Omelette

So handy being organised and pre-preparing stuff when I'm in a cooking mood. Today I'm able to grab my omelette. Otherwise it'd be straight to the canteen for toast!! 

Chick chick chick chick chicken

At least I had the chicken in the slow cooker to have after my slight digressions today ... We tried it with the left over paleo wraps from Friday, but they were dry and not tasty at all so we just ate some chicken with a bit of BBQ sauce and a few carrot sticks. At least it was decent protein. There's plenty left for a chicken salad tomorrow and probably a chicken & veg meal on Tuesday. 

I had a slice of soreen.

Coffee count.... 5, I think! 

Slipped

Tuna salad for lunch ✔️

But... I've also had a grab bag of walkers cheese & onion,  a small grab of wheat crunchies, a small breakaway bar and half of one twix finger. Damn you restroom..

Nuts

Nuts, seeds, dried fruit mix and an apple. The omelette hadn't filled me up for long!! 

Breakfast time 0730

My omelette has gone down a treat. A very very convenient and filling early morning breakfast. I've got a coffee too now. A long morning ahead. I must try and stave off boredom snacking...

It's Sunday,6am

I'm up and off to work. I've just had a quick coffee and banana. Packed my picnic hamper with yesterday's made up Tupperware tubs of breakfast omelette and lunchtime salad plus a tin of tuna.

I've also put a chicken in the slow cooker. I've put the timer on it for 10am, so it'll come up to room temperature then start cooking. When I come home after 2pm it should be smelling delicious and ready for 5/6pm. This will probably be for chicken wraps tonight, chicken salad for work tomorrow or even just a tub of snacking meat in the fridge.

I love feeling foodie organised!

See you later Mr CHicken.

Tea today

So I'm just waiting to put the Yorkshire puddings in the oven. I'll be having one or two even though they are non-paleo. This is a realistic attempt at a lifestyle, not an all or nothing mentality which would be doomed to fail if everyone else indulged whilst I abstained. So Yorkies and a bit of gravy it is! I am using gravy granules. I never find stock and thickener does the same job. Maybe its just more trial and error. I do try and use gluten free stock cubes anyway and have pots of homemade chicken stock in the freezer for other dishes.
Feeling peckish but that's probably more because I am anticipating it!
Oh and I forget to mention the new potatoes..... a few failings in this meal....

Self impressed

I'm very happy with my efforts this morning! I had a lovely sleep in which was well deserved after a busy week. I'd popped to the local farm shop yesterday before work and got a shoulder of lamb, a chicken, bacon, sweet potato, tomatoes and bananas yesterday. So as soon as I got up I put the lamb in the slow cooker with some mint from the garden. 

I made myself bacon, scrambled eggs and tomato for a late breakfast. 

I cooked up the rest of the bacon with some green pepper, shallot, and mushrooms from the freezer.  I kept a bit of the cooked bacon back for something else, but then used the rest of the mix to make a 4-egg omelette. I also added a bit of chopped tomato and a couple of those never ending spinach leaves. The result is breakfast to take to work for the next two mornings!

I assembled two tupperwares of salad using the rest of the salad leaves, some radish which has been in the fridge for ages, chopped pepper, tomato and  cucumber. These are now ready for a lunch to take to work or side salad mix in the week. 

The courgettes have lingered for far too long in the fridge. I've now grated and salted two to possibly make fritters later. Remember that kohl rabi?! I've grated that up too and might use some in fritters and the rest is ready for a stir fry. It tastes like cabbage, so just thought I can add a sprinkle to my salad mixes.

I try to always leave chopped carrot, cucumber & pepper out for the boys to snack on and if it's there they do.

Happy with my efforts. Only just relaxing with my second coffee now and it's after 12:30!

The slow cooking lamb smells delicious. The carrots, potatoes and greens have been prepped already and I even made (non paleo of course!) Yorkshire pudding batter. 

Lunchtime

I squeezed out the liquid from the grated courgette. Mixed in a little of the grated kohl rabi, an egg, salt & pepper and those bacon bits I saved from earlier.

Mixed all together and gently fried off in patties until crispy.

Not bad! Needed ideally a sweet chilli dipping sauce. I didn't have any, so just dipped in a bit of BBQ sauce for extra flavour. They were a bit salty even though I rinsed the salt off the courgettes. Anyway, happy with having tried them and used up some ingredients. 

I've also had a nectarine, banana and will have an orange. 

Porkie

Felt hungry and ready for my tea. I got a pot labelled 'pork dinner' from the freezer this morning. This pot has been lurking in there for quite a while. I wasn't hopeful, but it was actually pretty tasty! 

It did have a bit of gravy with it. It must have been a roast dinner leftover some time ago.

I've got a banana for later and had some seeds & dried fruit earlier with a coffee.

Coffee count...5

Morning mission

I needed something quick and filing this morning, so I made a 3-egg omelette. I didn't have any bacon or ham so did end up putting some cheese in it to make it flavoursome. 

I met my friend for coffee and had a macchiato. It was tasty. Resisted the apple pies and cakes that were all around!

Came home hungry and made lunch. Tuna wraps. But not just any wraps... Paleo friendly wraps made with coconut flour.

I'd ordered these from a paleo online shop ages ago and today seems the ideal opportunity to try them.

A little dry and brittle. Filled with tuna (and salad cream) and cucumber and salad leaves was actually pretty tasty. Not a sandwich but certainly an inkling towards that. Not sure I'd buy them again as they were rather expensive, but good to try as an alternative and cupboard back up. There's a few left so I hope they stay fresh until Sunday or Monday to use.

Feeling good. I've just had an apple and the coffee count is.. 4

Nuts, seeds and dried fruit..

Snackage needed. It's going to be a long afternoon..... 

Teatime

Carrots from yesterday and the apricot chicken I defrosted overnight. Hungry.

The Apricot chicken recipe was from a small paleo book I found by chance in sainsburys. It has several very user friendly recipes in without hundreds of ingredients. 

Snackage

Having a snack bar now and a later meal.

These nakd bars are pretty good. I'm sure I can get into them as my sweet treat. 

Coffee and more

Coffee count...3

A few chunks of coconut to snack on.

Also had an orange from the veg box which was juicy and tasty.

So, just made a quick lunch before heading off to work. A packet of prawns tipped over a few leaves from today's salad pack. I did add some salad cream dressing. Was nice but I should have let the prawns come up to room temperature before eating as they were glacial.

Chicken and veg packed in a Tupperware to take to work in my 'picnic' bag.

Going to have another coffee then off to work.

Coffee count..4

Laters x

Veggie box has arrived :-)

Although I only had a Riverford box delivered on Monday I still have my Abel & Cole box today. I'll be sticking with Abel & Cole I think. Both schemes are good but A&C takes the edge for me as their website is particularly user friendly and easy to navigate.

So I have lots of veg to plan meals with now. A bit trickier to use fresh this week as I'm working this afternoon/evening and tomorrow so I won't be cooking evening meals from scratch until Saturday. 

A great selection. This is the large fruit & veg box.

Asparagus...

Carrots

Cucumber

Courgettes

Bananas

Green pepper

Leaf salad

Nectarines

Oranges

Pak choi

Salad potatoes

Spring onions

I need to plan properly to ensure this gets used at its freshest. The delivery scheme suits me. It makes me plan and think more rather than resorting to freezer foods.  I also get my eggs and milk from A&C. It's organic and makes me feels organised and healthy. 

I'll start my menu planner.... In a min...

Breakfast

I challenged myself... 

A bag of haddock fillets has been lurking in the freezer for many months. It's time they were tried. 

So wrapped in a foil parcel I popped it I the oven while I ran the boys to school. 

When I got home it was almost ready. It needed something to go with it. Poached egg... I've never tried my new poach pod, so here goes.

I followed the instructions but may have boiled too rapidly rather than simmering because unfortunately it just ended up as a flat hard boiled egg! I added a couple of those washed spinach leaves to the boiling water. Result = a very very nutritious and healthy looking meal BUT eaten with a frowny face. Not that delicious to me, but hey I ate it and feel virtuous for doing so!

Coffee count..2. I needed one to take the taste of the egg & fish away!

Teatime!

So last night I got out a beef stew portion pot from the freezer to defrost. This was a batch cooked recipe from the book 'paleo for dummies' which was my first ever paleo book and is my go-to top up info book now. I microwaved this with some carrots and broccoli. I cooked extra veg so I have some for tomorrow to take to work.  

The boys wouldn't have appreciated this stew, plus I only had one decent sized portion. I did my best standby for them. Veggie burgers with cheese. I popped this in a flatbread with a side of baked beans and they ate it all up.

Broccoli & carrot garnish was eaten too!! They had plenty of raw carrots earlier so had a good veg portion today.

I've already got an apricot chicken dish out to defrost for tomorrow to go with those extra cooked veg. I'm working a late shift tomorrow. I've washed the bag of spinach I got in my veg box. I was planning on cooking it for tea tonight but there was enough other veg. 

I will try and use the spinach for breakfast (I'm thinking spinach/eggs/haddock) or possibly in an omelette for lunch? 

Coconut & coffee

Snacking on coconut chunks from the one we chopped up yesterday.
Coffee count..3

We are all snacking now on the spring carrots from Monday's veg box. They are crunchy and tasty.
Coffee count..4

Lunch

I had an apple earlier.

Now my soup. This was cooked and frozen in batches. It's chicken and veg. Light on the chicken though. To be honest it's rather bland! But it's all I've got with me and it is nutritious and hopefully filling. I have a handy Sistema microwave soup mug to transport it and warm it in.

I'm slowly eating a nakd bar 'cashew cookie'. Eating it slowly with a big drink. It's pretty good considering its scant ingredients. 

Prunes

No tuck shop for me! 

Prunes that have desiccated coconut and seeds stuck to them. Pretty tasty. 

Temptations..

Tuck shop! The most comfy chairs are in this room, but so are the snacks!

I'm finding other places to sit in my breaks!

Breaky

My organised omelette is out. Convenient, fairly tasty and more importantly it's filling. 

I'll probably have a filter coffee in the next hour.

0555 alarm

Up, showered, picnic work bag packed.

Coffee count.. 1

Yippee, it's teatime!

Feeling hungry.

I'd defrosted a couple of portions of lamb meatballs overnight. I made a huge batch of these last week and froze portions to make mid week meals easier. The recipe is from 'Well Fed' by Melissa Joulwan.

Anyway, I had mine with some broccoli and carrots. I also cooked all of the (non paleo!) broad beans from yesterday's veg box. They were disappointing as they were tough and woody. Still, it saved me eating too many! 

To make it more '10 year old boy' friendly I did it with pasta for them.

Result.. We are all well fed in speedy time. I just need to put the dishwasher on now!

I've had a coconut lurking in the fruit bowl for over a week. It's time it was cracked! J was more than happy to take it outside and bash it onto the patio. Now I have a tub of tasty coconut flesh for when I get the munchies for the next day or two.

Snackage

So the boys are home from school. I've chopped them apple, pear and cheese. I resisted the cheese! I can smell their second snack.... Prawn cocktail crisps. My fav. I'm resisting but it's hard. Roll on teatime! 

Lunch

Remember the Tupperware of salad I prepped yesterday, well out of my picnic bag it comes. Teamed with a tin of mackerel fillets in olive oil. To be honest it was a bit of a struggle eating this. Not my favourite fish. In fact I'm only really keen on tuna. But I know it's healthy and filling so eat it up. I could have put salad cream all over it to mask the flavour a little but didn't today. 

Coffee count..3

Snack bar of a nakd 'berry delight'. Pretty tasty considering it's just fruits and nuts squished together. A definite sweet fix. 

Peckish

Munched on an apple. Still hungry. Had some nuts and dried prunes. I have a small tub that I top up with a mix of nuts, seeds and dried fruits. This is always in my bag and is a handy snack pot to help me avoid less wholesome temptations. 

Early starter

Alarm was set for 05:36. Up no problem as I had a pretty early night and decent sleep. I always have an espresso coffee when I get up.

I have been at work for an hour. I've just had the omelette breakfast I made yesterday. It might not look too appetising but warmed up it is pretty tasty. The salty bacon and chunky mushrooms mean I rarely miss cheese on top. This is when my organisation pays dividends as I'm not ending up in the canteen now. Let's see how long I stay full up!