Slimming World and Christmas Markets

Bonjourno!

Seems like forever ago I was starting this blog and telling you all of the delights that were at Manchester Christmas Markets last year. How much can a year change everything?! This time last year I was so unhappy with myself, depressed because I couldn't fit into the clothes that I liked, and wondering if I even had the motivation to do anything about it. 

Fast forward to 12 months later and here I am, an amazing six stone lighter and a definite spring in my step. Last year I struggled around the markets, having to sit down every few minutes because I just couldn't hack the walking around. This year we walked for 2 hours around the Trafford Centre before coming back and spending another 3 hours in the markets! I have to admit my feet hurt after that, but there would be no way I could have managed that last year!

The picture on the right was taken in January and the one on the left is from a couple of weeks ago! Can't believe how much my face as changed!

Anyway, onto food and the markets. It's surprising how much there is on offer to eat for someone doing Slimming World - it's all about asking for what you want, rather than just accepting the whole lot, syns and all.

Because we stayed in a hotel we were offered a free breakfast, which I was sure would have nothing but very bad (but very tasty) things to eat. So I was really surprised when I saw weetabix (HEXB for 2) and fresh fruit! I also filled up on a big bowl full of beans.

In the Trafford Centre, there are so many lovely places to eat, and very tempting too. I opted for a Spudulike jacket potato with beans and low fat cottage cheese, which came to 1.5 syns for the whole thing. Much better than a burger or pizza!

If you are venturing to the markets, make sure you check the ingredients before asking for something. Always ask if anything has been cooked in oil or butter to make sure you can count syns correctly. Guessing for me always leads to gaining!

Look out for:

• Carvery stands - they offer lean roasted meats in a giant yorkshire or a bun, ask for the meats by themselves and they will give you more, more protein will fill you for longer.
• Hog Roast - the pork is very lean and again they will serve you a massive bowl of lean pork without any sneaky sides!
• European food stands - offer roasted garlic potatoes and mushrooms in a garlic sauce. When  I asked, they said the mushrooms are griddled and served with creme fraise, but the amount isn't huge so count a few syns for that. They also serve boiled rice with all of their foods.
• Bratwurst Stands - I would avoid the actual Bratwurst sausage, but most of the stands had a grilled pork or grilled steak to offer, which was just cooked over an open fire on a grill, no oil whatsoever!

You could always use your flexible syns and save up for an amazing food experience - my partner had chocolate strudel, cheese, crepes, pancakes and waffles. Crepes are not very high in syns (4 syns per crepe) but watch out for the toppings they offer!

I hope this helps anyone who is travelling to a Christmas Market between now and Christmas, I would highly recommend it!

Ciao!

x

Slow Cooked Goodness

Bonjourno!

It's been so crazy round here lately, I've barely had time to breathe let alone create wonderful Slimming World recipes! A little update for you, I've managed to bag myself a brand new job! It's my absolute dream job, and I couldn't believe that they offered me it! So I'm super excited to start, but with me getting the job so close to my birthday, I've had at least 5 days off plan. You only have a birthday once a year, right?

I've had my slow cooker for a long time, but it's only been recently that I've discovered what amazing things you can make in it! It's literally a life saver for me when I have to work late, and I know that there'll be a lovely meal all ready for me at home and I don't have to make something from scratch. Normally I leave out the ingredients for my other half so that he can sort it all out (last time I actually left out a pot of measured spices so that he didn't get too confused) and then when I come home I just whack some veggies on or pasta and boom, tasty meal in minutes.

So I thought I would share a few ideas with you, as to what I have made in the slow cooker and just how delicious they are!


Beef in a Creamy Tomato Sauce (from SlimmingEats)
Throw some beef and whatever veg you like, paprika, garlic, mixed herbs and chilli into the slow cooker, add 120ml of stock, a can of chopped tomatoes and some tomato puree into the slow cooker and cook for around 6 hours. When it's cooked, spoon out the meat and veg and add 60g of quark to the sauce and stir till smooth.

 Breakfast Lasagne (from the Slimming World website)

• 300g tomatoes, chopped
• 4 medium sized potatoes, peeled and diced
• 6 rashers lean bacon, cooked and chopped
• 200g quark
• 6 medium eggs
• 200g mushrooms
• Herbs

Beat the eggs and Quark together. Spray inside of slow-cooker with low calorie cooking spray. Layer potatoes, bacon, tomatoes and mushrooms in the slow-cooker in two or three layers. Pour over the egg mixture and sprinkle with herbs. Cook on 'low' for ten to twelve hours or until eggs are set and thoroughly cooked.

Crispy Potato topped Casserole

Use your meat of choice and cut it up into small chunks. Add as much veg as you choose into the slow cooker then cover with stock until around 3/4 full. Add herbs and a touch of tomato puree to thicken the stock. Cook on high for around 4 hours then low for a further 2. For the topping, slice 2 medium potatoes and place on a fry light sprayed oven tray. Spray the potatoes then cook at 180°c for around 20 minutes or until crisp.

Pulled Pork

This one couldn't be simpler, cut the fat off a joint of pork and place in the slow cooker. Cover with stock and cook for around 8-10 hours on high. Serve with whichever sauce you like - we like to put ours in tacos and hexb wraps!

There you go, have fun using your slow cookers!

Ciao!

x

When The Moon Hits Your Eye...

... Like a big pizza pie, that's... so low syn it should be a crime!

Bonjourno!

Life has been ca-razayy as of late, what with moving house, new jobs and whatnot, but I've decided to share something amazing with you. So, my current weight loss stands at an amazing 5 stone and 4.5lbs! I can't believe how far I've come in such a short amount of time, it just proves how much Slimming World does work, especially when you stay to group and get the support. 

I've seen a lot of posts on Instagram recently about changing the bases of pizzas for things such as smash and grated cauliflour (something I'm a little reluctant to try since smash seems to play havoc with my stomach). The one I found does have a syn value, but compared to the syns in actual pizza - I read somewhere that Domino's can get up to 600 syns! - it's really tasty!



For Slimming World Pizza Pies, you will need:
2 Old El Paso Stand 'n' Stuff Tortillas (4.5 syns each)
Tomato Passata or Puree
Any of your chosen pizza toppings
40g cheese (HEXA)

Preheat the oven to 200°c, then fill your tortillas about 3/4 of the way full with your chosen toppings. My favourites are chicken, ham, mushrooms and sweetcorn. Little tip, if you cut everything up small, you can get lots more toppings inside! Fill the remainder of the tortilla with passata (add some garlic and herbs to give it more flavour if you like) and divide the cheese between the two. Cook in the oven until the tortilla is crispy on top and the cheese has melted (around 10-15mins).

These are so amazing, I have them all the time and feel like I'm eating something really bad for me, when they're so low in syns its amazing! Enjoy!
Ciao!
x

Weekly Shopping Recipes

Bonjourno!

How is it already October? I feel like I've only just perfected my summer wardrobe and now I have to roll out the jumpers and scarves. It's a great excuse to eat some fabulously heart warming food now that the weather is a little bit colder, I'm finding that salad for lunch just isn't cutting it anymore, I need something that will warm my soul!

This week I've decided to show you all my shopping list, and what kind of Slimming World food I would make with it. I'm a self-confessed bargain hunter, and I won't spend any more than I have to on food that I know I can find cheap. I also like to buy in bulk and make meals that I can freeze if I need to, which is really useful for lunches the next day - especially when they're hot and filling in weather like this!

So here is my current shopping list (I'm actually heading out this evening to get it!)

As you can see, myself and my partner like to plan what we are eating throughout the week, and work out which days we're working so that we can plan who is going to cook. My partner likes to cook on his days off, because he feels bad that I tend to cook 5 days out of 7 (which I am definitely supportive of!). The 'fend 4 self' just means that I won't cook for both of us, we will just forrage from what we have in the fridge. Days like that are great for me to have more speed, because he really doesn't like vegetables, so on those days I tend to have some kind of meat with lots of veggies.

Monday

Salad is a must on a monday for me because I have weigh day on a Tuesday, so I like to get in as much last minute speed as I can. This week I'm making quiche, which I can have with veggies and my partner can have with onion rings or chips. He likes the Slimming World food that I make, but occasionally he likes to have something a little more synful. I'll put chicken and mushrooms in my syn-free quiche, and have it with broccoli, cauliflour and carrots.

Tuesday

Like I said, Tuesdays are weigh day for me, so I try not to eat much throughout the day. Once I've been weighed I have something for a cheat meal, so that I won't crave any junk food throughout the week. This week we'll buy some frozen pizzas and have them with added toppings.

Wednesday

Although it says spaghetti and meatballs, when I went to Iceland they didn't have any of the Slimming World meatballs left :( so we changed the idea and decided to have some chicken with the spaghetti instead. I'll make a tomato sauce with passata, herbs, mushrooms and peppers.

Thursday

It's around this time of the week when I try and be a little bit more creative, and maybe try a recipe that I haven't tried before. I saw this recipe on the BBC programme "Eat Well For Less" and adapted it so that it would be Slimming World friendly. It's basically cous cous with tinned salmon, mushrooms, peppers and sweetcorn with some added flavour from herbs. I can't wait to try it!

Friday

Thankfully my partner is off work today so decided he wanted to cook. He's a dab-hand at cooking meat and loves to sizzle us some steaks on his days off. This week we're going to have lamb steaks with syn free chips, veg for me and onion rings for him.

Saturday

Again, we changed our minds after I'd taken this picture! We're going out for lunch on Saturday, so changed the meal from slow cooked pulled pork to syn free steak bakes, because lunch will be quite big so we didn't want something huge for tea. I love these, and the recipe is on my blog :)

I hope you enjoyed my shopping list, and maybe it's inspired you to have some meals that you haven't tried! 

Ciao!

x

Shocking Revelations

Bonjourno!

I seem to start every blog by apologising for the lack of posts, but I have actually been super busy with work and other things - trying to sort out moving house makes me want to eat cake! However, I did have the chance to try out a few new things recipe wise, as I felt as though I was getting into a rut where I was eating the same things over and over and not really enjoying anything that I was eating because it was all so samey.

Saying that, I'm open to suggestions, so please comment below if you've tried anything exciting this week, I'm running out of ideas of things to do with pasta and rice, so please let me know if you've had something tasty!

This week was a tad up and down. Normally, my slimming world consultant is just lovely, supportive and enthusiastic about slimming world, but this week things have just turned on their head. Basically, I was perusing Instagram one day and came across a post about new hifi bars. Just to stress, this person was NOT a consultant, nor had she mentioned anything about when the bars were out. Being a supportive person as I am, I screenshotted the pictures and posted it to my local group's Facebook page, thinking that everyone would be as excited as I was, because the flavour sounded really good. About an hour later, I got a message from my consultant asking "where on earth I had found this" and "the consultant that is feeding me this info should be fired" because i am "always in the know and it makes her look stupid". 

The message really upset me, and at that point I was ready to not go back to that group, find another one and tell her to eff off. It wasn't until the next day that she messaged me saying that she'd just had an awful group that night and my post "tipped her over the edge".

Am I in the wrong here? No one ever said that these hifi bars were a secret, and since they were shared on Instagram, surely most people know about them by now? I feel degraded and like this whole Slimming World thing isn't about support anymore.

Still, the support from this blog is just amazing and I couldn't do it without you guys <3

Ciao!
x

Half Syn Three Course Meal

Bonjourno!

I've decided that I'm actually going to take the time to write more of these blog posts, since I recently hit 3000 views (which I could not be more grateful for!). I have a lot of blog post ideas for recipes and snacks to help inspire and motivate people just like me, who are losing weight the slimming world way.
It was nice over the summer to actually spend some time with my partner, we work opposite shifts so as I'm coming home from work he tends to be heading off.. it's a bit of an annoyance! So when he managed to squeeze a day off in the summer he decided to treat me to a slap up slimming world three course meal - which he only ended up cooking the main course! It was so tasty, and only ended up being half a syn for the whole thing, which was amazing! So here are the recipes for everything we made, the syn values, and some pictures to get your mouths watering.

Starter - Stuffed Cheesy Garlic Mushrooms

You will need:
2 Portobello Mushrooms
1/2 tub Quark
Garlic Powder
40g Mozzarella

This one is so simple, just mix the garlic powder and the quark until it's a smooth paste, fill the mushrooms with it and add the cheese on top. Put them in a preheated 180° C oven for 10 minutes until the cheese on top has gone a lovely brown colour. 

Main Course - Steak and chips

You will need:
2 pieces of rump steak (all fat removed)
2 large potatoes
Any veg/salad to accompany 

First, preheat the oven to 200° C. Wash, peel and cut the potatoes into chip shapes, spray an oven tray with fry light, place the potatoes on then spray again with the fry light. These take around 20-30 minutes to cook. In the mean time, heat a griddle pan to a medium/high heat and spray with fry light. Cook the steak however you like it, I personally prefer it medium/rare. Serve the steak with any veggies or salad that you like.

Pudding - Jelly and Cream

This one is definitely the easiest, take the remaining quark and add sweetener until it's at your preference, it tastes so good! Then serve it with a Hartley's 10cal jelly of any flavour, which is only 1/2 syn! 

I haven't had such a good meal in a long time, and I only had to make a little part of it. Maybe he should cook for me more often ;)

Ciao!
x

A Syn Free Pasty?!

Bonjourno!

I do apologise, these blog posts are getting further and further apart! My life has just been so crazy busy since I started my new job, and although I've had the entire summer off (perks of working in a school) I still had loads and loads of things to do. 
After coming back from Alton Towers, we went to see my family up in Newcastle, and spent a long week with lots of small children! It was really nice to see my family again -  I only really get to see my sister once or twice a year because she lives so far away. 

Anyway, I was browing the interwebs looking for some new ideas for Slimming World recipes, as I'd been totally off plan for a while and not really lost that much weight since I got my 4 stone award. I thought about just giving up completely since it was so nice to eat whatever I wanted, but when I had the shock of the scales, it pushed me right back to knowing that I needed Slimming World. So browing around and I came across this recipe for a syn free Steak Bake.

I know exactly what you're thinking, syn free and steak bake are not words that you would normally associate with each other. But when I made the recipe, I can honestly say that it was amazing - even my partner enjoyed it!

You Will Need:

Asda Chosen By You Stewed Steak (400g tin) (This is the only one in Asda that is syn free, but there are a few other options around other shops)
Kingsmill Wholemeal Sandwich Thin (HEXB)
Egg

Preheat the oven to 180 degrees, then put around half of the tin into the sandwich thin. In a bowl, beat the egg, then use it seal the edges of the pasty, and brush over the top to make sure it crisps up. Put it in the oven for around 10-15 mins, or until the top is nice and browned.

This recipe is so simple, you can rustle these up in a matter of seconds and have a tasty snack!

Ciao!
x