90 Day Graduate….I did it!

90 days done! Graduated! Perhaps not with honours though, as things began to slow down towards the end. I might have already mentioned I wasn’t as dedicated as other “students” are to the Body Coach plan, and as the 90 days drew closer, I got worse and worse. Our holiday, which was the finish line for me was in sight, and we had numerous celebrations and parties in the run up to it which I wanted to enjoy without guilt.

I’d basically lost the bulk of the weight that I wanted to, a total of 4kg and 13 inches, which I was really pleased with. It’s incredibly hard to remain focused and commited to such a plan when looking after a 2 year old whilst also weaning a 6 month old baby. I began to find that there was little headspace left to plan different meals for everyone and after 90 days I was kind of done with it. A lot of the meals just too long to make. I loved the exercise, doing 5 short high intensity workouts a week was doable to begin with, but with each cycle, the workouts got slightly longer and the kids older that everything became more challenging.

I’m now looking forward to mixing exercise up a bit more again. Some gym classes like Body Attack, some spin cycles, the odd HIIT workout and perhaps even some running again. I think I achieve better results by doing different forms of exercise rather than just repetition of the same thing as I just began to lose my mojo for it.

I’ve discovered the concept of what he practices though. Having less carbs with each meal by replacing them with extra vegetables is very easy to do. Equally, when having reduced carb based meals, these are to have a higher level of fats which your body requires to fuel everyday activities. So I’d like to try and maintain the balance of nutrition somewhat but allow myself some more treats, especially at weekends!

So here is a collection of the final meals I enjoyed in cycle 3:

Chicken Arrabiata with Penne

My kind of dinner, pasta, chilli, chicken and veg.  This was really balanced, only used 50g pasta, 1/3 less than I’d previously help myself to. Quick and simple, midweek winning.

Low Carb Granola

I love this, and I’m still eating it 5 out of 7 days a week even though I’ve finished. You batch make about 9 portions which was really simple to do, and then serve up with some yoghurt. Generous portion and keeps you filled up til lunch. Perfect.

Coconut Daal with Chickpeas

This was full of filling pulses despite being a reduced carb meal so it was very hearty. Can easily make a big batch and freeze saving for a cold wintery day!

Trail Mix Bites

These were the craze of the summer. The Body Coach gurus posted additional snacks, one of which was a trail mix of nuts, dried fruit and chocolate. People quickly cottoned on that you could chop up the fruit and nuts and mix into melted chocolate and leave to set. Amazing treat with a cuppa!

Coconut Poached Chicken with Mangetout

Another dish filled with chilli! Was super easy to make, warming broth based dinner. When meals are full of different textures and flavours I do tend to forget about there being a lack of carbs!

Chocolate Protein Porridge

Not a visual showstopper but it was tasty enough. I don’t think I need to add chocolate to my porridge though, I’m perfectly happy with porridge as it comes or with a bit of honey or compote. Does keep the hunger locked up til lunch though.

Mexican Burger with Chipotle Sauce and Guacamole 

Great friday night treat, but I wouldn’t ordinarily cook a burger for dinner unless we were having a BBQ. Really good though.

Cod & Chickpea Stew

Cinnamon French Toast 

More like a pudding than breakfast so nice for a change but not a regular meal for me.

Chicken Sausages with yellow split pea mash

This was another recipe that I loved! The split pea mash was slightly time consuming but it was really delicious and a change from potato. Easy to do if you’re at home and can soak / cook the peas in the day.

Avocado and Berry Smoothie

This type of smoothie I’d never have thought would be on a diet plan. It’s really rich and smooth and again surprisingly filling. It’s good to find meals that don’t have a large amount of carbs to fuel your body for low intensity activity days.

Loaded Potato Skins with scrambled egg

Another recipe that involves a bit of time and effort but they were really delicious. Carb refuel meal using sweet potato, generous portion size for 1.

Speedy Speedy Kedgeree

This was a speedy cheat for a kedgeree and it was simple to knock out. You steam cook the fish in the microwave which I’d never thought to do before!

Satay Chicken

I love satay chicken when we get a chinese so I was looking forward to this one. The chicken was good and the broccoli was doused in chilli so an extra thumbs up!

Butternut Squash Rosti’s with Salmon & Poached Egg

These were good, but not as good as a real potato rosti! They were quite time consuming to make like a few of the dishes, which was beginning to get a bit taxing!

Croque Monsieur

How this is classed as reduced carb I’ll never know, but I was happy to have it on my plate. A healthier take on the classic but still tasty enough. It uses yoghurt on top, which works ok to keep the amount of cheese down!

Meatball Goulash

A lot of the reduced carb meals like this don’t come with any side of carbs which is ok, but I was making a side for my husband which I often got jealous of! Plenty of meat and veg, but a little bit of rice to soak it up would be lovely!

Now to continue the journey on my own……

 

 

 

Week 1 done! 💪🏻

Oh and it ended on a high with the amazing chicken jalfrezi curry! As you may know I like a bit of a fakeaway and this was great, I used the hot chilli powder to really give it some punch and it didn’t disappoint. And with poppadoms on the side too.. winning! I have to admit, I did have a glass of wine with it, I’d had such a long slog of a day. The husband is away so after putting the kids to bed it was a lot of tidying up and chores to get done on my own so fully deserved it in my opinion!

Besides, life is for living. I will (and have already) cheat a little on the program but I believe I’ll still get results if I’m on it 80% of the time! Obviously they won’t be as good, but I’m not looking to become a gym junky, just a happy and toned up mummy!

The 80/20 rule is my mantra, eat well and healthily 80% of the time, so that when you enjoy treats or have a bit of a blow out the other 20% of the time you won’t suffer with weight gain and you won’t have deprived your body or mind so you’re happy all round. And happy mummy equals happy baby, happy kids and happy daddy!

Other highs this week have been a create your own (CYO) 3 egg omelette with tomato, peppers and cheese for breakfast. (Reduced Carb)

The chicken Caesar salad bagel was immense! It was a post workout refuel meal and it was divine. You can’t not love a bagel that needs to be converted into an open sandwich because there is simply too much filling!

The reduced carb BBQ Turkey Meatball Bake was great for dinner and then leftovers for lunch the next day. It’s a little strange having a hot meal like that at noon, but it’s so easy if all I have to do is reheat it up, it makes a nice change from sandwiches!

On Fathers Day, I didn’t think I could put the husband through an Uber light carb lunch so pumped out a hiit workout before lunch so we could enjoy the chicken mac and cheese! We had been to the pub for lunch the day before so didn’t feel too guilty!

The lemon and herb pork was another great meal we enjoyed, although I hate the prep of making an escalope! The pork portion was so generous, I didn’t feel like I missed the carbs.

The seared tuna on Asian slaw I’m on the fence with. It started off great, but there was simply so much slaw that the spring onions were repeating on me all night long! Maybe I’ll just make with less next time, it’s still a lot of slaw though, makes the generous portion size of tuna look tiny!

All in all, a great week of food. It’s been quite stressful making 3 meals a day with the kids but I try to “prep like a boss” as much as I can. I’ll find my way and it will become more manageable and then the recipes will change when I hit cycle 2 and it will be a new juggling act again!

The first few days..

When you get your program through your inbox it’s very exciting, like getting a whole new cook book but everything is made specifically for you. What to cook first!

It’s true what they say, to stay on track it’s best to really prep and plan ahead so that you don’t make naughty substitutes. It’s quite a headache to do when you’ve got kids at your ankles, am I making this recipe for just me? For me and the Hubbie? Some for the next day too? Some for the freezer? Despite it taking a while to chop up all the veg when batch cooking it pays off in he long term, I love a stocked freezer!

This salad called out to me immediately, chipotle chicken burrito bowl. It was amazing! Full of great flavours, spicy chicken, avocado, black beans and mozzarella. Loved it!

Dinner time was less easy on the eye but with generous amounts of prawns and chorizo the stir fry was also a winner. Made enough for our lunches the next day too!

When it came to Friday night, I wanted to have more of a treat, a salad wasn’t going to cut it. However, NY style steak and eggs was going to hit the spot nicely!

It’s reduced carb so only 100g of potato for me, but it’s mixed with chopped tomato and as the potato is made into little cubes it doesn’t look too measly!

Weekends used to be for brunching, a thing of the past these days! Nothing leisurely about eating anymore! But as the husband was around, it meant I could at least cook us a hot breakfast. Spanish style shakshuka is a tomato based sauce with peppers, red onion and chorizo with paprika and cumin, then it gets the eggs poached into it. Delicious! Of course it needs so sourdough toast with it, but for now I’ll have to accept that’s a no no!

The start of my Body Coach Journey

I’ve always been so intrigued by Joe Wicks’ lean in 15 programs, everything about it rings true to me. It’s all about good exercise and eating right. So many diets are calorie counting or cutting out fat that you end up depriving your body of essentials that it needs.

I did slimming world for a couple of months after baby 1, and I did lose the weight but I got a bit fed up of not being able to eat healthy snacks with good natural oils such as avocados and nuts because of their fat content even if it was good for you. Instead I was eating artificially flavoured muller lights like no tomorrow… no comparison really!

This body coach plan should also be sustainable afterwards as it’s teaching you about how your own body works and whether you tick better on more carbs or not. I love exercise, so it’s ticking all the boxes except for how to do all this food prep and hiit workouts with a toddler and baby in tow!

If you don’t know how it works, you fill out a questionnaire about body vitals, eating and drinking habits and also your activity level (I’m definitely not the level of a desk job anymore!) and in a few days you get your personalised food plan with 30 odd recipes for the next 30 days. There are also measurements for creating your own so you can get adventurous when wanting to think outside of the box!

You must try to do HIIT workouts 5 times a week which are only 25 mins long, and Oh My God they are hard! You really feel like you’ve had a workout and it’s great you can do it from your own home. Then as a reward you get to eat carbs with your next meal! Winning.

I love carbs, so rest days in particular where it’s reduced carb meals only will be tough, but it will be good for me and if it sheds the post baby love handles, even better!

Anyway, here’s to shifting away the mumbod and hopefully feeling a bit more bikini ready for the holiday in September!

Feeling full of enthusiasm I set my alarm clock early with the intention to do the hiit before baby and toddler woke up. I ran into problems immediately! The baby bless, her decided to not wake for her usual 4.00 feed and so was then stirring when I got up. New plan needed; quick feed, lay down and get back to it. Well the feed was ok but once I started the workout she was crying for me. Why of course, she was now up for the day! So she came to watch me from her bouncer, lucky girl.

Then another 10 minutes in, the toddler is standing up in his cot calling out that he’s done a poo! Typical!! Another quick speedy nappy change and lay down and I finally got to complete my interrupted but first workout!

Maybe mornings won’t work for me!

That be said, I did enjoy tucking into the Apple Bircher for post Carb refuel meal for breakfast! This is going to be a juggling act and a half!

It was easy to make, put the oats, protein powder, a mix of dried cranberries and raisins in a bowl with a pinch of cinnamon. Add the Apple juice and leave to soak in the fridge overnight. The next morning stir through grated apple, ground flaxseed and yoghurt and top with almonds! Yum!

Valentine’s Day Dinner; The way to my Man’s heart, MEAT!

Luckily for my husband, Valentines day fell on a day where Freddie was in nursery for most of the day, so I felt like I would make the effort to make him something tasty for dinner. I put a ban on presents this year with the arrival of the second quite imminent. I told him, my gift to him was carrying this bundle of love for the last 9 months, and his to me was putting up with me and my hormonal moods in the process! That surely has to be the greatest sign and gift of love!

My mother is Danish, so I have a love for Scandinavian Food, it brings nostalgia to childhood times either at home as a big family or over in Denmark visiting relatives. Something that I’ve not had as an adult is Meatloaf. I’m not sure why, but it seems to come with an image of school dinners or cheaply made bad food.

If made properly, it really is truly delicious. I went to the local butcher and bought 50% minced pork and 50% minced beef.  Some recipes only use the beef, but the pork definitely makes it a softer and juicier loaf.

I have the book The Scandi Kitchen by Bronte Aurell. It’s got everything from danish open sandwiches, to Scandinavian classic dishes such as this to the breads, sweets and biscuits that I used to devour in my younger years. I love it.

The meatloaf is essentially the meat mixed with stock soaked oats, onion and spices. It is then moulded and wrapped into a loaf parcel with streaky bacon. Meat on Meat OH YES! I made the loaf in the day, so just had to pop it in the oven in the evening.

It takes a fair amount of time to cook in the oven, and in that time I cooked the hasselback potatoes. Another traditional Danish classic. Why we don’t cook more of these I don’t know. Perhaps it’s all the extra butter that is used!

I made a sauce from the meats juices, classically a thick sauce using flour and recurrent jam and then served it with a seasonal side of green vegetables, I had made the perfect meal. Meaty Meat, Naughty Potatoes and Green Beans to balance out some of that naughty.

 

For a little touch of added romance, I saw this recipe fly across my twitter account from Sainsbury’s:  Red Berry Galette

The portion size looked generous, it did say served two plus left overs so I cut down by 1/3, merely because that was the amount of pastry I had frozen in my freezer to use up! We ate it all between us, but it needn’t have been so big!

This was deadly simple to make, prepare the frozen fruit in a juice, roll out the pastry, spoon over the fruit, shape into your heart for valentines, brush with egg and bake! Can a desert be any more simple? Barely.

Like in the online post, I served it with a large scoop (or two) of vanilla icecream. It was delicious and I loved the cheeky gimmick of it being a heart for the occasion. Oh the romantic in me!

Entertaining; a prepare ahead 3 course dinner for friends

With the due date fast approaching, I wanted to squish in as many catch ups with friends and family where we can still make the most of having the evenings to relax and chat while the eldest sleeps blissfully in his room above us.

Having been through the early weeks and months of a newborn before, I am oh so aware of those evenings where the baby will just scream between 6pm and 10pm (Witching HOUR is clearly misleading!) and for what reason no one will ever know, the baby is clean, fed, burped, cuddled and yet still it seems to just incessantly cry. At least this time around, I am more confident and I know it’s not forever, from looking back at photos, we first put Freddie to sleep in his Moses basket and had dinner downstairs with only resettling him once at 6 weeks old, so it really wasn’t all that long. It just felt endless at the time!

We invited my sister and husband up for the weekend, and it was lovely to have that adult time before I am so sleep deprived and physically exhausted. I carefully picked a set of recipes that could all be prepared ahead minimising any effort required on the day.

We started with a Devilled Crab Starter on sourdough toast, a recipe which I found in the monthly Waitrose magazine, you can find the recipe here.

It was really easy to make, I prepared the chopped ingredients ahead of time, and measured out the sauce ingredients too so when it needed to be served warm, it was very bish bash bosh!

Devilled Crab on Sourdough

The crab had a good zing, but I would personally add a bit more chilli / cayenne if making it again.

For prepare ahead mains, I am currently loving Nigellas At My Table. It’s full of hearty comforting meals, many of which don’t require much effort. The Miso Sesame Chicken was a great recipe whereby I merely had to make a basic ginger, garlic and miso marinade and put that in a bag with the spatchcocked chicken overnight. Then roast it the next day. So simple! It was so tender and juicy. Full of miso flavour which I just love at the moment!

I served it as she suggested, with some sushi rice which was deliciously sticky and a smashed cucumber and radish salad with sesame, also from her book. The flavours of which really completed the chicken and made the meal a little lighter which is good when having 3 courses in my opinion! This again, was a dream to make, I made the marinade ahead of time, then just smashed the cucumber and left to marinade as we ate the starter. I prepared the radishes earlier in the day too which I just added last minute. Beautiful and seamless!

Smashed Cucumber & Radish Salad

Another good find in her book, was the desert; Passionfruit Ice-cream cake with a coconut caramel sauce. The ice-cream can be made up to a month ahead, and the sauce 5 days, so I just did this in the days running up. The ice-cream cake was very simple, basically adding cream to passionfruit and broken up meringue (which was pre-bought!) and the sauce similar, a simple caramel made on the hob with some coconut cream added to it.

I just took it out of the freezer when clearing the table giving it a little time to soften and it was delicious. Lots of zing with the passionfruit and sweetness from the caramel sauce. Not too heavy either, will definitely make again when entertaining friends! You can find the recipe for the ice cream cake here. As I was just making for 4, I halved the ingredients which worked out fine, the sauce was actually very generous so had  leftovers to pour over some ice-cream in the week. Winning! 🙂

Passionfruit Ice-cream Cake with Coconut Caramel Sauce