What I ate when working in London

Whew last week was tough. I was in London for four days as part of the final bit of a project (for those who don’t know, I’m currently a software test analyst… yes very geeky). These last few weeks have been very stressful as we’ve had some unmovable deadlines to hit and lots of work to get done. But I won’t dwell on that for this post, this post is about the good stuff. FOOD.

I was in London Monday until Thursday. I was the only one in the group to be staying in a hotel. Everyone else lives in Basingstoke or nearby so the commute was a bit more manageable (well, I say that but one guy had commuting issues all week… something I was glad to avoid!). Luckily the office we were in had a very fancy pants kitchen area so I bought porridge oats and almond milk at lunch time on Monday so breakfast Tuesday until Thursday was covered as I could make it in the morning there. Saving money and still able to enjoy my usual breakfast 🙂

My job expenses travel, hotels and dinner but for breakfast and lunch I need to buy myself. The office was located in Victoria so at lunch there was a wealth of options available, from the Shake Shack, Subway, Pret, Itsu, McDonalds, Starbucks…etc. I’d heard good things about Leon so went there on Monday to grab something.

I went for the South Indian Spiced Fish, which was delicious.It was really tasty. It contained chunks of smoked fish in a mild coconut and turmeric sauce on a bed of rice. It was lovely and hot but not too spicy. I actually did buy some extra cooked chicken though to add to it as I knew I wouldn’t get much of a chance to eat again until dinner and I generally have quite a big appetite! It kept me going until 8.30pm (we didn’t finish work until 7pm).

That evening after getting to my hotel, which was in Paddington (so not too far from Victoria) I’d made sure I’d already made a Deliveroo order on my commute back. I didn’t fancy going out as I was exhausted from the day so this was ideal. I ordered from Lokkanta, which is a meze and barbeque restarant. I ordered a Tavuk Shish, which was chicken with Bulgar wheat with a halloumi and sundried tomato salad. I also ordered some bread on the side. I’m always wary of ordering when I don’t know portion sizes so I’m always willing to get more than I need than risk not getting enough 😉 Turns out I didn’t need the bread, but it was tasty.

My hotel… *sighs* was dreadful. It was tiny and not part of a chain, which can be nice sometimes but in London a chain is sometimes better because there’s a level of quality that needs to be maintained however basic the actual amenities are. When I was lying on the bed watching TV after eating I noticed tiny little white dots slowly moving on the sheets. On closer inspection I found that they were tiny mites. URGH. I headed downstairs to talk to the manager (the only person who seemed to work there…) and complained.

He literally looked like he couldn’t care less (by the way, this is the same guy who gave me a master key for the hotel when he couldn’t find the key for my specific room – oh yeah, I felt safe!!). When it looked like he didn’t really a) know what to do and b) want to do anything I suggested quite firmly new sheets for my bed. He looked really grumpy and finally agreed. He appeared at my door a few moments later and handed me the sheets. I handed them back to him and said I was going to step out to make a phone-call. I was not going to change my own sheets thank you very much. I came back and thankfully my bed had been made and the mites had disappeared. But Jesus. So yeah, that delightful abode is called Mina House Hotel FYI.

The next morning I headed out for a run. Despite my hotel being awful, it was very close to Hyde Park. As my last solo run in London had be disastrous I was glad to have somewhere specific to run around that had lots of maps about the place (and water fountains)!

I thoroughly enjoyed this run. I decided to go around the perimeter and see how far that was. It was very warm but the sights were so pretty with trees, grass, fountains, flowers and statues. I don’t think I’ve ever actually been to Hyde Park before so it was a lovely way to explore it.At one point there was this huge line of horses with very fancy looking men all in special uniform walking graceful through the park. Apparently the Queen’s Guard! The Queen wasn’t there (obviously, it was like 7am) but it was very cool to see this procession.In the end I ran 8 miles which felt great! I had breakfast at the office again (porridge) and for lunch I headed out to find what delights I could embark on. I decided on Pret (how original) because I love their salads and their miso soup. I got that with the extra chicken from Sainsbury’s and some apples. The salad was the Greens, Grains and Chicken Salad. Sorted!

For dinner I decided to find somewhere on the way home from work as we finished after 6pm again and I wanted to prolong the time before I had to face my hotel room again. I found a lovely little Turkish restaurant (I think it was called Raffles) in Paddington. I went for something simple so had chicken wings to start (*cough* I know, I just can’t help what I like!) and chicken with rice and salad for main.It was really tasty and just what I fancied. When you have to spend a number of days away from home (and not on holiday) eating out on your own can get a bit tiresome and annoying. Granted this was only my second evening but I was pacing myself. I’d have loved to have eaten crazy exciting meals each night but I didn’t want to be too unhealthy. My usual mantra is eat fairly balance and normal meals during the week and then splurge at the weekend on more fancy and exciting meals.

The next day I headed out early to go to the local PureGym. I’d rung up the day before to extend my membership to the Bayswater one (which was about a 15 minute walk from the hotel). It would cost me £4 for the week on top of my month’s membership which sounded good to me. I punched in my code when I got there and found it wouldn’t let me in. I got a text message from PureGym informing me that my code wouldn’t work at this location. WHAT.

I tried ringing them but at 6.30am the hotline wasn’t open and there was no one in the gym to help me. So I huffed and puffed and then walked back. Luckily the weather was nice so that was something. I rang them later to find out what was going on and it turns out the person who I rang the day before hadn’t extended my membership properly. They were very apologetic and said I could go to the gym for the rest of the week without the £4 charge.

I had the same Pret lunch again (as I did for the next day – I just love that salad) and after work went for another run round Hyde Park.I decided to do something similar to before by running the perimeter. There were some live events going on (music, cinema and things like that) but being on my own I didn’t really fancy getting involved.A run was a far more fun activity for me as a solo person. As I was running I thought I might as well run somewhere to dinner and really fancied Nandos. So basic but I do love it. And handily Nando’s was just over a mile from Hyde Park so I incorporated that into my run.It did mean me sitting there in my shorts rather hot and sweaty but no one seemed to mind and I actually didn’t look that weird amongst the other assorted London folk… I was very warm though and cleaned up a bit in the bathroom. I went for a half chicken, with a side salad, char-grilled vegetables and a corn on the cob. I would have loved a whole chicken but it was only a Wednesday night after all!

The next morning I got up early once again to attempt the gym for the second time. I am but a girl of very small brains. Of course a trip to London must mean at some point I will go wrong and have an adulting fail moment. This was my time to shine. I put in my maps app what I thought was the Bayswater PureGym and headed off. I used a different app from the day before just because I prefer it to the Google one. It took me on a different route, which I put down to it being a different app. But as I became a bit more awake and compos mentis I realised I was actually no where near where I was the other day. And lo and behold, the PureGym I arrived at was not in fact the Bayswater one but a different one entirely. And nope, I could not get it. So I had to turn around and walk all the way back again. Well done, Anna.

My last day in London saw the same breakfast and lunch as the days before. I’m fairly glad I don’t work in London all that often because spending £6-7 at least every day on lunch was becoming expensive! Normally I make my own lunch and take it with me, but for four days it was a nice treat (especially considering dinner was sorted for me).

This will be my only post for the week as I’m actually currently in Austria on the MarathonTalk running retreat (SO EXCITING!). So catch you on the other side!

Do you go to London for work often?

What do you eat for lunch during the week?

What’s your favourite lunch restaurant?

Let there be cake… #WIAW

Hello, you fabulous people.

The weekend gone was amazing. My mother-in-law, who I get on so well with, had the brilliant idea of hosting an afternoon tea party at her house on Saturday. Obviously this is the best idea in the entire world to me. So I thought I’d get involved with What I ate Wednesday!

 Check out Jenn’s blog for more details

But before I get to the good stuff…I had a really good workout in the morning. Obviously I would have much prefered to be out Pakrunning (do I say this every week? I think I do) but this was a second best. I went to spin and endured that torture for 45minutes before then going and doing my own strength routine afterwards. I like Saturdays at the gym because I don’t have to rush off straight after the class or worry about time like I do in the week. Though Saturdays are heaving with people furiously running on the treadmills (don’t they know about Parkruns??), using machines or doing personal trainer group sessions.

I did a similar routine to my Winter Workout but I missed off the single leg squats and added instead:

  • Russian twists with 8kg kettle bells
  • Planks
  • Lateral pull-downs
  • Kettle bell single arm presses
  • One arm rows

Ahh I fear that the days of my 5 minute planks are gone…I didn’t attempt a lengthy one, I tried to vary it up by moving each leg out and in while maintaining the same core position. And that was tough. Use or lose it!

In the end I was at the gym for two hours. Seriously. I am that sad. But it felt good to take my time and get what I needed to done. I didn’t want to go to the gym Sunday so it was then or never.

Back to cake.

My MIL had done herself proud 🙂

Let there be cake

There were sandwiches (ham, prawn, coronation chicken, cucumber and salmon with crème cheese), home-made Victoria sponge, home-made lemon drizzle, éclairs, little biscuits, scones (with raisins & plain)…a feast!

MIL Afternoon tea

Well, I pretty much had everything. Obviously.

A few sandwiches (I see it as a necessary ‘lining of the stomach).

Afternoon tea sandwiches

The coronation chicken was my favourite. I went back for a few more of those!

Then a lovely slice of Victoria Sponge. Positively scrumptious.

Victoria sponge

A cheeky slice of lemon drizzle.

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And obviously a raisin scone with jam and clotted cream (no photo. I can only assume I was too concerned with stuffing my face and floating in cake heaven).

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Mmm. Though I must say I was quite stuffed. This was Ben and my late lunch…and dinner as it turned out. We were so full! (How does that surprise me? Three cakes and a platter of sandwiches??)

Sunday was just a blissful day of nothing. I took Alfie on three lovely long walks though as I did get a bit cabin fevery. Sometimes I just have to be outside…I listened to Marathon Talk on two of the walks and walked with Ben on the other one. We were spying on some potential houses that we would love to buy…Fingers crossed maybe to moving out this year!

What would be on  your menu for afternoon tea? I’m not a fan of éclairs at all but my dad loves them. Victoria sponge is always a winner for me. And cucumber sandwiches.

Does it annoy you when the gym is busy? Thankfully our gym is quite big so there’s never a queue for machines or weights.

Have you been Parkrunning lately? I have such withdrawal symptoms!! 

A spot of afternoon tea

Hello! It’s Wednesday – half way there! Not that I’m living for the weekend or anything… Winking smile

This week I’m joining the blogging link-up What I Ate Wednesday and share the delightful treats and meals I’ve been loving lately. Pop over to Jenn’s blog to see what’s going down Smile

 

So here’s a recap of Saturday’s eats as they were pretty damn good. As I mentioned in my last post, I didn’t run Parkrun on Saturday. This was really hard and sad for me. Without sounding overly dramatic, it sucked. Ben went but I went to spin instead. I could have volunteered but I wanted to get the endorphins going and to be honest I was in a bad mood.

And let me tell you, spin was hard core. The usual person was sick apparently so we had a stand-by person do it. I assumed it would be a cop-out session. Ha. Usually we have little breaks between songs but not this time. It was just non-stop. And then the instructor goes “right, time for a 5 minute sprint”. Seriously?! It was 30 seconds of sprints, with about 10 seconds recovery, over 5 minutes. I was a sweaty mess.

After this I had my usual breakfast:

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Same old same old. Porridge (oatmeal), almond milk and chia seeds.

Then after getting ready and usual house stuff, Ben and me headed to my parent’s where I dropped Ben off for some ‘man-time’ with my dad to watch the football and play Xbox. I picked my mum up and we headed off for a lovely spot of afternoon tea for lunch.

Besides from getting immensely stressed out trying to find a car park in the world’s smallest village square and ending up giving up and parking in a ditch, we arrived at Lilly’s Tearoom in Wickham in one piece (not always guaranteed when I drive).

We ordered soup to start because we weren’t sure afternoon tea would be an adequate lunch (rookie error right there).

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Delicious pea and ham soup

I loved how beautiful all the crockery was. In fact, the whole tearoom was beautifully decorated and the service was fabulous.

Tea at Lillys

Obviously we had tea Smile

And then our ‘main’…

Afternoon tea

Heaven! We had the choice of so many different cakes (carrot, chocolate, lemon drizzle, coffee and walnut, rocky road, millionaire shortbread or Victoria sponge). Well, my mum and me both adore Victoria sponge so we both went for a slice of that. It also came with crustless chicken sandwiches and crustless cucumber sandwiches (but of course!) and scones with clotted cream and jam.

Yeah so we clearly did not need that soup!! We were both quite full by the end, only leaving a couple of the sandwiches (choose your battles I say – cakes all the way). It was perfect.

And then we looked round the little square at all the lovely little shops. And lo and behold I found the most amazing chocolate shop.

Chocolate shop Wickham

Because after so much cake, surely this makes sense??

So many beautiful and tasty looking chocolates! Well, I pushed the boat out and went crazy. I bought Ben and me a box to share.

Box of chocolates

I forgot to take a photo of inside, but I will share soon as it’s pretty impressive

The shopkeeper thought it was hilarious that I was buying this for just Ben and me to eat ourselves. How terribly indulgent, I know Winking smile

Well, dinner wasn’t needed for quite a long time afterwards! Luckily Ben had had a pub lunch so we were both happy to have a nice late dinner.

Roast sausages and veg

I kept it simple and had roasted vegetables and sausages. I threw in a chopped cooking apple as well (because I don’t eat enough apples – it’s something I’m trying to work on Winking smile). I threw some herbs on it (rosemary and thyme) and then drizzled it with some oil and balsamic vinegar. LOVED this. Definitely happening again. And so easy – everything just went in a casserole dish and then in the oven for 20ish minutes.

And that’s that!

Last night I went for an easy 8 mile run and it felt pretty good. No pain, no major discomfort. Just a bit of aching but I was more concerned with the raging thunderstorm going around me! But more on that another day.

Have you ever had afternoon tea? I think it’s pretty much the best thing in the world. OK I’m easily swayed by anything cake-related.

What treats do you like to buy? A box of chocolates is fairly extravagant for us, but I just couldn’t help myself. Usually it’s Cadbury’s chocolate or Lindt!

What’s your favourite filling in a sandwich? I am a bit turkey or chicken fan, with loads of salad. And cranberry sauce.

Everything but the kitchen sink

How s-l-o-w-l-y things seem to drag when you’re soon to be going on holiday. Every day seems to crawl by…I know I shouldn’t complain though. I’m very grateful to soon be on a beach in Mexico applying another layer of suntan lotion…

It couldn’t have come at a better time as well. I feel a bit frazzled. And I know Ben is as well with all his travelling and hard working he’s been doing lately. So bring on the cocktails!

But first I have the small tiny little Bristol half marathon to get through first…I’m strangely looking forward to it. It should be great to do such a big race in terms of numbers of people. Cheddar Gorge half was under 200, whereas this one is around 20,000! Even Reading was only around 15,000 I think. So a lot of people!

What’s crazy as well is that when we get back from our holiday the ‘big’ training begins. Marathon Training. Those words just look scary to me. Marathon? Whoa. It’ll be less than two and a half moths until the big date when we get back from Mexico. I already have two races planned to help the training along:

End of October: Great South Run (10 mile road race – very popular, should be brilliant)

Mid-November: A nice and local half marathon (Gosport Half)

December 22nd: Marathon

Annoyingly enough our work Christmas party is the night before. My work always do a really good Christmas do. Last year’s was in Bruges for the weekend. This year it’s at a beautiful stately home in Winchester. Unfortunately Ben and me will opt out as it just wouldn’t be a good idea. Not with a 9.30am start the next day. I’m not too sad… *sobs*

Anyway, like I said I’m feeling a bit frazzled with work. Definitely in need of a holiday. I’ve been using my workouts as a bit of a escape. Seriously, I can’t think of anything important during those tough spin classes. My mind is purely “this hurts” or “I’m tired” or “when’s it over”. And running is like a cool breeze flowing through my mind. It just wipes all that stress away. For the half marathon I plan on just putting on some music and enjoying the scenery. I do enough introspection and worrying in my daily life to allow myself to get bogged down by unnecessary thoughts for 13.1 miles.

I haven’t really posted much about food lately. Mainly because it’s all been a bit samey and not interesting at all.

However, as it’s Wednesday (WIAW: go check out Jenn’s blog!) I did stumble across a quick meal that I just can’t get enough of at the moment. It was after I’d gotten in from spin and my body was like FEED ME. We had a lot of vegetables in the fridge that needed to be used and I just thought “what the hell”. So it was pretty much a meal with everything but the kitchen sink.

Kitchen sink meal

This delightful mess is a three egg scramble with lots of stir fry veg, mushrooms, sun dried tomato and diced trout. With a side salad of course – because you can never have too much veg, am I right? Winking smile

What made this was the trout and the sundried tomatoes. The tomatoes were in oil so this helped increase the flavour as well. I loved this. And good healthy omega oil from the fish as well!

Another meal that I’ve been enjoying is gammon steak.

Gammon

I grilled the steak and had this with cauliflower mash with goat’s cheese mixed in (heaven) and broad beans…and maybe a sneaky bit of beetroot (it needed eating). Oh how I miss eating gammon! I’m on such a meat kick at the moment.

And at work it seems everyone can’t stop bringing in cakes. Not that I’m complaining!

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Hello oat and raisin cookie. How I love thee.

Sadly our cake stash in our freezer is quickly going down. This is not good. My mum came over the other day for a catch-up…and we had the last slices of Victoria sponge. I almost cried. Winking smile Well, that just means getting/baking more I guess!

As my last point, I’ve just started reading Gone Girl after it seemed the blogging world exploding with how amazing it is a while ago (I’m so behind the trend). I couldn’t wait to get stuck in. I’m 17% through (God bless the Kindle) and I’m not massively keen. DON’T HURT ME. It’s just that it reads a bit like a comedy romcom style book but so clearly is not. I don’t know how to take it if I’m honest. It just seems a bit odd. I shall persevere though.

Have a great week guys!

When’s and where is your next holiday?

What’s your latest favourite meal?

Do you use exercise to switch off or switch on? Sometimes a long run is quite cathartic to think about different things, but usually I just like to stop thinking and shut off from the world for a bit.

What are you reading at the moment ? Have you read Gone Girl? Thoughts?


Tasty dirty food

Hey guys, how’s everyone doing? You can really tell the summer is coming to a close and schools have begun again. Hello annoyingly long commute.

Anyway, I wanted to rant talk about this business of ‘clean eating’ today in line with WIAW (check out Jenn’s blog).

I read a great article the other day that really made me think. Honestly, go and read it.

It made me wonder. What is ‘clean eating’? You read so often in so many blogs, magazines, adverts etc. that clean eating is the done thing. The healthy thing. The right way forward.

No processed food. Lots of vegetables. No refined sugar. No white bread. No caffeine. Something like that, right?

Clean eating

The article basically argues that clean eating doesn’t exist. It raises some very interesting points, such as for every diet/way of eating (e.g. vegetarian, vegan, paleo, low carb, etc.) there is always a type of food or selection of different foods that are deemed unhealthy or toxic (unless you’re a veggie for animal welfare reasons I guess**). Basically, all food can be seen as unhealthy from one perspective or another.

So, by rights, this meal could be described as ‘not healthy’.Stir fry meal

Stir fry with river cobbler fish thrown in, tons of veg, courgette noodles (or coodles as we fondly call them in our house) and a large dollop of cream cheese to create a lovely creamy sauce. [With a corn on the cob because they’re so damn juicy right now.]

Yep. Processed Philadelphia low-fat cream cheese. Not the full fat version…probably produced in a factory god knows where adding god knows what making it taste like pure heaven.

I have also been eating loads of turkey and pork sausages.

Turkey sausages and mash

And they don’t always contain stellar ingredients. Check out the ingredients list on your sausages (pork, chicken or turkey). Doesn’t look great doesn’t it? Do I even know what half of those things are??

But they taste pretty good. I mean, they taste like sausages. If you want to remove all that other stuff out then just buy a damn pork chop or turkey breast. But let’s be honest, you’re not eating sausages for breakfast, lunch and dinner are you? Every day? Then seriously: stop worrying.

I am a strong believer that no food is bad for you. No food is going to cause you nutritional harm. Obviously if not eaten in excess. Let’s be very clear here: any food eaten in excess will cause you issues. Yep, that includes my beloved apples.

Apples

Now, you know I like my cake. I eat cake every week. I even ate this bad boy then my husband made and he didn’t even make his own icing.

Jam sponge and icing

He used SHOP-BOUGHT icing. Icing from a tub. OK it didn’t taste as good as normal icing but it was pretty good. He went for the quick and easy. Quick and dirty.

My point is I’m tired of hearing about clean eating all the time. I understand that for some people that’s their life and that’s their prerogative. I don’t mean to offend anyone so I’m sorry if this is how it’s come across! But it really annoys me the tone that some of these blogs or articles etc. can come across. The ‘holier than thou’ tone. I agree that eating a balanced diet with lots of fruit and vegetables and whole foods is a great approach, but it’s not the only approach and it’s not mutually exclusive with eating foods that, let’s be perfectly honest here, taste amazing but have been in some way been processed.

Those tasty dirty foods. Ice cream. Chocolate. Cake. Sweets. BBQ sauce. Steak. White bread!! Stuff that we can turn to when life just sucks a little bit or we just fancy eating.

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Let’s not feel bad about not eating clean! Let’s enjoy the balance of life. Don’t banish those cupcakes (*cough* cupcakes with ACTUAL sugar in them and actual WHITE flour). Enjoy your food, whatever it is your eating.

Vanilla cupcake

*Jumps off her soap box* Have a great Wednesday!

 

**I know that some people can’t eat some types of food for medical reasons as well. My aim is not to offend anyone!

Clean eating: what’s your opinion?

Do you avoid any foods? Why?

What’s your tasty dirty food preference?