Live For Food

I found this easy midweek meal recipe at Waitrose.com and have adapted it to help me use up some leftovers which I have in the fridge and freezer.

Ingredients: (serves 2)
½ tsp oil
50g salami 
6 pork chipolatas
5 mushrooms, chopped
80g easy cook long grain rice
200g passata
1 tsp dried mixed herbs
225ml chicken or vegetable stock
1 green pepper, deseeded and cubed
4 small green chillis, chopped (adjust number based on personal taste)
 

Method:

Heat the oil in a large pan and cook the salami for 2-3 minutes. Add the chipolatas and mushrooms and cook for 3-4 minutes until lightly browned on all sides. Tip in the rice and stir until coated in the oil.

Add the passata, herbs and stock then cover and simmer for 15 minutes, stirring occasionally.

Add the pepper and chillis. Cover and cook for a further 10 minutes until the rice is tender and most of the liquid has been absorbed. 

Verdict

This is a great midweek recipe, and everything is cooked in one pan so its easy to prepare. It was tasty with a nice kick to it from the chillis. It was a little salty, so if I made it again I would make my chicken stock from half a cube instead of a whole cube. It needs to be stirred fairly frequently or it will stick to the bottom of the pan. A useful recipe for using up some of those Christmas leftovers.

Happy New Year everyone! I hope you had a great Christmas, and are ready to start a New Year. Typically at this time of year people make resolutions about what they hope to achieve during the coming year. Typically most people don’t keep them either! At church on Sunday we had a talk about resolutions, and when we were asked what our previous year’s resolutions were, no-one could actually remember, so I think its safe to say that we all generally have good intentions but that they don’t often go much further.

I’ve learnt a few things this year about my eating habits, and in case you fancy making your own resolutions, I thought I would share my thoughts in the hope that maybe one or two of these ideas will work for you. Don’t forget that different things work for different people, but that there is no harm in giving something new a go.

1. Reducing carbohydrates in your diet can assist weight maintenance: This year I have consciously lowered my carbohydrate intake. I’ve eaten less bread, rice, pasta, potatoes and breakfast cereal. I’ve probably eaten slightly less sweet stuff too, but not as noticeably. By the end of the year I have managed to achieve a more steady weight maintenance without the assistance of keeping a food diary.
2. Advance tactics can lessen the impact of buffet meals: This year I have planned in advance how much I am going to eat at buffet meals and bring and share type meals. Whilst my plans do not always fully come to fruition, I think overall I ate less than if I had not had a plan at all.
3. Teamwork or support from other people can motivate you: This year a friend of mine also had success with low carb eating, and some close relatives lost weight for a family occasion. Hearing their experiences and sharing my own made me more enthused to keep my own weight down.
4. If you find a way of eating that you enjoy you are more likely to stick to it: I enjoy eating low carb breakfasts and lunches, and find an evening meal more satisfying if it is low carb rather than low fat. This makes me more inclined to stick to this way of eating even if its more work.
5. Consistency is the key to exercise rather than frequency or intensity: My exercise levels have been nothing to shout about this year but I do regularly take a lunchtime walk at work. Just keeping up this level of exercise, 5 x 30 minute walks a week has enabled me to continue to maintain my weight.
6. Eating sugar early in the day can make you eat sugar ALL day: I do like something sweet after a meal, and a square of chocolate or two or a small scoop of ice-cream after dinner is sufficient. If I have a cake mid morning, I find it hard to resist eating cake or chocolate throughout the day. Whilst part of this response is in my head, I think part of it is chemical as well. My body seems to reset to “normal” overnight and I’m okay again the next day.
7. Consistently drinking water is good for you: I’ve had some headaches this year, and making sure I am well hydrated seems to have reduced the frequency. I am drinking up to 3 litres a day and haven’t had a headache for a month. Obviously its anecdotal evidence and there are other triggers too but it’s worth trying if its something with which you have a problem. I don’t just drink plain water, that includes weak tea, green tea, and fruit and herbal tea.

Whatever your resolutions are, I wish you all the best for 2013 and beyond!

This will be my final post for the year as I will be taking a blogging break for the holidays.  I wish you all a very Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year!

I am eating out for the first time on Christmas day this year, so there is not too much festive cooking going on in my house. That will also mean I won’t spend the next two weeks eating up turkey leftovers. So I hope you all enjoy your festive fare, and see you in the New Year.

Christmas is a tricky time of year if you are planning on either losing weight or maintaining it over the festive period. It’s not quite as bad for us in the UK as for our friends over the pond, because at least we don’t have Thanksgiving to contend with, and no-one forces us to eat weird food like sweet potatoes with marshmallows on top. 

However the season still brings plenty of its own challenges. If you work, people are more likely to bring in treats for the office and there are work dinners and parties to contend with. At home, people entertain more, and always like to have a choice of treats and desserts in, and end up with the leftovers to eat up. 

You know your own personal nemesis. I commented to my Mum that December was more difficult because people brought mince pies and sweets into work and I have quite a few social events.  She said that her problem was January with all the leftovers to eat up. I then said this to my Mum-in-law and she said she ends up doing both – too much social stuff beforehand AND too many leftovers!

So it seems we have three problems. The time before Christmas, the day(s) itself and the time after Christmas. Work out which period is your problem time for piling on pounds and plan in advance how you are going to deal with it. Here are my suggestions:

Devouring in December

• Come up with a stock phrase to refuse snacks such as, “Thanks, I’m not hungry right now”, “I’m cutting back on sugar before Christmas”, or “No thanks I have a big meal coming up this evening”.
• Always get out for a lunchtime walk.
• Bring your own sandwiches to work.
• Alternate alcoholic drinks with water at social events.
• At buffets avoid too much “yellow” food – pastry, crisps, bread and instead pile up the salad.
• At restaurants skip dessert and have a liqueur instead – just one though!

Consuming at Christmas

• Remember – your eyes will be bigger than your stomach – try and take this into account!
• You don’t have to sample absolutely everything!
• No second helpings.
• Don’t spend the morning or afternoon scoffing chocolates. Have one and put the box away.
• Have a glass of water before meals, it will hydrate you, and fill you up to stop you eating as much.
• At buffets offer to do the washing up – it will stop you hanging round the table.

Nibbling in the New Year

• Give away as many leftovers to your visitors as you can.
• Freeze some of the leftovers – meat and cheese freeze well, as do casseroles and pies.
• Ask your neighbours in for coffee and cake in the mornings to eat up the mince pies.
• If you don’t like something you are left with, don’t eat it. Throw it away. Waste is not ideal, but neither is eating food for the sake of it.
• See if you have any elderly neighbours who would appreciate some portions of casseroles or cake for their freezer.
• Consider taking any leftover unopened tins or packets to your local homeless shelter.

Wishing you all the best for a happy and healthy Christmas!

While I was reading a magazine the other day the page with suggested products to try caught my eye. In particular this item:

Aunt Bessie’s homestyle frozen gravy

My standard everyday method of making gravy is pretty lazy. I take some Bisto granules and add boiling water. That’s it. It’s not very special but it’s quick and easy with a good meaty taste. It’s also very easy to have the granules in the cupboard and they keep for ages.

I was quite intrigued by the idea of frozen gravy. Obviously it’s another product with long life potential. So I bought some in the hope that it would prove both tasty and quick to make.

The gravy comes in two flavours, a meat one and a poultry one. It did indeed prove to be quick and easy to make. You pop the gravy ice cube in a jug and pour boiling water over. Then you stir it till it’s dissolved. Finally you put it in the microwave for a couple of minutes. One cube serves 2 people and the box contains 6 cubes.

Of course the all important question is the taste. The gravy was a good consistency which could be easily altered with water to your preferred thickness. I had purchased the poultry flavour. It had a light herby taste which was very pleasant, however it was nowhere near as meaty as standard Bisto granules. It did however taste a lot more natural than Bisto and not as overpowering. I suspect it wasn’t as salty as Bisto either. The taste of the herbs coming through added a little something extra which you don’t get with straight gravy granules.

There is also the option to make up the gravy with meat juices which would probably improve the meatiness.

I will certainly be using up the rest of the box quite happily and may keep some in my freezer for convenience. However my husband preferred his meaty Bisto overall so we will probably stick to that as our quick and easy week night gravy.