pancakes - AnnaTheApple

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!)

August 9, 2012August 9, 2012

Impending Doom and an Alpro Review

So tomorrow is a very scary day. I’m off to London to do a Very Scary Presentation in front of Someone Very Important (capital letters are strictly required to convey the magnitude of this event). I’m confident I know my stuff, I’m fully prepared – this is something I’ve been immersed in for weeks now. I know it. But I am terrified. I am lowly business analyst and the person in question is our customer’s Big Boss. There’s no one above him. There’s a lot riding on this – how I present it and what I’m presenting. No pressure then.

I am amazed at how far I’ve come since I started this job and this project I’m on. I’ve been put (pushed? dragged?) into uncomfortable situations where I felt out of my depth, I’ve given presentations to our team and customer when I thought I knew nothing, I’ve been in meetings where I’m put on the spot, I’ve even picked up someone’s slack when they underperformed – but I’ve handled it. I’m a new woman! OK maybe not new, but definitely improved. It’s been tough though – some Sunday nights I’ve contemplated calling in sick. But I haven’t. I’ve dealt with these hurdles and I’ve definitely benefited. I just hope I keep getting better.

So, the lovely people at Alpro sent me a hoard of products to have a try of. Check out my very happy grin when I saw the parcels:

It was like Christmas!

Almond milk, Strawberry Shake Soya Milk, Hazelnut Milk and Soya Chocolate Dessert.

I’ve been experimenting with all these to test them out and see what’s my favourite. The almond milk is amazing (but that’s no surprise!). I’ve been using it in my smoothies:

It adds a very subtle sweetness to them which I adore. It also works brilliantly in pancakes!

The chocolate dessert is a sweet indulgence after dinner, but it’s not actually that naughty. 110 calories per dessert (less than 1g Sat Fat as well) and it’s a fairly hefty little tub. Bigger than your standard chocolate mousses but it’s richer and thicker. Very nice. I really want to try the caramel one. I’ve even added the chocolate dessert in one of my more filling post-run smoothies:

This made an amazingly dessert-like chocolate rich thick smoothie (why use one descriptive word when you can use many??):

The only thing that I didn’t get on with with the almond milk was that it was too sweet for my porridge. I’m very particular about that – I like it to be almost savoury. Anything like jam or fruit in my porridge I’m not a fan of and sweetened milk is not my cup of tea (or bowl of porridge as it were). However, I know Alpro do an unsweetened soya milk which I love so maybe they’ll bring out an unsweetened almond milk…

My favourite was the hazelnut milk…This was delicious. I’ve just been drinking glasses of this fresh from the fridge.

It’s so yummy. Perfect for smoothies and pancakes. It has a different taste to almond milk (duh, Anna, it’s a different nut) and it has a lovely creamy brown look to it.

Now the most crazy things of all – prepare yourselves – is that Ben loves the Strawberry Shake and the Chocolate Dessert. He can’t get enough! This is the boy that hates anything that isn’t your bog-standard cow’s milk or yogurt. Greek yogurt is even a push for him. So anyone who’s a bit unsure of soya, give these a go and see what you think. I’m partial to a Strawberry one after a run just to inject some protein and sugar into myself fast:

And you feel like a bit of a kid with the little carton

I also treated myself to the plain yogurt as well:

The pouring one is brilliant as I just pour a slug of it into my smoothies without any extra washing up. Soya yogurt tastes completely different to normal yogurt and I much prefer it (anyone else with me on that?). I couldn’t sit there eating spoonful’s of normal yogurt or Greek yogurt but I could with this.

I love Alpro because they’re a good source of a host of nutrients (calcium, vitamins B12, D, etc.) and no artificial nasties. Big thumbs up from me!

**All these views are my own – and yes, I am a bit of an Alpro fan! Hehe **

So hopefully tomorrow will go well. I won’t fall over and embarrass myself (it could happen, honestly, I’m that clumsy).

Anyone else got something scary happening tomorrow?

Or any tips on how to use hazelnut milk in some interesting recipes?

August 8, 2012August 8, 2012

WIAW #3

How depressing that the nights are now drawing in and summer seems to be ending (had it ever begun?) I’ll miss walking Alfie early in the morning when it’s still light, and then I’ll miss running in the morning light. I’m definitely not looking forward to running along in darkness hoping to either a) not run into carefully concealed street paraphernalia, b) run through cold, muddy puddles that I hadn’t spotted, and c) step on slugs – possibly the most disgusting running-related incident. Or a snail…that horrible crunch. *shudders*

But summer is surely not over yet. I’ve had strong words with it over a certain specific date in September where I need a reasonably warm temperate and sunny blue skies (though not too sunny)…specific requirements for good wedding weather! We’re still in negotiations…

So, on the theme of summer: WIAW! Thank you, Jenn

Now prepare yourselves for something a bit crazy (or at least mildly different):

Yes, that is a plate of banana pancakes that I made on Saturday morning. Not my usual green porridge! I made them using Katie’s recipe. They look a little bit well-done…but they tasted great! A dollop of yogurt and they were good to go. Trying to keep it varied. Baby steps…

So, lunch time over the weekend Ben and I had another salad (we’re going crazy for them at the moment; so easy to prepare and so many possible varieties):

We had chicken fried with garlic over a bed of salad (cucumber, bell pepper, tomatoes, beetroot, & leaves) with a massive dollop of roasted red pepper hummus. So simple but very nice. And! on the side (as I had soo many courgettes to use up) I whipped up a tzaziki side dip, but using Jenn’s amazing recipe.

Fantastically refreshing. Ben didn’t even realise it was using his least favourite vegetable rather than cucumber (which he has a better relationship with). So a nice summery salad to fit in with the Summer Staples style!

And dinner last night:

This was chicken curry. I followed this recipe from BBC Good Food website.

I subbed actual peanut butter with PB2. It wasn’t as creamy as I thought it was going to be, which was a bit disappointing and it didn’t taste overly nutty. So maybe next time I’ll use ‘proper’ peanut butter and that might make a difference. It was tasty though. On the side I made some kale chips and had some steamed veggies. I loved the kale chips. I think it was purely for the satisfying crunch you got when eating them. But Ben didn’t like them at all (no surprises) but a win-win situation for me. Mountains of kale chips! Apparently it sounded like I was burrowing around in a pile of leaves when I was eating. Well, no one said being healthy was a quiet occupation!

Snack-wise I’m loving my green smoothies (I mix it up a bit and have some kale instead of spinach and Alpro hazelnut milk instead of almond – a review of Alpro products to come very soon!) and I’m loving this dark chocolate:

74% dark chocolate with cocoa nibs in it. It’s soo rich and the small nibs in it are add a lovely texture. I’ve got into the habit of having a square in the evening to savour after dinner. It just hits the spot, you know? When you fancy that something sweet but don’t want to push the boat out too much.

In terms of fitness, the week didn’t start off well. I ran on Tuesday and it was tough. My legs felt heavy, I felt tired…it just wasn’t amazing. I got through it but honestly the fun factor wasn’t there (OK I use the word ‘fun’ loosely here).

But hey ho, such is life! I haven’t been sleeping amazingly recently. Lots on my mind with the wedding and up-and-coming hen do. I always have problems sleeping when I’ve got too much to think about. This is usually when my friend G&T comes and gives me a hand (to qualify that sentence, as it does sound like I’m slightly alcoholic, I don’t drink every night!! And only a small measure when I do hehe).

On an Olympics side-note, I’m so proud of Britain! We’re doing spectacularly. I can’t believe we’re third! I’ve been watching as much as I can. I’ve found myself screaming at the T.V (scaring Alfie in the process). And the 100m men finals…wow they were stupidly quick, weren’t they? And they all had a certain swagger. Well, I guess you would if you could run that fast!

And Ben has even been influenced by the Olympics…to the extent that we have bought a rowing machine! He is now rowing in the evening. Crazy. I really miss rowing as I used to do it in the gym quite a lot but now I just run so this should be good for me vary things up a bit. However, we don’t really have the space in our tiny little house for a rowing machine!! Ben didn’t quite think about this when he ordered it *sighs* oh well. Our lovely little spare room has been taken over. But with healthy intentions.

Happy WIAW! And happy eating!