Sometimes You've Got to Crack a lot of Eggs!

I am 16 days into my 21-day plan to make sure that someone in my list of priorities I come first…. I reckon that for about 12 of those days, it’s been the case. The days it hasn’t happened, I’ve checked myself and put it right the following day… it’s a learning curve right?

  So far in the 16 days, there have been trips to the gym, dog walks, reading, watching films, catching up with friends and some evenings where I’ve allowed myself to give into how tired I am and just unashamedly got into bed at 7pm and slept!

  My 21 day KT plan has also involved making sure that I eat right, so I’ve invested in a couple of cook books.

  This is what I’ve leant, if its green it’s good for you (green jelly babies don’t count) if it’s some form of protein that’s good for you and don’t be scared of fat, some fats are good for you.

SORTED!

  I’ve also learnt that already slinky people cook from scratch! They use things like Tahini and turmeric and tender-stem broccoli, which is apparently different from tough-stemmed broccoli. See I’m learning stuff.

  I now eat a lot of stuff cooked in a slow cooker or a wok, I work on the “shove it all in and let it cook” method and so far my one pot culinary skills have not let me down!

  Today though, today I got cocky! One of my favourite things in the world is dippy eggs and because I don’t have time to eat them in a morning, I sometimes have them for lunch. Check me out with my lunchtime protein, which keeps me full till teatime.

 Today I thought I’d step it up a gear, I’d seen this recipe where you got some large mushrooms and then you cracked an egg into the mushroom, added a bit of ham and cooked them. They looked nice, they looked easy to do and they were healthy!

Things I have learnt today…. Cracking an egg into a mushroom is not easy!

I'm a bit Green About Eating Clean and Lean!

Do you remember when Christopher Columbus realised the world was round and we didn’t have to sail in straight lines anymore (you probably don’t, it was the 15^th Century) So then every explorer and his dog set off on a spherical adventure. 

*disclaimer, this photo isn't historically accurate

Then in the 16^th Century Galileo upped the anti and went “hold on, I reckon there’s planets other than the earth, I’m pretty certain there’s a Solar system” (he probably said this in Italian and it probably took him a bit longer to reach that conclusion) but you get my point.

  I think dieting has become the same. First we should eat carbs, then we shouldn’t, then we should eat fat, then we should concentrate on a low fat diet, and then maybe just eat half a grapefruit and a bit of cottage cheese, the amount of diets that have been in fashion over the years is scary. Then eventually the dieting version of Columbus went, I think I know how you loose weight….

So that’s what people started to do and lo and behold, people started to lose weight, dieting mystery solved.

  However then the dieting version of Galileo went “yes that works well, but as well as eating less and moving more, you need to eat clean and lean” and everyone went “brilliant”

  Over the last few months, I’ve heard lots of my friends’ talk about eating clean and lean and quite frankly it confused me! All the food I eat is clean, because I wash and prepare it correctly! I buy lean meats, so am I eating clean and lean? Am I meant to be eating fat? If I do eat fat, it has to be good fat and low fat really isn’t good for me?

  There’s no wonder anyone without a degree in nutrition struggles to make sense of it!

  Now I’m a sensible kind of girl (well ish) so as I figured I needed to understand exactly what clean and lean meant, so I turned to Amazon, typed in “books about eating clean and lean” and discovered this bad boy!

  It had great reviews and James Duigan had worked with Elle McPherson, a lady known as “The Body”, it felt like the right choice. I can achieve an Elle body by next year? Right?

  When the book arrived, I spent a bit of time reading it and getting my head round what it really meant.

  It turns out basically just don’t eat any processed stuff! Eat fresh meat and fish. Green leafy vegetables are very good for you, berries are also an excellent choice, nuts are a good snack and there’s these things called mung beans and chia seeds, which you can sprinkle on salads.

  The book is full of recipes and being to cooking, what John Sargent was to dancing, it’s been a bit of a test. There were a few early pancake disasters, but it turns out raspberries can mask the taste of “burnt oats”, but I’m getting there.

A flipping disaster!

  I’ve even learnt to like avocado and been able to drink 2 and half litres of water a day, which apart from having to wee having 10 minutes is OK.

  I wouldn’t say I’ve totally perfected the art of eating lean and clean. There’s no section of the book that suggests red wine is an acceptable drink, so there have been a couple of slip ups, but there’s more good than bad eating days.

  So I shall  continue being a clean, lean, green eating machine, well that is of course until someone else pipes up with the dietary equivalent of walking on the moon!

PS – any clean, lean recipe ideas greatly received!

The Great Katie Bake Off

First full week back at Weight Watchers and I’ve lost a pound. Secretly I was hoping it would be more, but hey a pound off is a pound gone and it puts me back on the weight loss road! I've also managed to fit in two zumba classes, one Just Jhoom class and I even turned down a bit of caramel shortcake one  particularly stressful!

Now as much as I love cake, I hate watching programmes where people cook, I just don’t get the attraction. The fact people get so wound up about TV shows like “The Great British Bake Off” amazes me. However the headline “Baked Alaska Scandal”, which apparently was worthy enough to make the front of most British newspapers and “Heat” magazine (step aside alleged Beyoncé / Kim K feud,  dissing someone's baked goods is where it's at) 

   From what I can gather some bloke with a beard made a Baked Alaska and some woman with grey hair could have possibly left the fridge door open and ruined it. He threw it in the bin and she left because she wasn’t very well. The beardy man has since said it was nothing to do with the lady, he just made a crap Baked Alaska. CONTROVERSIAL! And if I'm honest I have no idea what a baked Alaska even is!

  I decided it was time to create a bit of controversy in my own kitchen this week by actually using it for something other than making a cup of coffee!

  So on Saturday afternoon as the mighty Stags took on Burton Albion and the commentary blared out, I decided to get my bake on.

  Having trawled my Weight Watchers cookbooks, I decided to give sausage rolls a go. Now let me say if you’ve never made sausage rolls, they’re quite hard to do, the difficulty rating of "1" on the recipe was in my opinion a blatant lie! I bought some low fat sausages and for the first time ever filo pastry graced my shopping bag. I have learnt that I have a look at the recipe, get a vague idea of what should be happening and then do it my way (I blame my love of Frank Sinatra for this)

  I squeezed the sausage meat out of the sausages into a bowl, added some chives, some black pepper and a chopped onion. I then put it into some filo pastry and rolled them up. If I do say so myself they looked OK.

 

There are actual sausage rolls under what looks like a mess of crispy pastry!

 I bunged them in the oven and waited. It soon became apparent that one sheet of filo pastry was not going to be enough, so I kept adding more and more layers, until eventually I think I’d used about 4 on each one. By the time they were done, I’m pretty sure Greggs weren’t having a re-think of their sausage roll strategy!

The sausage roll aftermath (which sounds like a good title for a horror film!)

  I think points wise, the sausage rolls were probably about 5 points each, but they tasted OK and everyone that ate them is still alive and didn’t end up in hospital with a crippling stomach condition, so that in book makes them a success!

  Maybe I should sign myself up for “Master Chef” afterall!

Don't Say Bum It's Naughty

My week of back to basics has started to work and I lost a pound this week! I’ve given myself a massive talking to and I’ve worked hard at upping my exercise, trips to the gym, walking the dog and even spring cleaning the office, which involved lots of lifting things. Every little bonus point helps! I’ve also experimented in the kitchen, in more ways than seeing if watering my houseplant will bring it back to life!

  I went through my cookbook and this week, I’ve made banana and peanut butter muffins, which were nice, even if they did have soggy bottoms. Which was the review my friend Gripper gave them…. At least I think he was talking about the muffins!

Banana & peanut butter muffins ingredients

The soggy bottomed muffins

  I also made bacon and chilli pasta and a salmon and prawn pie. All from Weight Watchers recipes and all Katie-cooking friendly, and they actually tasted pretty good!

making the pie

  As my reward, I treated myself to a couple of trashy magazines. I love reading about random celebrities; how they’re swearing off men following their latest heartbreakingly devastating relationship breakup, only for the following week to be seen out and about with a new mystery man. I love the stories about the beauty treatments I should try; a £1000 liquid gold facial sounds like something I’ll definitely not be trying. I’m also running an unofficially tally as to exactly how many pages in one magazine can be dedicated to the cast of TOWIE (13 out of 90 in this week’s “NOW”)

 My favourite article was all about “Bumology” I’ve only just got my head round what a “Belfie” is (a bum selfie) Apparently Bumology allows you to tell all about someone from the shape and size of their bums. So just in case you're planning on picking your future friends by the size of their arses, these are the categories. (said in my best award announcing voice)

·       The Square Bum as seen on people like Cameron Diaz. Square bummed people are laidback and not good at making decisions.

·       The Heart-Shaped bum – as seen on Rihanna, these people are romantic, loyal and sensitive.

·       The Pear Shaped bum, think Mercedes from “Hollyoaks”, these people are ruthless, but also make good friends.

·       The Flat Bum, these flat-bottomed people are like Katie Price and they tend to be obsessed with work and can be negative.

·       The Pert Bum, unsurprisingly Cheryl Cole falls into this category and if you’ve got a pert bottom you’re artistic, creative and great friends with Simon Cowell (one of those things may be a lie)

·       The Full Round Bum, I think this is me, because I think it's a polite way of saying "has a lot of junk in the trunk" apparently having a big bum makes me sensitive with a short fuse (particularly when someone mentions my big bottom) defensive, stubborn and opinionated, but on the plus side my big bum makes caring and allows me to think I'm a goddess.

Reading the article it felt a little bit like reading your horoscopes for the year in January, I was reading the description of what a fat bottomed girl is like (sorry lady with a full round bum) and nodding, yes I am like that, I AM sensitive, I AM stubborn and I DO think I’m a goddess!

   As I read the article, I realised that playing in my head were the lyrics to a song my Dad made up when we were little, it goes

“Don’t say bum it’s naughty, don’t say bum it’s rude, don’t say bum it’s naughty, don’t say bum to me”

Surprising really that Dad never made it in the song writing Hall of Fame alongside the likes of Lennon and McCartney. Still I’m sure if there’s ever a TV show called “Celebrity Bumology” Dad would be happy to negotiate a fee for them to use his song as the theme tune!

  My full round bottom and I are off to the gym later to try and continue my Slinky quest to make my bottom a little less full and a little less round!

PS - It's the National Blog Awards tomorrow night so wish me luck that I bring home the award in the Lifestyle category!