it for breakie as it makes a nice change to my usual porridge! 😛

 

Its been Officially my hungriest Fast so far.  Although think it was more cravings, as what I wanted was chocolate- on more than one occasion did I fancy some, which isn’t really normal for me, and also didn’t happen on the other Fast days either!  Thought it was to do with today being especially dull at work, but then realised it’s prob because it’ll be my TOTM in a few days time (apologies for the too much info).  Oddly this makes me feel better about being “hungrier” today, in that it’s not the diet, it’s those crazy hormones!

 

ps.  Just ate dinner, and I’ve decided to rename it cauliflower “couscous,” as this is a more accurate description.  Name aside, fake carby goodness was yum! 🙂