Week Three Weigh In: Slimmer Of The Week!

SO PROUD!

I am Slimmer of the Week! I lost 4.5lb! I got my half stone award and sticker on my book! 

Look at the haul I got for being slimmer of the week:

Every group member brings a piece of fruit or something and the person that's lost the most weight that week wins the basket full. There was an extra banana but I ate that before taking the photo.. but it still shows how much I've got! Very happy :)

Here's to doing the same thing next week! This week is mostly going to be sponsored by 'finding nice things to make with scan bran' (which I detest) - favourite idea so far is a spiced cake recipe, I'll keep you updated!

YAY!

Steak!

On our anniversary, we decided the best thing we could have would be a beautiful steak dinner. Homemade peppercorn sauce (free), butternut squash cubes (free, though didn't work out as planned - not crispy enough), salad - and the main event, the biggest piece of meat you have ever seen.

I left half of mine and had it with salad for lunch the next day!

Never let it be said that SW isn't full of possibilities for having all the things you love!

:D

Cape Cod Chowder

Well this is a true thing of beauty. One of the recent SW magazines had this recipe in there and we decided to try it, given that we had fish in the freezer from a clearance shelf at Tesco and decided we fancied sea food.

Smoked river cobbler, prawns, mussel meat, and bacon cooked in milk with leeks, parsley and probably coriander (the boyfriend made it, and he got himself some plants this week and loves the coriander) -  it was so good we had it two days in a row.

This is probably one of my new favourite SW recipes. It's also 'fancy' enough that if we had people over for dinner, I could serve it and be proud of it and no one would know it was on plan!

Fake-Take-Away: Indian - Heart Dopiaza!

We were looking for cheap meat and I (perhaps foolishly) picked up a pack of sheep hearts. "Hey, shall we go for it? Live on the edge?" I said, knowing full well that it'd be me that cooked them. "Yes!" was the resounding answer I got back. I then proceeded to scowl at them in the trolley all the way around the supermarket, as I wondered what kind of ridiculous idea it was for me to point them out and how was I going to cook them and what if they still had blood in the cavities and and and ick.

They were delicious. So tender and beautiful!

I made a Dopiaza curry in the slow cooker - literally dopiaza is double onion, so there is a spicy onion sauce and plenty of onions chopped into it. We should have had more vegetables with it, I know that, but we wanted a 'takeaway' experience. I also made a SW raita which was absolutely beautiful - and I've since made it again to have as a salad dressing. The boy reckons he could just eat it on its own with a spoon!

Success!

Beef Olives

Look at these:

I have never had these in my life and my other half is trying to convince me that they're a common thing and it's me that's odd for not knowing what they were!

Beef Olives are (apparently) minced beef and onion formed into balls and wrapped in bacon, then baked. And usually served with gravy, but we didn't fancy it.

They were nice, don't get me wrong! But I've never heard of them!

A Catch Up: Goals and Challenges

I've been remiss on updating the blog because I have a new job and it has utterly zapped me of time and energy. In fact I have two new jobs, but the point is still the same. I am exhausted.

Because of work, I couldn't go to my regular SW group (9.30am) and had to go later (5.30pm) and I was terrified it was going to affect my losses. I text my consultant and asked her about it and she agreed that maybe 1/2 a pound - 1 pound, but it'd show the week after as a bigger loss.

Come the evening of the weigh in, I crept onto the scales rather scared. I lost half a pound. That was it. I was devastated. We'd had a really good week, I was excited, I thought I'd get my certificate for half a stone. All I can say is that I hope it does show up this week at the next weigh in otherwise I will be losing faith in this plan a little, heh. The consultant of the evening said he would tell my consultant how upset I was, and I think I thought she'd get in touch - but to be honest I've been so busy I probably wouldn't have been able to talk to her anyway. I was really down, though. Eventually I convinced myself to use it as motivational, and inspire me to make sure this week is a huge one and maybe even get Slimmer of the Week (maybe? it's good to have goals!) so we've tried really hard, and my new job (1) is 1000000 times more active so that will be good too!

I think I could be near my goal by my birthday next March. I've decided that's the big picture aim. We're going to a Masquerade Ball in November, and I'd like to be in a slinky costume for that night (as I should theoretically be half way to my goal, no?) And we've decided to go on a big holiday in the February, which means I would like to be looking fantastic for all of our photos. So again, I say, it's good to have goals.

We've tried really hard again this week, reprieving the Chicken and Mustard Casserole from last month (yummy again, though not quite as mindblowingly good). We made a macaroni cheese dish, which you're not going to see because it was revolting. We've had healthy fruity breakfasts, I've been taking salads to work and snacking on fruit and syn free yoghurts, drinking plenty of water. Hopefully, when this weigh in comes around, I'll be happier. I've resisted all of the cravings I've had (and there have been many, in my new workplace, and lots of things I would LOVE to indulge in) and have been 100% honest about what I've eaten. It needs to go well and I want to be happy when I get to group.

Eggs Cooked In Things!

After seeing this article on Buzzfeed about eggs cooked inside things, I decided to make a SW version and had a tasty brunch: eggs baked into my wholemeal bread and served with baked beans! Because it's a bit unusual as well, it felt like a real treat. And the boyfriend was impressed too! I used Martha Stewart's bacon and egg cup recipe but made it a bit more SW friendly and they were really very tasty!

Brunch is an underrated meal. The boy wants to reinstate Brinner (a la Scrubs) and I'm 99% certain he'll convince me to do a full fry up one night next week to sate his cravings, but for me, brunch is the best. Lazy lying in bed until 9am (or, shock horror, even later!) then a late breakfast/early lunch combo on one plate. Win.

Sweets and Pride

I've had another rough day so wanted to share the rather tasty sweeties we made in a bid to cheer me up.

Penguins! (Okay, okay, so the most exciting ice cube tray we own is penguin shaped. All the fun stuff will come like penguins.) Made a Hartley's sugar free jelly sachet up to half a pint with boiling water, and added two gelatine sheets. I let it cool for a minute or so then stirred in a yoghurt (in this instance a peach one, but a friend on Twitter suggested that a combination of raspberry jelly and Turkish Delight Muller light would be her choice and that sounds amazing). I put berries into the sections of the ice cube tray but I probably won't do that next time, the blancmange type jelly-ness was excellent on its own and I can always have fruit on the side. 

Sweeties!

And in other news, the pulled pork I slow cooked earlier in the week has been so cost-effective! We had it as a meal in itself, with BBQ sauce and mashed potatoes. We diced it into macaroni cheese (which I did not post here as it was not very nice at all!). We used it as pizza topping (and were quite generous with it!). I have had it twice through the week as a snack, cutting a few slices and nibbling them when I've been peckish. And today it finally disappeared into a pasta salad I made for the boy's lunch tomorrow. The joint only cost £3.50 in the first place! And it was beautiful. I am proud of myself on that one!

Fake-Take-Away: Pizza!

This week's takeaway was to be pizza, and I'm not going to lie, I was very skeptical about the idea of smash potato pizza bases!

However! They were fab! Topped with all manner of things - peppers, onion, sweetcorn, pork, even some spicy 'sausage' we made especially to imitate real pizzas - and smothered in fabulous melty cheese - happy tummies!

Unlike lots of people on the internet, we managed to get crispy bases on our first attempt - you can even pick up a slice and eat it from your hand like a 'real' pizza!

And there's some left for the boy's lunch tomorrow, so everyone is happy!

Sushi

I made my boyfriend this sushi selection for his work lunch, and when I worked it out the sushi nori (seaweed sheets) are only 1.5 syns. So it's a healthy lunch too! (I was going to make some with avocado, but it turns out that it's ridiculously high syn! So I'll not be bothering with that!)

Little cucumber and carrot maki, smoked salmon in the bigger ones and a nice rice ball with a little heart on top. I do spoil him!