What do you eat for breakfast?
This is mine – I call it oat smash. An invention of my own, as far as it is possible to invent something new with such a traditional breakfast ingredient!
Birthday Cake Flowers
I had the perfect excuse to do some more no added sugar baking this weekend, it was my birthday!
I wasn’t actually very organised about cake, which is unlike me, and so the day itself had snuck up on me before I realised! With a couple of free hours in the afternoon, and very few ingredients to hand, I set out to bake myself something birthday worthy.
Baking is back – Strawberry Swiss Roll!
It’s Bake Off time! The highlight of the British TV year – in my opinion – and time to dust off those aprons and start making cake!
Have I mentioned I love cake? And making cake? And baking anything involving cake?
Mango Chicken Salad
I love bargains, have I mentioned that before? I also hate wasting food. It seems like such a shame to have to throw away something that took so long to grow before it reached my fridge.
Here is a recipe for a salad that I made for lunch this week using a selection of products from the reduced section of my supermarket. They often do bags of mixed fruit and veg that is looking beyond its best, so there are always weird and wonderful bargains to be had! This is what I ended up with this week.
A bag of key limes, some mini cucumbers (the picture doesn’t show how mini they really are) and some really old looking mangoes.
I didn’t really know what key limes were, other than for making the associated pie, but it turns out they are like mini lemons and limes crossed together!
So, I managed to get all three into a salad with roast chicken. The mango and key lime juice, combined with peanuts, gave a slightly Thai theme. As this was lunch, keeping it quick was top of my mind, so I didn’t even bother with a proper dressing and just drizzled the salad in oil and squeezed a key lime over the top. This would be good with some chili incorporated somehow, perhaps some sriracha drizzled over or chilies chopped, but I can’t take the heat so my lunch was more sedate!
Ingredients: Serves 1
- 1/2 ripe mango, cubed
- 1 small chicken breast, roughly chopped
- 1/2 large ripe tomato
- large handful lettuce leaves of your choice
- 1 mini cucumber, or 2 inches of a normal cucumber
- tablespoon roasted unsalted peanuts (if yours are un-roasted, toast in a dry pan for a couple of minutes)
- 1 key lime (or normal lime) and drizzle good quality olive oil
Recipe:
- Roughly chop vegetables including lettuce and put in a bowl. Scatter over mango and chicken pieces.
- Drizzle olive oil and lime juice over salad and season to taste.
- Using a flat bladed knife, gently chop the peanuts to create large chunks. Sprinkle over salad.
- Eat on your lap while finally catching up with Orange is the New Black.
Yoghurt Feta Dip
I’m going through a yoghurt phase.
I often find my cooking follows a theme for a few months; there was the Moroccan phase after a holiday to Marrakesh, for instance. For months after, I attempted to make everything into a tagine. I’m just coming out of a mexican moment, or more specifically a ‘put smoked paprika in everything’ obsession.
Strawberry Cheesecake Ice Cream
There has been so much ice cream around this week! With the crazy soft serve trend still in full swing in Toronto, and guests visiting for the weekend, there were too many reasons not to indulge in a frozen treat.
Ice cream has been haunting me! So I decided to re-create the most popular flavour from the Baskin Robbins ice cream cart that turned up in the office last week, but with no added sugar!
Ratatouille ‘Lasagna’ Bake
This is a totally satisfying veggie main, and perfect for a prepare ahead dinner that can be kept in the fridge then popped into the oven and ignored until you are ready to eat!
Roasted Banana Whisky Ice Cream
This no added sugar ice cream recipe is a real treat! Super creamy and smooth with a hint of whisky. I could eat this every day, but I probably shouldn’t!
The magic is created by roasting the bananas. This gives them a more subtle flavour, still sweet but also an almost buttery richness that elevates them far beyond the everyday ripe banana. I also added cream to this recipe, for extra indulgence, as I said, this isn’t one for every day!
Ingredients: Serves 2
- 3 medium ripe bananas
- 2 tbsp double or whipping cream
- 1 tbsp whisky, a bourbon works well here
Method:
- First roast your bananas; simply place in an oven dish, peeled, and roast on a medium heat for 40 mins, or until bananas start to turn black and release juices.
- Let bananas cool, chop into slices and freeze until firm.
- Add the frozen banana, cream and whisky to a blender and mix on high until combined. Taste and add more cream or whisky depending on your preferences.
- Transfer to a freezer-proof container and freeze for at least three hours, until the ice cream has firmed up and can be scooped!
- Enjoy!
Roasted bananas.
Just out the freezer.
Enjoy!
Banana Bonanza
I can never resist a bargain, which is how I ended up with more ripe bananas than I knew what to do with! All of these bananas cost me only $1.15!! That’s less than my normal weekly bunch, and they would have gone to waste otherwise. I had to buy them!
So, a banana challenge! What could I do with all these bananas, and how could I use them up before they turned into banana mush?
A bonanza of banana recipes coming your way…!
Recipe 1: Black Forest Ice Cream
Fruity and refreshing ice cream with a hint of chocolate. The banana keeps it creamy and indulgent tasting but it’s dairy and added sugar free! Perfect for a hot summer afternoon on the balcony.
Ingredients:
- 1 ripe banana, frozen.
- 1 cup of mixed forest fruits, frozen.
- 1 tsp cocoa powder.
Method:
- Put all your ingredients into a blender, if you froze your banana whole, break it down into smaller chunks.
- Liquidize! *
- Enjoy straight away, or pop in the freezer to firm up if you prefer.
*This could take a while, depending on the power of your blender. Keep persevering and stirring the mix with a spoon if necessary, eventually it should start to blend together. If your blender really isn’t powerful enough to cope with frozen fruit, add a little milk and pop the mix back in the freezer afterwards to firm up.
2 Months without Sugar!
I’m a good 2 months in, and i’m still sticking to my low sugar diet!
Well, nearly. It isn’t always easy to eat food that is entirely free from added sugar, particularly when i’m eating out and about. However, I’m not doing this to make my life more difficult. I’ve given up sugar because there is so much media attention surrounding how bad it is for us, and I wanted to see if it would make a difference to my health. It’s not the same as going vegetarian or vegan – I don’t expect a restaurant to serve me a sugar free meal, and I’m not giving up going out to restaurants! I also don’t want to let this have an impact on my social life, if i’m out with friends and everybody wants ice cream, i’m going to eat the ice cream. (Note to friends: this hasn’t happened yet, but I’ve got my fingers crossed.)
Things I have noticed since last checking in:
- My energy levels have gone up! The less sugar I eat, the more energy I have throughout the whole day.
- Fruit sugar is still sugar. I have just been through a major breakfast smoothie phase, until it occurred to me that giving up fruit juice but drinking blitzed fruit every morning was pretty hypocritical. I’ve cut back on smoothies and it has really made a difference. Eating 1 slice of toast with creamy mushrooms and a banana kept me far fuller than a fruity oat smoothie, and I actually felt a little thinner on my smoothie free days, I think they were bloating me up!
- Carbs are sugar – but i’m not sure I want to give them up. I started out with good intentions, but little knowledge, about giving up sugar. I have since discovered such a plethora of contradicting information, from focusing on giving up just fructose, to bloggers angry about the carb content of apples. I am all for taking the middle road, and found this article on the difference between simple and complex carbohydrates very useful. I’m now thinking I will try and cut back on simple carbs, such as white flour or white pasta, and focus on whole wheat versions instead.
- My nails are stronger. This one is random, and may not be sugar related. I used to have lovely long nails, but they have been really weak the past few years and liable to break at any time. Recently they have got their strength back, could this be related to the extra fruit and nuts in my diet? Who knows? Probably not, but i’m happy with them.
Conclusions: I am still working out what I want to eat for the rest of my life, but it’s probably food. The more I research the perils of sugar online, the more I realise I have opened a huge can of gummy worms. It’s hard to please some hard line sugar free eaters without giving up all carbohydrates, a well as certain sugary fruits and vegetables. This just isn’t me. When I say i’m sugar free, I mean added sugars such as table sugar or honey. I will still eat fruit, and pureed fruit, and bread. I will cut back on processed and white carbs, and report back!
britoutofwater 