Tuesday, 20-01-26

Good evening, everyone.

I watched this video on YouTube the other day.  If you've ever thought losing weight is as simple as calories in and calories out, maybe you should think about watching it.

As well as exploring the above, she talked about three types of hunger which I found helpful.

One was proper hunger, when you need nourishment.  Homeostatic hunger
Another was habitual hunger - for example, if you're used to having a cuppa and biscuits at four o'clock, you're going to feel 'hungry' out of habit.  It is the sort of hunger that says 'I need and evening snack' even if you had a good dinner two hours before.

The third is a sort of environmental or emotional hunger when you see something or think of something and suddenly crave it.  Often linked to the cravings that ultra processed food gives you, this can be very hard to resist.

Definitely food for thought in this video.
(sorry!)

Breakfast was fruit - two apples and two easy peelers.

Lunch:  a toasted roll with avo, scrambled egg, mushrooms and tomatoes.

One fibre and one healthy fats.

Late afternoon I had some fresh pineapple.

For dinner I used a couple of my home made lasagne sheets rolled around a portion of savoury mince, topped with some seasoned tomato and red pepper sauce and with grated cheese and a sprinkle of mostly pumpkin seeds on top.  Basically a lasagne but without the white sauce and really tasty.

One calcium and two swips for mixed seeds

I had planned a dessert but was full so maybe I can have it tomorrow.

Summary:

Healthy extras: one of each

Swips:  two - very low and I could have more but I'm very satisfied and don't want anything else.

B:  baked oats with fruit

L:  soup with cheese and seeds

D:  steak wrap pasty, vegetables or salad

And fruit

Exercise is personal training

Monday, 19-01-26

Good evening, everyone.  

Bravely, I served that ravioli to a friend who came for lunch today.  Do you do that - try something new and serve it to guests rather than testing it yourself first?  Anyway, I boiled it up, mixed it with some tomato and red pepper sauce I had in the freezer and served it with salad and it was lovely.
As I said, having done the maths, I'm calling the pasta itself a free food on Slimming World.  The filling had a bit of cheese in it. 

I had an apple before Circuits - I've found that if I go fasting I lack a bit of energy at times.  While I was prepping coleslaw, I had a bit of carrot and a quarter of an apple.

I've already talked about the ravioli above.  Very delicious and very satisfying in both the flavour sense and the filling sense.

I have four left and they are now in the freezer.

One calcium healthy extra and two swips for super-low mayo.

Later on I had a couple of easy peelers.

I had salad left over so for dinner I baked some salmon and air fried some chips - just a few - to have with the mixed salad.

It was delicious.

Another half of a calcium choice (leftover grated cheese in the salad) and half a healthy fats choice for cooking the chips.  I'm not combining them to call it one healthy extra though.

Summary:

Healthy extras:  one and a half calcium choices, not fibres and half a healthy fats.

B:  Another very busy morning so I'll stick with fruit because that can be eaten on the run

L:  avocado bagel with scrambled egg and a salad

D:  hm sort-of-lasagne with steamed veg or salad - depending on how I feel.  I will top with cheese rather than with a cheese sauce. 

And fruit

I might have to miss Groove tomorrow which is a shame but I will catch up later in the block.

Sunday, 18-01-26

Evening, everyone.  

It's been a busy old kitchen day today - three sourdough loaves, a slow cooked batch of savoury mince (which will slowly simmer away all night) and some hm chicken and mushroom filled ravioli.  Oddly enough, when I have days like this, I tend not to feel all that hungry but I've really enjoyed my meals/snacks today anyway.

I just had an apple for breakfast and saved myself up for a nice cooked breakfast/brunch!

How I enjoyed this!  Bacon, egg,  mushroom, tomato and a toasted crumpet.  So tasty.  OK, I know the bacon isn't the healthiest but now and again is not so bad.

One healthy fibre choice.

When I opened the cooking bacon pack I mentioned yesterday, I found a few raggedy rashers, a few 'bits', a couple of small gammon steak thickness slices and one decent chunk which I can use as a gammon joint  Everything is now wrapped and in the freezer except for the bits and the gammon slice on the plate.

Halfway through the afternoon I had a couple of small apples and some cheese.  Apples and cheese go so well together, don't they?  
Anyway, the cheese was two calcium choices.

Ooops.  You almost didn't get a photo of dinner and, looking at what I did take, maybe you're wishing I hadn't bothered!

When it came to it, I just didn't fancy roasties, etc so I reheated the broccoli from yesterday, steamed some sprouts and had them with the chicken.  I'm out of cranberry sauce so I had some cherry, plum and sloe gin chutney (no, I couldn't taste the gin!!) at one and a half swips.

I really enjoyed it.

Summary:

Healthy extras:  two calcium and one fibre choices.

Swips:  one and a half

B:  fruit, probably - I don't have all that much time

L:  I have a friend round.  I know I said I wasn't making any more pasta until I'd used what I had made but I have had a go at making ravioli with a chicken and mushroom filling for me and my friend.  I have a tomato and red pepper sauce in the freezer and will do a side salad.
I'll let you know!

D:  Not sure.  If there's any ravioli left, I will probably finish that unless it is so awful that it has to go in the bin, in which case, I will have some of the savoury mince that's slow cooking as I type this.

And fruit

Exercise:  it's circuits class on Mondays.

Saturday, 17-01-26

Hi, everyone.

I had another go at making more wholemeal based pasta this morning, starting with 50-50 rye to white (plus the psyllium husks because it couldn't hurt).  I thought I could see how that went and then gradually increase the rye/white ratio in favour of the rye to find what you might call and 'optimal' point.

50/50 worked so much better.  I could tell as soon as I took the kneaded dough out of Thermione and squeezed it into a dough.  It was pliable, didn't crack and rolled beautifully.  Definitely a win!

I made two portions of tagliatelle (this is the one I had for dinner) and four lasagne sheets (I use two at a time).  Some might feel that it's quite a small portion but it's enough for me.

Next time I will try 60/40 but not until I have used this lot up!

I took an apple, some grapes and an easy peeler with me on the walk.  It went really well with a black coffee.

SW caramelised onion sausages in a roll with onion chutney and brown sauce.

The sausage are a free food, the roll was one fibre choice, and the sauce and chutney together was two swips.

And a side salad to go with it.  All speeds foods apart from half a healthy fats choice for mixed seeds and a drizzle of balsamic vinegar (SW free)

Later on I enjoyed two easy peelers.

Dinner was the pasta I made this morning (delicious) with a sauce of chicken, onion, pepper, mushroom, chopped tomatoes, tomato puree and quark (I found some - it's really hard to get hold of), seasoned with garlic granules, smoked paprika, black pepper and some chicken stock powder.

I totally forgot that I had steamed some broccoli to have on the side - so I can have that tomorrow.  It was more than filling enough anyway - and I was so pleased with the pasta.

Just half a healthy fats choice for oil - I am calling my pasta a free food as the shop bought and processed stuff is a free food.

Summary:

Healthy extras:  half a calcium (a nibble of cheese and I may have the rest in a little while to make it up to one), one fibre, one healthy fats

Swips:  two - so I might have more than half a calcium's worth of cheese.  That's low for swips.  :-)

B:  Breakfast crumpet - a M&S five seeds crumpet which is a new fibre choice with bacon, egg, sausage (perhaps), tomatoes and mushrooms -  a good old cooked breakfast!
(It might do as a brunch rather than a breakfast!)

L:  (if I have it) soup

D:  roast chicken or turkey dinner, depending on which container I find first in the freezer!  Sides will probably be roasties, carrots, broccoli, sprouts and cabbage.
It will be Sunday, after all.

Plus fruit

Exercise:  rest day

Friday, 16-01-26

Evening, all - as dear old PC George Dixon used to say back in the 1950s and 60s.  Does anyone else remember Dixon of Dock Green?

Back on subject, I was pleasantly shocked to have lost half a pound this week.  No, not the biggest loss in the world but after Christmas cake, extra bread and goodness knows what else during a very confused week, I was relieved and grateful.  It's a new week now and, apart from this lunch time, I don't think there is anything to throw me off track.
So I'd really like to lost two pounds by next Friday.

I managed to hold off eating anything this morning - not something I would usually condone but, given I was lunching out, it felt right.

At The Giggling Squid (lovely name) we had the most amazing lunch - prawn crackers, spicy chick peas, Bangkok bites (a sharing platter), caramelised pork belly and, for afters, I had lychee yogurt ice cream.   It was delicious from the first crunchy prawn cracker to the last scrape of ice cream.

I found this picture on their site - it's the Bangkok bites sharing platter.

Obviously, no idea of swips whatsoever.

In the end, for dinner I had a fish finger roll - a wholemeal roll with three fish fingers, lettuce, cucumber and super-light mayo.  It was hard to build and even harder to eat but I got there.

When it came to working out the SW values, it was one fibre for the bread, I have no idea about the fish fingers because different brands do vary, two swips for the mayo and half a healthy fats choice for some spray oil to cook the fish fingers.

Ad the fish fingers have all been used now.

B:  fruit - we're having our first SW Oldies walk of this year and I will eat my fruit when we stop for coffee.  

L:  sausage sarnie with salad - I want to try out the SW caramelised onion sausages.  I'll let you know

D:  chicken and veg pasta, broccoli

And fruit

Exercise:  the walk

Thursday, 15-01-26

Evening.
Another rather scratch day with no photos but the boiler is now replaced, I have heating and hot water, everything is finished and never was a shower more welcome.  :-)

Breakfast was a good pot of overnight oats.  One fibre choice, two swips for chia seeds and half a swip for kefir.

Lunch was off plan - some hm focaccia and some soft cheese with tomatoes

Dinner was a jacket potato with cheese, cubed roast beef and some more tomatoes.

B:  just some fruit because . . .

L:  Alex is taking me out to lunch at the Giggling Squid and I want to be hungry!! 

D:  again, it depends on lunch, but something simple.

Back to normal by the weekend.

 

Wednesday, 14-01-26

Good evening, everyone!

Isn't it hard to get hold of the more specialised 'healthy' stuff.  Today I was in town looking for buckwheat flour, spelt flour and psyllium husks.  I tried three 'wholefood' places and not a sausage from any of them.  So it was the usual fall back - Amazon - to be delivered tomorrow.
A great shame, isn't it.  And I have just remembered, maybe Lathcoat's would have had some or all.  Drat.

It wasn't a great day for photos (the plumbing/boiler work continues!) but it was fine for food.

Breakfast was half a can of baked beans on toast.  One fibre choice and a swip for brown sauce.

Lunch was a lovely, albeit expensive, fruit 'platter' from M&S and I finished off the baked beans too.  Swip free.  

Later in the afternoon, I had a nibble of cheese for my calcium choice.

For dinner, I chose the beef rendang curry SW ready meal .  It was OK - no, that's not fair, it was quite nice but it was more a beef casserole with a bit of a spice kick than an actual curry.  The meat was beautifully tender and the 'gravy' was good.  Just not, in my opinion, a curry.

There was plenty.  If I could have bothered with rice and a side of lentils, it would have made two portions

Swip free as was the apple I had for afters.

Summary:
Healthy extras:  one calcium and one fibre
Swips:  one

I'm so glad to be back on it after yesterday's crash.

B:  overnight oats with fruit - it is already made and in the fridge

L:  I'm at a Thermomix cooking demo - Nutrition Meets Thermomix:  Eat well, Live Well.  There should be some nibbles available.

D:  It depends on lunch but I have roast beef that must be eaten up so I might make a beef and mushroom carbonara or similar.

And fruit.

No exercise bug the steps will be fine.  My aim is over 5,000.