Monthly Archives: October 2017

I love to cook

It Takes five (ingredients that is)

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I love cooking and baking and although not trying out too many recipes from my vast book collection, my love of food is still there. I am probably still a person who is a traditionalist with her meat and vegetable meals but have made Mondays a meat free day. I have to work hard on remembering this when making my sandwich for work.

Another thing I do tend to do is follow recipes very closely and rarely deviate from them. I’ve surprised myself recently by actually coming up with my own Monday night recipe. This one is quick and easy and contains just five ingredients; three of which are my favourite foods of the moment.

5 ingredients

The ingredients are (first three are my favourites):

  1. Cauldron Lincolnshire vegetarian sausages – I love sausages and wanted to find a vegetarian sausages. The reviews were very good for these and I can confirm that they are lovely. They do a few varieties and whilst normally I would go for a Cumberland, they are not as good as a Lincolnshire.
  2. Spinach – I just so love this. Why does it disintegrate so much!
  3. Goats cheese – Chris has raved about this for years but I’ve only just started enjoying it. My favourite cheese (other than cheddar) at the moment. I will still eat Camembert, Brie, Wensleydale with cranberry, etc!
  4. Baked potatoes – I forgot; I love potatoes in any form – mashed, roasted, chipped, baked and let’s not forget the plain boiled new potato.
  5. Peppers – any colour will do.
Colourful Dish

Tina’s method

  1. I allow 2 sausages per person and whilst I could fry this, I tend to stick these in the oven for 20 minutes whilst preparing the rest. The great thing about these sausages is that you can actually cook them from frozen so I don’t have to remember to get them out of the freezer.
  2.  I put the potatoes in the microwave allowing one per person.    Whilst these are cooking, I slice two peppers (any colour but red and yellow give a wonderful colour to the dish).
  3. Once the potatoes are cooked, (I always over cook but it still works) I slice each one into wedges. My lovely red pan is put onto heat with a squirt of oil. I add the potatoes to this and fry until turning a golden brown. Then add the peppers and continue frying for a few more minutes.
  4.  I then chop the cooked sausages up, add to the pan along with a bag of spinach and continue cooking until the spinach has wilted. It might look like a lot of spinach but it isn’t when this process has completed.
  5. Add the goats cheese and the dish is ready to be served. Once upon a time, I would have made sure Chris has the most of everything. I realise now that life is too short; I go for lots of goats cheese!
Tina’s Veggie Sausage and Goat Cheese Delight

New potatoes can be substituted for the baked potatoes.

The sausages are also great in a toad in the hole (another favourite dish).

Toad in the Hole

Hope you enjoy this dish.

Fitness and Health

Runnin, runnin, runnin, ain’t running by myself no more!

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This time last year I was taking part in my first 10 mile run; the Great South Run That was one of the best challenges ever and I will never forget how I felt at completing that run. I couldn’t take part in this year’s race due to my foot injury but I would love to do it again.

Great South run finish

I first started running 5 year’s ago using the NHS Couch to 5k podcast. This is a 9 week programme that gradually builds you up to run 30 minutes. Since I had my foot pain in May, I have found it difficult to get back into a good running pattern. I made the decision to try the couch to 5k again. This time though I was going to have a running partner; Chris.

Before running

I am a bit of a plodder when I run and because of this I do find running on my own is an advantage. Whilst Chris hadn’t run for a while, he was going to make me run and not plod! Can I cope?

As someone who never believed they would never ever run, I am a big fan of the couch to 5k. I am now coming to the end of my third week and I am fully committed to my running plan.

All runs start with a 5 minute walk and one of the other recommendations is to have at least one day’s rest in between each run. I have always stuck to this. Your narrator is a lovely encouraging Laura, who will tell you when to start, give you encouraging tips along the way and really is too nice to shout at when she tells you that you are half way through and don’t give up.

This is the first 3 runs:

Week 1 – run for 60 seconds and walk for 90 seconds for a total of 20 minutes. As this is my second time round, I found it so much easier. This was not the case the first time round. Running the first 60 seconds was so hard and then when I realised I had to do this 8 times, I was devastated. Normally maths is my strong point but first time I really could not make that add up to 20 minutes; more like 50 minutes.

The one thing I recommend when you finish running is stretching. I missed this out on my very first run and my legs did ache. I use a stretching plan from Rosemary Conley 28 day inch loss book and I rarely ache now.

Week 2 – run for 90 seconds and walk for 2 minutes for a total of 20 minutes. This time you run 6 times.

Week 3 – start with a 90 second run followed by a 90 second run. This is followed by a 3 minute run with a 3 minute walk. This is repeated again which makes your 20 minutes of exercise.

I certainly would have whinged a bit about running 3 minutes the first time round but as Laura says, the feeling you get when you finish the session certainly outweighs the pain you feel. Honestly it does!

So I will start week 4 next week. It is certainly helping me gently return to running. I am a morning runner but as I have been doing this programme with Chris, we have been running early evening. Normally I shy away from change but I haven’t noticed the change at all.

So if you have always thought you could never run but are up for a challenge, give this a go. You won’t regret it and honestly it feels good to run for a bus!

Grab the running shoes
Fitness and Health, I love to cook

It’s Hard Work But It’s Good For Me

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Thursday was the big weigh in. After following normal weighing procedures (and yes I did try it three times!), I had lost 3 and a quarter pounds in 8 days. I don’t expect to see these results again but the first week of reducing calorie in take does result in a bigger loss. I have seen people lose a lot more than this but I was overjoyed with this.

This result was due to the fact that I cut down on all that extra rubbish I had been eating; crisps, chocolate biscuits, chocolate and all the food that I put in my mouth when I am cooking! I am still eating normal dinners; curry with onion bhajis (a weakness this week), homemade pizza (I will share this later) and a toad in the hole made with my favourite vegetarian sausages.

So, as I am doing this as part of a challenge on Rosemary Conley Online, I was so pleased to find myself 13th in the league table on Thursday. There is currently 164 people in the “lose a stone” category; they are so honest. They record their gains too!

I thought that as I was 13th (don’t expect to be that next week but I am still competitive) I would try to come up with 13 items that have helped me lose weight this week:

Pizza Trays
  1. Planning dinners – this helps a lot. As I knew what I was having for dinners, I wasn’t tempted to have a takeaway
  2. Cutting out on a biscuit with my tea at elevenses at work. I had my pot of grapes if I needed something
  3. Making lunch last. I did find that if I didn’t have grapes at 11 a.m., I did want my lunch at 12.30. When I am at work, lunch is always the same; sandwich and a yogurt. I try to make this last over 90 minutes. That way I don’t feel overfull either.
  4. Letting Chris cook me breakfast most mornings. Okay I have to ignore the fact that he puts butter in to the scrambled egg. Yes there is a slimmers version of scrambled egg but it is so delicious and most of the time I walk 2 miles to work!
  5. This is more of a Tina’s tip – on the first week of a new eating plan, don’t also be too ambitious with your exercise. I always think that on the first week, eating less can take a bit of getting use to so if you are adding lots of exercise that you normally wouldn’t do, you can feel quite drained.
  6. Doing the couch25k with Chris. So I have run 10 miles before but as I have had an injured foot, I haven’t been able to run. I have found that getting back into running hasn’t been so easy so starting at the beginning this week has been very good and having a running partner is a good incentive
  7. Telling family that you are going to be good in your eating. Okay,Kathryn did say that I am better when I am eating everything but she is encouraging too. I did try one piece of her Montezuma white chocolate bar;it was delicious but I didn’t have a second piece
  8. Not telling work colleagues. I do the tea run at 11 so they don’t need to know I’m not eating the biscuits! It is amazing the opinions of others on this subject so I find it best not to talk about eating habits.
  9. Sticking with my normal meals. I have had what I actually want to eat including my favourite food ever, chips! I do have oven chips served with my own healthy turkey burgers.
  10. Wearing clothes that make me feel good. I did admit defeat a few weeks ago and bought some work trousers in a size 12. I found some cheap trousers in Asda’s George range which look good too.
  11. Treating myself. How many times do I say I need a treat and it will be a bar of chocolate or a cake. This week I had a shellac manicure and really love seeing my lovely nails. Surprisingly if I bought chocolate or biscuits regularly it would be the same price as having my nails done so if I can keep off them, my nails will be done regularly. Another treat; a food one. I bought four individual pizza trays from Marks and Spencer’s. Maybe not a treat in other people’s books but I was so excited to find them. We did have a lovely pizza using them.
  12. Dancing to George Michael’s Fantasy helped me this week. I have always liked this song and now it has had a bit of a Nile Rodgers touch, I certainly enjoy dancing around to it.
  13. Staying positive and not letting any problems encountered make me reach for chocolate and crisps.
My nail treat

If I follow these again I am hoping that my next weigh in will be successful.

 

Cross Stitch, Fitness and Health, I love to cook

It only takes a minute girl!

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Well I’ve been away from blogging for a while now. In fact, I have been avoiding a lot of things for a while. I’m not going to blame anything or anyone but myself for this negativity. I haven’t been idle for all this time and whilst one of the activities I have chosen to do can be attributed for this post, I have also started a Christmas stitch a long and am actually managing to keep up with it.

Christmas Stitch-a-Long

Last Tuesday evening, after finally accepting that I have a wardrobe of beautiful clothes that seem to have shrunk, I decided to visit Rosemary Conley online site. I have been a member for years and actually used the site to lose weight 5 years ago when I got down to my target weight. I had stayed within 7 lbs of this weight for quite a while. My love of cooking, which is an activity I have been doing a lot of recently along with my lack of exercise has contributed to a bit of excess flab around the waist.

50 and trim

Do we need diets? Well, I don’t think we necessarily do if we accept the reason we weigh a bit more (or a lot) than we should is the result of overeating and/or lack of exercise. There are medical exceptions to this; something I can’t put my weight gain to unfortunately. I think diets do give you a purpose to lose weight and whether you go alone in reaching your goal, or find other people to go along the journey with, they are certainly worth trying. It is important to learn how to eat correctly and the importance of exercise whilst doing it.

Which diet do you choose? I think you choose one that suits you. Personally, I do not like fad diets at all. All this do not eat after 7pm, this food group is not good for you or calorie counting is not what I’m all about. As for liquid diets; I would never go there. I still believe that is everyone’s choose though; just don’t try telling me I am wrong in my choice when you decide you are not going to eat bread!

So why have I been a member of Rosemary Conley? I have found her books and exercise DVDs very useful. The DVDs could be described as low impact but if you haven’t exercised for a long time, they are perfect. I love the music in them too although sometimes Steps can get on my nerves. The recipes in her diet books are brilliant; so much flavour and for someone who likes to cook homemade food, perfect. For my weight loss 5 years ago, whilst keeping an eye on what I ate, I did the Lifestyle Plan which wasn’t a diet as such but made me think about what I ate and gave me guides to aim for each week. The first week, I learnt to put a number on my rumbling tummy. I soon learned that my rumbling tummy did not mean I was hungry at 10 a.m. so my lunch could wait until lunchtime. Just following it meant I chose wisely when going out for a meal at a restaurant the day before my birthday, ate fish and chips on Brighton pier in the rain for my birthday and had a slice of homemade birthday cake. I still managed to lose 2lbs that week! On this plan, I gave up on a guilty pleasure, eating Pringles. Pringles were only something I bought at Christmas but once they were open, I had to eat them. I have been Pringles free for 5 years. Since then, I have given up on chocolates in tins; roses, quality street,celebrations. I would eat them without tasting and enjoying. This worked for me although it might not work for everyone.

On Tuesday, when I visited the website, I hadn’t stood on the scales for months. I had decided I didn’t want to be ruled by dieting. After cutting back on exercise but eating too much chocolate, crisps, biscuits and lots of homemade cakes (could you resist these?)

So yummy
A favourite
Do I need to say more!

I really needed to get back in to control. I just went to look at the diet plans and ended up signing up for their winter challenge; lose a stone in 8 weeks. I needed now to make the brave mood to weigh myself.

Wednesday morning, I woke to start the routine of weigh in. I am very particular on this routine. It has to be done first thing in the morning before any liquids or food passes through my lips. First of all, I like to be in the lightest clothes as possible; pyjamas are perfect for this. A visit to the bathroom is then necessary then I make my way to the kitchen. I weigh myself in this room because the floor is more level. I knew the result is not going to be good and I do the best of three. They are all the same; I have to lose a stone. Now I know, I feel a bit more motivated to try to lose it. I can do this one step at a time.

Evil numbers

First step is to give up eating in between and to stop picking at food whilst eating. A week later I have been okay with this. I have made Thursdays my weigh day so I will let you know if I have lost anything soon! Hopefully it will be a lighter me writing the next post.