dinner - AnnaTheApple

July 17, 2013July 17, 2013

Trying new things

Happy Wednesday! Hope you’re week is going well and the sunshine (if you’re lucky enough to have it) is keeping you smiling. Or at least stopping you from crying tears of frustration on realising that it is, in fact, only Wednesday

I’m excited to announce that I have joined a gym. I know, I know, exciting stuff (ha). I have made the executive decision to balance things out properly with my running. I have been doing stretches and yoga poses in the morning but to be completely honest… it’s just a bit half hearted.

I just can’t motivate myself to do a proper session on my own. Seriously, at home there’s way more exciting things to do. Eat food, watch TV, stare at the wall. I need someone to kick my butt into gear and force me to do these things. So I joined my very local gym (open 24/7 – imagine, I could go to the gym at 3am. Why would I want to?? No idea). And the gym has loads of classes!

Don’t worry, I don’t actually do this. I use Twitter

OK I suppose I could creep into the actual gym if I felt so inclined but really I want to go to a class, be shouted out to do this and that, and then leave sweaty.

I’m so keen to get into pump and kettle bells for the strength improvement (read: INJURY PREVENTION). And spin to work my cardio without pounding the pavements all. The. Time.

Speaking of balancing out the running – on Tuesday morning I actually went for a BIKE RIDE. Yep, I set out with my little helmet on and gave myself an hour to basically cycle as far as I could (with getting back in time to get ready for work). I managed 12.8 miles!

I actually have no idea how good or rubbish this is as I know nothing about cycling. After Googling a bit I think there is some consensus that cycling to running has a 3:1 ratio of miles. So my 12ish miles = 4ish miles running. Which makes kind of sense as it didn’t feel too tough a workout (though my butt hurt like you wouldn’t believe – seriously need to think about some better padding).

But moving away from fitness, I thought I’d share some tasty meals I’ve been trying lately in line with What I Ate Wednesday (thanks Jenn!).

So for breakfast…come on, of course it hasn’t changed. Even in the blazing heat we’ve had I’ll sit there sweating eating my piping hot bowl of almond milk oatmeal.

For lunch, at work I take in a zillion boxes of food. I’m like box lady.

It’s all good. Takes me ages to get through it all. I love it. Bloody pain when I get home and have to wash everything up though…

Dinners have been good. I’ve been trying new things. I’m the girl who swore she hated sausages.

But not chicken sausages! I love them! For this meal there’s only two but I split them in half to make sure I cook them properly (paranoid). I had cauliflower cream cheese mash with this and two eggs. Don’t get me started on how devastated I was when that second egg’s yolk popped.

I’ve also still been loving ~~Skippy~~ kangaroo burgers.

I had one with fried mushrooms and onions, and sweet potato and zucchini fries with salad. Love this so much.

And stir-fries are popular quick meal too.

Chicken, cashew nuts, loads of random stir-fry veg and zucchini noodles (and my stir-fry sauce). All I did for the noodles was use a peeler on a washed zucchini. No cooking, nothing. Plonk the stir-fry on top when it’s ready and enjoy.

And the usual million apples as snacks and cake. Always cake

What new things have you been trying recently? Any new found loves?

Cycling: lover or a hater?

How do ensure your workouts are balanced? I have been so bad at this recently…

Do you go to the gym or do you prefer home/outdoor workouts?

November 16, 2012

Super salads and an ego adjustment

Well, it was meant to be my day off today but work got too critical and I had to come in. If I’m honest I’m not too annoyed as work is really interesting at the moment (how sad do I sound??). But it’s Friday so weekend soon!

This week in the UK the Twilight Breaking Dawn Part 2 premier happened in London and it was Twihard mania. I mean seriously, over 5,000 people waited for over 32 hours in Leicester Square to see the cast. Unbelievable. My dad was in Leicester Square the day before and girls were camped out ready.

Jeeze. I work with an older guy (let’s call him Fred) who really isn’t in touch with current happenings in terms of new music, films, trivial celebrity happenings etc. Fred’s super smart and has an immense knowledge in history and things like that, but ask him about a TV programme or a film and he knows nothing – we’re talking, no knowledge of the X-Factor or Harry Potter.

So, it was around this time last year when the premier for Part 1 was going on when Fred was at our current customer’s London site (Leicester Square) and (I won’t say who I customer is) but they often interview famous people. Anyway, Fred only got into an elevator with Robert Pattinson and Kirsten Stewart. He had absolutely no idea who they were and clearly was nonplussed with sharing such a small space with them. And (this is an absolutely true story) R-Patz turned to him and said “You have no idea who she is, do you?” and Fred replied “No, sorry I don’t work here”. He was dutifully informed of who they were when he got out of the elevator though by another one of my co-workers who was gobsmacked by who he was stood next to.

How funny is that? I love that Fred literally had no idea who they were. I mean it must have been a reality shock for them that someone in the whole universe didn’t know them. Don’t get me wrong, I love Twilight and R-Patz is a hottie but I like it when celebs get their egos shaken a bit.

Now, this might surprise you but I love my salads. I know, I know, this is crazy talk. OK, well no it really isn’t. But I thought I’d do a post focused on my beloved salads as I have them so often, but mix it up with different variations.

I always start with a simple base of some standard veggies:

Lettuce, chopped cucumber, sliced tomatoes, chopped mushrooms and diced beets. Simple, cheap, easy flavours that go well together and are cheap.

Then I always have some protein. This is usually in the form of a cheese (goat’s cheese, mozzarella, halloumi or feta).

If I’m feeling really hungry or the cheese isn’t that calorie dense, I’ll add either chicken, egg, hummus or chickpeas to make more of a proper meal.

And I’ll always have some kind of fruit chopped up in there as well for sweetness, like plumb, peach, mango, figs, pomegranate, or peer.

Sometimes I’ll drizzle balsamic vinegar onto the salad, sometimes I’ll sprinkle nutritional yeast, or some toasted pumpkin seeds.

This might sound like a boring meal but I honestly love it and I never get bored because I can switch up the ingredients to whatever I fancy. Like randomly adding roasted pumpkin!

It’s great for using up food. My salads are usually fairly massive and they fill me up nicely without making me feel uncomfortable, which is great for the evening when I get in at around 7ish after work and don’t actually eat until 8. I tend to go lighter on the carbs at dinner just because I don’t think I need it. I need my carbs in the morning to get myself going.

I’m always on the look out for new flavour combos, so I’m open to new suggestions

Have you seen anyone famous?

November 7, 2012

Merry Christmas??

Brrrrr it is cold! Though it’s actually quite nice in a weird way. To be snuggled up inside nice and warm and for it to be chilly outside. Though getting out of bed in the morning is not fun – nor is taking Alfie out for a walk first thing. Winter coat: check, Uggs: check, gloves: check. Result = a happy Alfie but a cold Anna.

And Christmas seems to have suddenly appeared out of nowhere. One minute we’re all vigorously carving our pumpkins and admiring the autumnal colours of the trees when suddenly, boom! hello tinsel, hello Christmas adverts on the telly! Now don’t get me wrong, I love Christmas so as far as I’m concerned this is brilliant. HOWEVER, I have now been thrown into a state of stress. When am I going to bake our Christmas cake? When will I have time to go shopping? What do my friends and family even want??

And breathe. Anna, it’s the beginning of November. But I am getting excited. I love Christmas. I love the food (who doesn’t?), I love how everyone is just more merry than normal, I love the Christmas decorations, the time with the family…the never ending boxes of Celebration chocolates (I don’t love that Supermarkets seem to think that they’ve put them on offer at the moment…erm, weren’t they always that expensive??) It’s without doubt my favourite time of year. So the sooner the better!

As usual as it’s Wednesday it’s WIAW. A big thanks to Jenn for hosting this as usual. I’ll show you a selection of different meals from the week as my best eats were spread rather than an individual day if that’s alright!

Breakfast: OK, OK you’ve seen pancakes a fair few times now if you’ve been reading my blog for some time…before you fall asleep, I did try a new topping to jazz things up a bit (and use some of the mass of fruit I have sitting in our freezer…)

As it was too difficult for me to work out how to defrost my pumpkin purée from the freezer (yep I’m that person) I decided just to stick with the standard recipe I use (find it HERE). The topping I decided to just have fun with.

I thawed some frozen blackberries, then sprinkled them with quite a generous amount of cinnamon and a few drops of Stevia. Then I zapped it in the microwave for maybe a minute. Basically so the fruit turns a bit mushy and is warm. Then I poured it over the pancakes. Bliss!

Lunch: During the week I always take food with me to save on costs. I used to have chilli using Quorn mince but I’ve gone off that mince a bit now and much prefer using mixed beans.

[Apologies for seriously bad photo]

I used a yellow bell pepper, onion, courgette, mushrooms, chopped tomatoes and mixed beans (like butterbeans, kidney beans, chickpeas, etc.). I also added chilli powder, paprika, cumin, a little bit of sugar and some mixed herbs. To spruce it up I added a large tablespoon of Philadelphia cheese. This made it so creamy and delicious – definitely adding this again! Along with this for lunch I have two Baby Bells and an apple. Maybe not the prettiest lunch, but it works for me!

I’ve set myself a little target for November to make a new recipe every week as I was finding myself in a bit of a food rut. You know what’s it like…getting in from work, being tired, you don’t want to whizz up some all singing and dancing dinner. But I’m pushing myself to try – at least on Friday and Saturday nights! So far this is going really well. I made coq au vin the other day and that was deeeelicious. But I also made another meal this week as well. And I probably say this about everything I cook I cook but it was such a good meal! Filling and sneakily nutritious.

I used THIS recipe. Basically it’s chicken coated in a ground almond coating and then baked in the oven. Crunchy and spicy!

And alongside that I cooked some cauliflower and then mashed it with some mozzarella cheese (well I blended it with a hand-blender).

I LOVED this. Seriously easy and a good alternative to mash potato if you fancy a lighter dinner. With all the ground almonds and chicken, this was a very filling dinner.

Snacks: I sponsored Maria for her Great North Run a while back and she very kindly sent me some baked goods (Swedish Apple Muffins) as a thank you. How sweet is that?? (Due to me going on my honeymoon she sent them to me now – I’m very chuffed):

PICTURE

[Please don’t judge the photo too harshly, they have travelled via post to get to me!]

So I have been happily tucking into these this week. They are so moist and yummy. Perfect evening snack. I thoroughly recommend Maria’s blog, she always has such yummy recipes and ideas!

Oooh and I’ve also been indulging in a few squares of these in the evening:

I can’t always be snacking on apples after all I guess!

Fitness: I’m still following my strength routines three times a week. It’s not quite as difficult as it was originally so I feel I’m making some progress. I’ve got my plank back to 3 minutes. Does anyone else get bored doing the plank? I mean, it’s tough and painful but so boring. I just end up staring at my stopwatch…

I’m thinking of getting a resistance band – has anyone tried this? Is it worth it?

Running is going well. The only problem I have at the moment is that now I’m running at work it means that if I have a busy day I can’t always run. I’m quite a structure, routine person (have you noticed??) so I find this really frustrating. I hate pushing workouts to a different day. But it’s one of those things I guess.

Outfit of the day:

[Can you spot Alfie hiding in the background?]

I can’t actually remember where I got this dress from, whoops. But the cardi is from New Look!

Have a great Wednesday!

Do you hate it when you have to postpone a workout?

Are you in a Christmassy mood yet?

October 22, 2012

Pumpkins, Pilates and Cinderella

And it’s Monday again! One week closer to Christmas…

This weekend was great. We didn’t really ‘do’ anything but we got a lot done, if that makes sense. Basically, we had no plans to go anywhere but we had a lot of chores to get on with. Mundane things like getting the car washed, then cleaning and vacuuming the inside, putting things up the loft, taking clothes to the Army and Navy… Yep, exciting stuff. I’m a married lady now, this is my life now! And I love it! It’s just nice to get all those niggling jobs done that have been driving me mad. I’m a bit of an obsessive cleaner so I’m in my element.

I saw my sister, brother-in-law and their little girl, Ellie. We gave her her present from Disney World (a Barbie Cinderella) and she was over the moon. Though I ended up having to speak for the Barbie in a ‘princess voice’ for longer than comfortable period of time. Though I think I got off lightly, Ben was her human climbing frame haha.

I also went to a local farm shop to buy a pumpkin. I could have bought so much veg but I refrained as I’m pretty sure Ben would get fed up eating squashes every night…

So I just bought a large pumpkin, a mini pumpkin (a munchkin!) and a corn on the cob. All for under a fiver. Bargain!

How cute is that little thing?? I just had to buy it. For 30p you can hardly not, right? I made a delicious soup with that little guy – which I will share for WIAW soon.

Last week we decided to have a bit of a different meal for Friday night. We tend to have more exciting meals on Friday and Saturday just because it’s the weekend. So I bought some chunky pork ribs from the butchers and a jar of BBQ sauce (I was feeling lazy – I know I could have easily made one myself…next time). So Friday morning I marinated the ribs in the sauce and put it in the fridge. I wasn’t too sure how to cook ribs to be honest so I Googled it as work. FIVE HOURS they said to cook it. Well, that isn’t going to happen for sure! So I found a ‘quick’ recipe for an hour and a half. OK, fair enough, ribs are probably better slow roasted but I’m a busy hungry girl and I really wanted them Friday night. You know when you just really fancy something? Anyway, that evening after roasting them for a ridiculously long time in the oven (almost 2 hours) they were done (or if they weren’t, I didn’t care by this point. It was either uncooked ribs or my own arm that I would have eaten at this point).

They were pretty yummy I have to say. We had one and a half ribs each. I had some veg on the side while Ben had some garlic bread. Thumbs up.

On a food-related side-tangent…I’ve been really enjoying my salads as of late as well. I tend to throw in whatever really, and usually a bit of fruit. Recently it’s plums or mainly figs but I’ve just bought a mango so I’m really looking forward to that.

Salads left-to-right: flaked tinned salmon, goat’s cheese with fig, fried egg, more figs and mozzarella, & homemade paprika hummus and two hard-boiled eggs.

On Saturday I went to my first Pilates class. It was a one-on-one so I get the basics before actually starting a class. It was brilliant. The instructor was very good. Really good at giving direction and clearly knew her stuff! We used the reformer machine [see below picture] as well, which I was so excited about.

My legs were in the air and everything. It was crazy. The hour whizzed by. I’m going again next Saturday and I’m so excited. I wanted a less intense exercise to strengthen and stretch my muscles, and this was perfect. The only tricky part was how technical it all was. Imprinting your spine, inhaling here, exhaling there, neutral position…a lot of technical jargon that I need to master. But it’ll come I guess.

So that was pretty much it! Here’s what I’m wearing.

Blazer and belt from New Look, top from Warehouse, jeans from Top Shop.

I’m loving the blazer look – stylish while warm! The best kind of outfits in my opinion.

What did you get up to over the weekend?

Have you done Pilates before?

August 29, 2012

WIAW #5

Wow I can’t believe this is my fifth What I Ate Wednesday. My blog is only in its infancy and I’m still learning and working on it to make it better, but I’m proud of what I’ve done so far. It’s got a long way to go I know but I’m happy. It’s just so great to have somewhere to put the random stuff in my head! It’s very cathartic.

I love being involved in WIAW as well because you definitely feel a sense of community and it’s great to see what other blogs are out there. So thank you Jenn (over at Peas and Crayons)! I’m still grasping desperately to summer with my summery salads and fresh flavours. Just want to hold out a little bit longer!!

On that note of summery yumminess, I had some fun over the weekend making these really tasty pancakes. I just kept reading about pancakes everywhere and thought as a Sunday treat I’d whip up a batch of them:

I used this recipe but missed out the cinnamon (not a big fan) and then drizzled PB2 mixed with water as a sauce and served with blackberries. I managed to get three quite chunky pancakes out of this mixture. Honestly, they were to die for!

Really spongy and filling. Basically I wanted a really filling pancake that didn’t contain protein powder as I don’t have protein powder!

Lunch time I tried my hand at making falafels. I had them in salad with some chicken fried with tagine paste. They didn’t turn out amazingly I must admit. They were a bit crumbly.

However, they tasted GREAT. I’m all about chickpeas at the moment. So yummy. Really went well with the tagine spices as well.

Dinner from Monday night was AMAZING.

I coated a chicken breast in chickpea flour with paprika and cumin and then fried it in a little oil. Alongside this I made roasted veggies with a sliced peach and crumbled goat’s cheese. Holy yum! (Yay my first holy yum! Sorry, novice moment…). This was epic. Just everything about it. I’m really enjoying peaches at the moment as well. They’re so great in smoothies, salads, grilled, baked…just as a snack. A bit more messy than apples but very juicy and yummy.

Snack-wise I’ve been enjoying beasty portions of honeydew melon:

And as a bank holiday treat on Monday night, I was very naughty….

I ate A LOT of this. It was so good. And not that bad really…erm…well, it’s not Ben and Jerry’s! I love this product and all it stands for. Fairly natural (gluten free, soya free, dairy free) and her story behind it it’s really sweet (no pun intended…sorry that was lame). Well, I enjoyed my scoffing session and life’s all about a balance! Can’t be good all the time

So all in all a very pleasing WIAW if I do say so myself.

Here’s what I’m wearing today:

The top’s from Oasis, jeans are from Top Shop, the gladiator sandals are from Aldo and the necklace is from Forever 21 (I think!).

In terms of fitness, as I mentioned last post, I’m enjoying my change in running. I’m not running more than 3 miles and always following it with a strength training routine. Whether that be an arm workout, a leg workout, abs or full body. I feel really invigorated with mixing it up like this. Definitely keeps me interested! I also don’t dread working out like I used to. Waking up and thinking “I’m running 2 miles or 3 miles” is a lot easier to digest than “I’m running 5 miles”, you know? I just need to think about nutrition a bit more – I’m trying to get my head around whether I should be ramping up my protein intake and when I should be eating carbs…it’s too complicated!!

Hope you all have a great WIAW! I look forward to sneaking a look through my lunch break/random times during work (shhh!)