What’s In Your Cupboard?

I am thinking about converting my under-stairs cupboard into a pantry and in the process thinking about what I would want to stock up on and store. Obviously it would need to be foods that I use all the time in various recipes and that are also Slimming World friendly. This got me wondering what would you stock up on? What do you use all the time in your cooking?

Some of the things I want to stock up on are:

• Chopped tomatoes
• Baked beans
• Passata
• Corned beef
• Tinned salmon
• Sardines/skippers
• Jacket potatoes (in appropriate storage)
• Pasta
• Spaghetti
• Noodles
• Rice
• Pudding rice
• Supernoodles, Pasta and Sauce, Savoury Rice etc
• Sugar free jelly
• Stock cubes
• Sugar free pop and squash

The Dream (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Looking at the list it doesn’t look like all that much so I’m sure I am missing a lot of stuff so I was wondering what would you stock up on?

 

My name is Vicky and I am addicted to weighing myself!

I can’t help it! Every morning I have to wake up and know what effect the previous days food has had on my weight-loss. Sometimes it has a negative impact when I have been super good and it doesn’t seem to be working. But on the flip side of the coin when I see that my eating is having a positive impact it is a huge motivator. It also helps me to see how badly I need to get back on track after a weekend of sheer indulgence. I know it is wrong to weigh myself most days but I can’t help it. A couple of weeks ago I went away for the week and I it nearly drove me crazy not knowing what was happening with my weight. But it did help me to break some of the weighing habit so now I have managed to only weigh myself every couple of days. You never know some time soon I might manage to only weigh in once a week in class. That will probably be about the time that I get to target some time after the wedding and honeymoon (I am probably going to end up gaining that week).

Anyway, onto other news…today’s food plan is as follows:

Breakfast – Shreddies (HEB), Semi Skimmed Milk (HEA) Banana (Superfree)

Lunch – Supernoodles (Free), Jelly and Mullerlight mix (0.5 syns)

Dinner – Spaghetti Bolognese (Free) MullerLight (Free)

Rice Pudding

Rice Pudding

I thought this tasted lovely but it was really sweet. I was wondering whether using milk instead of Cream Soda would take away some of the sweetness. I also couldn’t help but serve it with a blob of strawberry jam.

Ingredients

• 1 Pint of sugar free Cream Soda
• Half a mug of Pudding Rice
• 1 or 2 spoons of Vanilla Mullerlight

Method

Put the 1 pint of sugar free cream soda and half a mug of pudding rice and boil until all the Cream Soda is absorbed by the rice. Then mix some Vanilla Mullerlight (you dont need a whole one, a few spoon fulls to taste). There is no reason to stick to just vanilla Mullerlight, for example you could use toffee or strawberry.

 

 

Syn Free Pizza (using your HEA and HEB)

Well, it’s a great alternative to pizza and chips. I had some left over bolognese and there just wasn’t enough to make a meal for both me and husband  to be and as I HATE wasting food I flat out refused to throw it away. So I decided to turn it into a meaty pizza!

Pizza and Chips

I used 1 untoasted whole meal pitta bread (HEB) for the base. Spread a spoon of the syn free bolognese  over the pitta and then sprinkled it with 45g mozzarella cheese (HEA). This was then put into a preheated 200degree oven until the cheese is melted and going brown and then served with slimming world chips.

It really was lovely and it has quickly become one of husband to be favourite left over meals! Next I’m going to try it with chilli!

Chinese Slimming World Style

Tonight I am indulging in one of my favourite foods…chinese! I love chinese and look forward to it whenever I eat it. I haven’t had it in a good few weeks though due to the fact I have found that since starting Slimming World and cooking from scratch more I feel horrible afterwards. I’m not talking about that dreaded guilt trip I tend to go down whenever I ‘cheat’ but in myself I feel terrible. It is like my body is punishing me for putting something as fatty as prawn crackers, bbq ribs, egg fried rice and sweet and sour chicken (battered) into my body. It is like I just can’t handle it and to be honest I have now decided that it simply is not worth it. So tonight I will be really strict with myself and I will certainly not be indulging in the ‘really naughty’ chinese foods. Another added bonus to this is the fact that I will be saving a ton of syns. I looked up the syns of some of favourite chinese orders:

• BBQ Spare Ribs = 8.5 syns
• Prawn Crackers = 1.5 syns for 5 and you can guarantee that I could eat 10/15 in a meal so you looking at 4.5 syns
• Egg Fried Rice = 4 syns
• Sweet And Sour Chicken (battered) = 17.5 syns

So for my old chinese takeaway that made me feel terrible is a whopping 34.5 syns! I can’t believe I used to put that into my body and think nothing of it. It really is no wonder I used to feel terrible after that.

This time it will be a completely different story. I intend to not eat any prawn crackers or appetisers and will instead be ordering boiled rice (FREE) with chicken in oyster sauce (4.5 syns). Yum Yum and with this menu choice hopefully I wont be feeling half as bad as I did last time.

The Best Ever Scotch Egg Recipe And Its Slimming World Friendly!

Scotch Eggs

• 5 eggs
• 8 Sainsbury’s Be Good For You Sausages
• 1 beaten egg
• 4 crushed Scan Bran

1. Preheat the oven to 200c
2. Hard boil the 5 eggs. Once boiled shell them.
3. Take the meat out of the sausage skins, split into 5 and cover the hard boiled eggs.
4. Coat the scotch eggs in beaten eggs and then in the crushed Scan Bran.
5. Place onto a baking tray and spray with FryLight.
6. Put into the oven for 15/20 minutes until cooked and firm.
7. Once taken out of the oven place them onto a cooling rack to cool.

Back On Track!

As the title of my post says I am back on track and had a good day yesterday as well as today (so far), although I haven’t been doing much exercise. That is unless you count the fact that I spent all of today assembling a table and 6 chairs. The table weighed a ton and I was impressed I actually managed to move it around and flip it over etc.

Yesterday I decided that I needed to do an actual food shop and this alone has helped me stay on track. Before yesterday we were trying to make do until payday. This was alright, until the point where you have nothing left and you have the nibbles. It is at that point where you end up making toast and butter. But now I’m stocked up with plenty of fruit and veggies, lean meat and some cupboard essentials like chopped tomatoes and baked beans.

Actually have food in the house meant we could have something for dinner that wasn’t made up of the spot based on what we have left in the cupboards. So we had a yummy scrummy chicken dinner.

My lovely chicken dinner

It was just what the doctor ordered.

This morning I had a good start with a fruit salad for breakfast and surprisingly enough it actually filled me until lunch!

Fruit Salad

I’ve decided that I just eat way too much high starch food. Generally I have a bowl of Fruit and Fibre for breakfast, some sort of pasta based food for lunch and then my dinner in the evening usually always had potatoes. Plus I might have cereal bars during the day which is another added carb filled item. So for a week I have decided to try to reduce it down a little and swap it out for more superfree foods. Hopefully this will help my weightloss a little bit.

Tomorrow I am looking forward to trying this pancake recipe that I have found. I’m going to use the porridge as a healthy extra and this will make the pancakes free!

Magic Pancakes

Syn free on Extra Easy if you use the porridge as a healthy extra B choice.

Ingredients

• 35g porridge oats or 1 sachet of Oats So Simple
• 1 vanilla Muller light
• 2 eggs
• Approximately 4 tablespoons Sweetener (this is a case of trial and error and can change depending on taste)
• Fry Light

Method

1. Mix together the porridge oats and the Muller Light and leave in the fridge overnight.
2. Once you have taken the oats and yoghurt mixture out of the fridge, add the eggs and stir in well.
3. Add the sweetener and stir in well.
4. Spray Fry Light onto the frying pan and heat through well.
5. Put circular cutters into the pan and pour the mixture into the centre of them. Wait for them to brown then take the cutter off. Finally flip the pancakes and wait for them to brown on the other side.

To make the pancakes more interesting you can serve them with fruit or honey and even change the flavour of the Muller Light to add another twist. How about toffee pancakes, strawberry pancakes or even banana and custard pancakes.

It Sunday and it’s sunny so lets have a BBQ!

The weather has been beautiful today and as such we have had a lovely relaxing morning just sitting in the garden and reading while waiting for a friend to come over to have a BBQ lunch, Slimming World friendly of course. As I had Fruit and Fibre for breakfast as my HEB I didn’t have a cob but to be honest I didn’t feel like missed out. To help me stick to my syns I used a couple of my tried and and tested recipes that I know I love. The first on was Tandoori Chicken Skewers.

They are amazing and my other half thinks they are the best thing ever, in fact whenever we have a BBQ these are always requested. The best thing is that if you do not tell people they are Slimming World friendly they simply don’t know. They are just that good. Even better than that is that they are FREE!!!! I really would recommend that you try them and you can find the recipe HERE.

Another thing that I made is homemade burgers, unfortunately they looked and tasted so good that I completely forgot the take a picture, but you can find the recipe HERE. These are also FREE.

Alongside this I had some very juicy and tasty mushrooms (so juicy in fact that the juice burnt my lip 😦 ) and our friend brought along some Pork and Sweet Chilli Sausages. These I worked out and 5.5 syns and as I had such a good rest of the BBQ I allowed myself 1 without a cob. All in all it was a very good syn friendly BBQ.

In other news I also went to see my very first ice hockey match and I absolutely loved it! I’m really not one for watching sports like football (it annoys me when players roll on the floor for every minor injury) or rugby (I get annoyed by the stop and start play) but ice hockey is so quick! I was also strong and didn’t give into the temptation of burgers and hotdogs and chocolate and sweeties. Instead I just made do with…a diet coke. YAY for me!

So today has been an OK diet day again. I has better get a good weight loss this week.

Breakfast Fruit and fibre (HEB + 1 syn), semi skimmed milk (0.5 HEA), banana and a nectarine

Snack Muller Light Greek Style Yoghurt

Lunch 2x burgers (FREE), Tandoori Chicken (FREE) Pork and Sweet Chilli Sausage (5.5 syns) Mushroom (FREE) Sauce (2 syns)

Snack Mullerlight Banana and Custard

Dinner Mango

Total syns = 9 syns

Tomorrow I will be going to the gym and making sure I have another low syn day to make up for it. In fact I have some of that yummy scrummy pork from yesterday so that will make a lovely low syn meal for tomorrow evening. YUM YUM!

Saturday Antics

Happy Saturday guys and gals,

Well, last night went well and all the preparation I did for it worked like a treat. We went to Tamatanga where as planned I had the Rogan Josh (6.5 syns) and, as they didn’t have boiled rice, I had pilau rice (2.5 syns). A total of  9 syns and best of all I only had 1/2 of the Rogan Josh. I didn’t notice that I was eating a Slimming World friendly meal and am positive that I enjoyed it just as much as everyone else. It just goes to show that you can still eat in your favourite places and (hopefully) lose weight.

My Rogan Josh from Tamatanga

Afterwards we went to see Michael Mcintyre and he was brilliant. He had me crying with laughter. I was determined to be ‘good’ and as planned took my bottle of water and some grapes and happily munched on those whilst all around me Ben and Jerry’s, pop corn and candyfloss was being consumed. There was also temptation around every corner in the form of refreshment sellers. I would say that there was a new one every two minutes and as we were right at the end of the aisle they were being paraded right under my very nose…but I kept strong and now I am very proud of myself. Especially as I spent 40 minutes in the gym and then 20 minutes swimming so hopefully that will help as well.

This morning, being Saturday, meant cooked breakfast…YUM YUM!

My poached eggs and toast brekkie

Ordinarily I wouldn’t bother photographing my breakfast but I was so impressed with the shapes of my eggs that I just had to record the evidence. It was lovely and only 1 syn (I had slightly more bread than my HEB allowed and yes I did weigh it :-p).

I also made the Schezuan Pork from the new magazine as well. I served it with boiled rice. It was absolutely amazing. You can find the recipe HERE.

I would advise anyone with a hankering for chinese to give this a go. There isn’t enough sauce to cover your rice but it makes the pork yummy and sticky and it is a syn bargain at just 1 syn! It tastes like its a lot more than that and it would be lovely with egg noodles.

Todays food diary is as follows:

Breakfast 2 poached eggs (FREE), wholemeal toast (HEB + 1 syn) and a peach (FREE)

Snack Tea with milk (HEA) and sweetener (FREE), Banana (FREE), Grapes (FREE)

Lunch Batchelors Chicken and Mushroom Pasta and Sauce with no marg (FREE + HEA), 2 glasses of orange squash

Dinner Sichuan Pork (1 syn), boiled rice (FREE) and Muller Fat Free Greek Style Lemon Yoghurt (0.5 syns)

Total 2.5 syns

Not bad and should make up for yesterdays curry. I also did a ton of body magic in the form of gardening.

Tomorrow we will be having a BBQ so I will be whipping up my own FREE beef burger and marinading chicken legs without their skin to make sure that I still stick to my syns.