Busy Baker

Killa Choc Cupcakes from Gonna Want Seconds – oh my lord they were! Not in the slightest bit clean so its good I didn’t eat much more than half a mini one

A very over-exposed half batch of pumpkin muffins from here (I also added a mix of the following spices amoungst 12 muffins for a chai flavour.

Chai Spice Mix for Baking
1 ½ tsp ground cardamom
1 ½ tsp ground cinnamon
½ tsp ground ginger
¼ tsp ground cloves
¼ tsp ground nutmeg

The spice was very subtle. I would recommend doubling, and use 1/4 of the mix to sprinkle on top, or mix into cream cheese icing.

And mini banana muffins from here, my go-to recipe for banana bread. They are about the diameter of a 50c coin – great for a mini sweet hit  after lunch. Added ch-ch-chia and walnuts on top

Healthy + Yummy+ Portioned + Delivered?! Yes please!

I found out about the Harvest Box concept other day and being a lover of all things delicious, healthy and free/cheap (with a voucher!), I couldn’t resist signing up for a  few weeks.

The dealio: A Harvest Box is a completely bio-degreadable box filled with 4 portions of delicious and natural snackies – fruits, nuts, seeds and a few other goodies, delivered to your desk (or home) once a week or more. You don’t know what four snacks you’re getting, but you rate them so they can send you similar products, ensuring a delightful surprise and healthy variety.

Box 1: Very excited when I got this in the mail!

Cost: Its $6.95 a box, which is a bit steep for me, but this includes postage, and its cheaper than the four chocolate bars I’d be reaching for… I think I will ration myself to one of these a week or a fortnight, and eat fresh fruit and veg on the other days.

What my box contained: Big Kahuna, The K2, Blossom and Daybreak 

Health: The box I got said each pack contains about 650kj, but this is an average. Some snack packs had added sugar, but its mostly limited to ones where they are needed for caramelisation, rather than just packing your raisins with unneeded sugar, so I’m ok with that. And for the planet, its all 100% recylcable. Awesome

An idea of the size of the snack packs. Small enough to fit in my bento (with a 2mm trim, drat!)

Think I might use Daybreak with oatmeal. The dried fruit is a WHOLE nectarine! Looking forward to Blossom, then the K2 most from this pack. Also hoping to get Blue Parfait, Fruity call, Dino eggs, and soo many more!

Anyway, my verdict is give it a go if like me you need variety and something to look forward to at work (spending money and eating healthy foods tend to help me avoid 3.30itis and the vending machine)

PS, you can get a freebie/half off too, by using this code 10435HVO50G.

Still playing catch ups!

Not many photos this week! For a start I had a few days of non-clean eating. I let myself give in because it was easier (and tastier at the time) but I’m going to be prepared for next week!

A wicked sandwich – called “The Bone” (long story why) but its shaved turkey, garlic mushrooms and lite cheese, toasted in your favourite bread (that’s Helga’s Wholemeal and seed. Delicious!) I cant believe I don’t eat this more often!

Mr lion guards a yummy treat to help me avoid the vending machine at work!

Eggs are packed with protein and quite portable (and a blank canvas! This guy sat like this in the work fridge and got a few laughs. Somene even recognised the art I copied!)

Turns out the boy can cook some darn fancy food! Chicken smothered with basil pesto, wrapped in procutto, baked with a wine sauce and the veg, and garlic sourdough to mop up the sauce.

Having said that he is currently baking baby bok choi under tasty cheese as a side dish for dinner - Good lord! (Assuming its a remnant from his mother’s cooking as she used to put cheese on EVERYTHING to make her sons eat more calcium, and served bread with every meal to ensure they were getting enough fibre. Untraining him is IMPOSSIBLE!)

Playing catch ups

A little behind because I’ve been to a cocktail party, a wedding and have fallen off my clean eating wagon!!

Breakfast: Kashi Heart to Heart Cereal with banana, peanut butter and soy milk.

I got the cereal from a friend who visited the US. Kashi is a pretty popular brand, particularly for those who are trying to eat a little healthier, but looking at the ingredients its still a bit of a concoction, and has added sweeteners - at least its all relatively natural. Usually I steer clear of cold cereals due to the added sugar and often empty carbs. But on those mornings when you just can’t stomach something warm or heavy, cereals fits in perfectly. Just have to remember to balance with protein and good fats!

Enjoyed with some fresh flowers!

 

Lunch: Leftover Bento

This was really delicious! Peanut soba with extra broadbeans, a gyzoa and chicken yakitori. The white nectarine was over ripe and juicy and exactly what I needed as a pick me up at work!

 

 

 

 

 

 

Dinner: The boy’s Macaroni and cheese.

Not at all clean! At least it wasn't too cheesy – most of it was low fat ricotta. He is trying. Also became our breakfast the next day before the wedding.

The wedding was a crazy feast of champagne, delicious but fried nibbles, fresh entre and main interspersed with anecdotes from the family and friends of the gorgeous bride and ecstatic groom, and so much cake!  I don’t drink often, and I never forget anything or have bad hangovers, so I am a little cocky when it comes to drinking. Recently however, the next day has been a challenge – I just feel weak, dizzy, sick, am unproductive and just want to eat-eat-eat! I think my body is really trying to tell me something, and this time I am going to listen!

The Mac cheese was also accompanied by mint lemonade and some magazines. The new Cosmo health. $13 is a little steep for a magazine, but 1. its a special and 2. I get a free medium boost juice, so that’s $5 off the cover price (because I actually buy boost). It also came with a free bootcamp pass, but I don’t live close enough to the locations to get any benefit (so let me know if you want the voucher!) I bought it to read when I feel like eating chocolate – a distraction!

The mint lemonade is something I am trying to develop from Mint Lemonada I had at a Turkish Restaurant. The recipe so far is…

Mint Lemonada

1-2 lemons (depending on size) or about 1/3 c fresh lemon juice (pulp ok too)
1 stevia tablet (or tsp natural sweetener)
2 tsp agave nectar or honey
2 tsp to 1 tbsp mint (or a bunch of fresh mint, preferred)
1/2 c ice
1 c water or soda water

Blend all ingredients. Ignore colour. Delicious!

I think its still missing something. More lemon perhaps? Its meant to be tart and refreshing – a perfect beverage to cut through the powerful flavours of hummus, shish kebab and burek.

Back to basics

Finding 12 hour work days very draining, so going to keep my posts about the eats during the week, with minimal rants and blab on the weekends!

Though I will say, clean eating is about 70%-80% at the moment – room for improvement that can be fixed, I think, through good shopping and planning!

Breakfast: Steel cut oats, banana, natural peanut butter, chia and soy milky
A small portion due to physical activity at work

Lunch: Leftover Teriyaki Salmon with broccoli, onion and shallots, brown rice with nori and sesame seeds and a fresh date with frozen raspberry and coconut butter.
In my other bento, used for soups and cereal!

Snack:  Not exact picture, but a cup of this with blueberries and flax seed oil.
Its not the best, but will be doing a review of yogurts soon!

Dinner: Mine and the Boy’s peanut soba (semi clean due to soba noodles being wheat + buckwheat) with chicken yakitori and Coles Vegetable and Prawn Gyoza
Gyoza bought as they are the boy’s fav food (after chocolate). They were mostly “real food” but did have sugar and too much salt – will make my own one day.

Lastly, I have been getting crazy sugar cravings – clean eating is about the food, but its also about the mentality behind it. You need to be really motivated otherwise in a moment of weakness you may let yourself down (which for me is focussing on the short term, rather than long term goals).

Rubi Shoes Day!

Images from http://www.cottonon.com/au/rubi-shoes

I used to have an unwritten rule about Rubi Shoes, the footwear offspring of Cotton On: NEVER AGAIN.

After buying THREE pairs of the same killer awesome $20 heels, but the heels breaking/wrong sizes I decided I should just spend $50 on some nice Novo ones. Same same with the flats that looked cute and colourful on the shelf, but cheap and nasty on my feet.  The sizes were also annoying and never accommodated my wide feet in heels, so I stopped shopping there. But recently I’ve been venturing in more often and have been quite delighted!

Last weekend I checked out the sale rack and found these fantastic wedges marked down to $20– and just my size. At the counter they were 50% SCORE. They also give my calves definition, and I get comfortable height!

More about Rubi – pros and cons – below!

Today’s Noms

I actually got up  at 5:30am to attempt to ease myself back into fitness. At my peak I was doing an hour 5-6 days a week (1 cardio, 1 weights, 2 circuits, 1 yoga) but I have barely clocked up a whole hour in the past week! This morning was 30 mins – 10 min run, 10 min brisk walk, 10 min stretches and abs. Its difficult when you come home late, don’t get tired until after “bed-time” but want to get max sleep so you can concentrate on academia and work. But no excuses anymore – it should help me clear my head and get to sleep faster!

But onto the foods!!

Breakfast: Muffin and Egg – small but powerful!

Not ideal, but didn’t feel like oats. A “failure” muffin – carrots/bran/chia -  frozen then reheated became doughy and very edible (especially with natural peanut butter). Mini glass of Soy Milky. I also tried to boil an egg, but it came out runny... so I stuck it in the microwave, turned my back and when I came back the egg was gone!

Well... stuck to every wall of the microwave!! I made another… 

Some say egg yolk’s aren’t clean, but they seem pretty natural (and healthy) to  me. Sure, I’ll limit my intake, especially in pies/omelettes, but we don’t have egg beaters in Australia, and it would be such a waste to throw out every yolk!

 

 

Lunch: Beef n Black Bean and Brown Rice with Nori and sesame seed seasoning 

A co-worker's meat pie made me doubt my bento for a second, but once I digged in, I was happy. Did get hungry early - sugar in the jarred sauce? Peanut M&Ms were dancing in my head all afternoon – should have packed dessert. Drat. And then watermelon mid-afternoon, still CRAVING chocolate. Had a few cups of stevia sweetened tea.

Dinner: Teriyaki Salmon

At least the sauce is clean and the Salmon and veggies are fresh (and Australian!). The hokkein noodles, not so much. I like my Salmon skin-on but crispy, so I seared it in the wok, then added the sauce and brought to a boil.

The clean sauce was a marinade I turned into a sauce (see after the jump) Needs some adjusting – wayyy to salty! The boy didn’t finish his portion (extra noodles, mine was extra veg)

Just another manic Monday

So a review of my eats today. A little boring, but baby-steps, yes? I have italicised the clean foods involved. Oh and PS I am not a photographer – my point and shoot camera is lucky to still have battery, but I am improving!! I think…


Breakfast: Simple Warm Oats and Apple
Steel-cut oats (made in rice cooker) with Vaalia low-fat vanilla (leftover – may not be clean…) flax seed oil and chia. It was quite a small portion for 1/3 c dry oats, but it was uber filling – couldn’t finish my apple, and wasn’t hungry until midday!!



Lunch/Snack: Bento!!
First trial of my new bento box. Smaller than I thought, but it really helped with portions and surprisingly I wasn’t hungry!! Its leftover Bolognaise with extra veggies (the birdy has parmesan cheese in it) plus broadbeans and corn. For “dessert” I had a fresh date stuffed with a little natural peanut butter. Haven't got the right Tupperware for inside yet, so had to glad wrap my watermelon snack.



So not  fully clean, but note the lack of candy bar. This is what I carry my lunch in. I even have a mini fork-spoon=chopstick set.
Oh and I didnt even eat any of the brownies/cookies that I took into work. Bonus.





Dinner: Beef and Black Bean with Brown Rice
Cooked by the boy. Jarred Kantong sauce, so that’s a no-no considering the junk that was in it. Although not 100% clean, I am more concerned about impending mac-cheese night… This still had lean beef, lots of veggies and a small amount of brown rice.


Summary: A good start, although no exercise because I came home late so I’ll be up early tomorrow for a good session!
I never thought I would become an 100% clean eater straight away, but I made good choices from what I had, stopped before I got too full and had good willpower despite temptation. There are still a few hours to go (and a tub of Homer Hudson Icecream in the freezer) but I think its going to be ok! The transition has begun!

Green, clean and lean?

I have been  seriously considering “eating clean” as of late and last night’s late night sugar binge  may just push me over the limit (cookies and packet brownies. Not even worth the tummy pain and awful taste in my mouth!). My crazy love for all things sugary (especially when mixed with fat, in say, CHOCOLATE form) has gone too far.
I am starting to really care about what I am putting into my body because I only get a certain number of calories if I want to be lean – I need as much of that to be helping me get through the day, happy, energised and motivated! So I don’t seem the harm (only the benefit) in trying to eat more things as natural as possible for a number of reasons.
1. I am really busy in life now. I need to simplify things.
2. I am a bit of a control freak and I read labels, comparing EVERY brand on the shelf, balancing price, ingredients, calories, fat, fibre, you name it. It would be nice to put my health first for a while – goodness knows I need it.
3. I am sick of counting calories. Its not natural. What is natural is to know that the food you are eating will nourish you, and to eat a normal amount.
4. I think I have lost touch with myself, especially my health. I have awfully irregular sleeping patterns, am semi-addicted to Pepsi Max, fall asleep during classes yet have no energy to gym, stress to the point of tears, and have been sick three times in the last month, despite my “semi-healthy” diet (I eat all the “good stuff”, but just as much “bad stuff”).
Can eating fresh, clean, fruit, veg and lean protein really help? Given the amount of junk I just ate… I think so.

Follow the jump to read about clean eating and my plans!

Bron’s favourite things!

Yes its that time. Where I go on about how wonderful the things I have in my life are. Unfortch I only have one of these things so I can't really have a big giveaway.... just yet :)
These are the things that make my cooking/eating/fitness/home/blogging life a little easier or better!

 
First up (and stupidly sounding) this handy dandy can opener. I am pretty darn clumsy (I cut myself on a bread knife yesterday...) but this opener unseals the can lid, vice cutting, = smooth edge = no cuts!! It was crazy $$ from king of knives  but apparently you can get them for less if you look around.  I imagine it would be great if you had kids too.
 

 My Nespresso: in a moment of eternal lameness I called him George. I don't drink much coffee - maybe 2-3 cups a week at work, so I usually go the cafe, and pick up drinks for other etc. It can get to be $20+ a week, plus they dont do resuable cups there so I invested about $500 into this. I use George at work, making it about $1 a cup and take him home when guests are coming or on weekends. PLUS I use the aerrocino all the time for chai lattes and hot chocolate, and its much better than the hand whisk thingo.  Note: There is no way I could take a photo this good. Click for source
Jump to more of my fav things!
OH NO – my bad wb skills meant to just deleted the rest of my post! ARGH. Will continue later!
Read more »

Recipe: BBB

Also known as
"Bron's Best B.L.T" (I love acronyms that have acronyms in them!!)

What you need for two:

• Woolworths Garlic and Olive Oil Sourdough bread - seriously imperative. If you don't, I GUESS you could use sourdough bread and spread garlic butter on it.
• 3-4 pieces of rindless bacon (I use middle bacon then trim it)
• Lettuce (anything which is crisp and vibrant and will do), washed and pulled apart into sandwhich sized pieces
• 1 juicy tomato, cut into approx 6 thick slices
• 1 avocado, halved, seed removed and mashed
• Salt and pepper to taste

Optional

• Aioli - amazement, making the above a BLAAT
• Caramelised onions - BLOAT?

1.  Grill or pan-fry the bacon on high heat until crispy.

2.  Cut the loaf of bread on an angle so you get decent sized pieces, not straight like normal bread. Grill on a sandwhich press until light brown char marks appear, or you can't stand the smell any longer (its so damn good)

4.  Slather on the avocado then salt, aioli and onion (if using). On the other slice place your lettuce, tomato and then bacon.

5.  Place the avo'd side onto the top of the rest of your sammo and DIG IN.

6.  Die happy (eventually)

I dont know what it is about bacon + avo but whatever it is its AMAZEBALLS

And you know what, its not an awfully unehalthy recipe. You could go the rye sourdough etc and just add garlic to your bacon, shortcut at that and skimp on the avo (I usually only put about 1/4 of one on and the boy gets 3/4 on his bigger sanga)

The bread really does make it, and I've heard they might discontinue it so I am going to buy as many loafs as I can and freeze them.

I love a bargain–and there’s no better bargain than a freebie

 

A little weekend retail therapy led to a few fantastic buys. First stop, Forever New, where they had one of their buy-one-get-one-free sales. I usually never find much that’s cheap enough (other than accessories) but I saw this Tribal dress and just loved it. Mind you, it probably looks better on Sam than myself.

But then comes the hard part – finding the second item. I ended up getting the dress in a 10 and the skirt in a 14 – can you tell I’m a bit pair shaped? Can’t wait to wear this with a white tight tank or a silky pink singlet.

Next, Rubi shoes. I don't usually buy from here as the quality is poor. But they are good for on-trend cheap shoes – the place was overflowing with clogs and heeled combat boots, and if you keep up with fashion I guess you don't care if they fall apart in two months. but I fell in love with these open toe wedge sandals. They make all my dresses look far better than the plastic and canvas ballet flats I wear everywhere.

They also were selling these little shoe bags for $2 – perfect for tucking shoes into when you pack them. Usually I hate the $1 bags you can buy ,but i bought a few of these as they will also stop my shoes from scuffing each other.

Its a bake-off!

Oh its been a while. But I have been busy-busy baking (instead of taking photos!)
First, I accepted the challenge to make Vegan cupcakes that were delicious. Enter Vegan Cupcakes Take Over the World’s sexy low-fat vanilla cupcakes. I added sprinkles for look and crunch (and checked – the red isn't from crushed bugs as per normal, so they were ok to add)

I ended up topping these with a tofu-icing that REALLY DIDN’T WORK. The recipe just yielded liquid slush. I had to add cocoa, custard powder (dairy free of course – it was basically sugar and cornflour) all my cornflour, egg-replacer, anything powdery to dry it out. In the end I added all my coconut oil (about $5 worth, ugh, baking is costly) and froze. FINALLY, it became useable, and I also put on sprinkles. So imagine these with browny orange topping.

Odd thing was I made about 27, two trays of 12 and then some singlies, all from the same batter, but I could only put the trays in first lot around. The second lot seemed to be a lot more bouncy (below right). Perhaps letting the dough rest was ok. Also not burning them probably helped.

These ended up being a hit at work. I waited until people told me they were delicious before breaking the news that the topping was made out of tofu and there was no butter or milk in them. Oh, and they were low-fat. So a winner!
Next up were some ricotta cornmeal muffins I kinda made up/mixed up.

The recipe was an edit from Creative Gourmet, something like
Ingredients
1 cup shy self-raising flour (I used half wholemeal)
1/2 teaspoon baking powder
1/3 cup polenta (yellow cornmeal)
1/4 + 2 tbsp cup caster sugar (I did half with splenda)
125g low fat ricotta cheese
1/4 c applesauce
1 tbsp butter, melted
1/2 cup water or as needed to make soft
1 1/4 cups berries, frozen or fresh
Instructions

1. Preheat oven at 160ºC (fan forced at 150ºC). Lightly grease a 1/2 cup-capacity 12 hole muffin pan.
   
2. Combine all ingredients in a bowl, except blueberries. Using a large metal spoon, stir to combine. Spoon 2 tablespoons of mixture into each muffin cup. Dividing blueberries, top each with some frozen blueberries. Cover with remaining ricotta mixture. Bake for 35-40 minutes or until cooked through. Cool in pans for 10 minutes. Turn out from pans and serve warm.

They were very tender, and not too sweet – great for lunch BUT the ones I left fresh in the baking box ended up going disgusting and tart and rotten. Lucky I froze a few for lunches!

Lastly I made this recipe from taste (minus the fruit)–  honing my fruitless hot cross bun recipe for easter. I actually halved the recipe but not the yeast and it worked perfectly – the boy prefers these to woolies (and to my previous attempts which turned out like bread rather than buns) Thank goodness for the Kenwood Chef!!