Penne with mortadella and mixed veg

Mmm tasty :)

I fancied pasta again for dinner today so I made wholewheat penne, drizzled with 1tsp of olive oil, and mixed with about half a tsp of dijon mustard. I threw in some chopped nuts, mixed veg and mortadella. I then grated smoked applewood cheese over the top, added pepper and was ready to chow down :) Awesomeness.

Digital SLRs

I've been after one for ages - years even - but I still haven't got one! It's just that they're so expensive and there's too much choice, I don't know which one to go for :/ I'm thinking the canon 450D. I always seem to go back to that one, it seems like a good beginner SLR. Any thoughts?

If i do eventually get one I'll be posting plenty of pics :) The camera I have now isn't really worth using so I've nothing to illustrate my posts with.

Mac and cheese!!!!!

I LOVE mac and cheese, it was probably my fave thing to eat as a kid! I didn't eat it for years though, until I got some in hospital a few weeks ago. That reminded me of how much I loved it, so last night I made some for me and my mother :) Couldn't find any big macaroni though, only the really tiny thin stuff, so I used a durum wheat pasta which I can't remember the name of.. It sort of looks like flat spirals, almost like a snail shell.

I chose to make it just with bechamel sauce and grate cheese on top, because I think it tastes cheesier than if you make a cheese sauce. In my opinion, melted cheese loses half the flavor.

Pasta:

boil for about 10 mins.  Meanwhile, make the...

Bechamel:

butter

flour

milk

salt

Melt the butter in a pan over high heat and very gradually add flour until it becomes thick and you can make a ball out of it. Then very gradually add milk, little by little, stirring constantly, until it becomes a nice thick sauce. Add salt to taste.

If you add anything too quickly it will just become lumpy and you'll have to start over. Also, if it becomes a little too thin/runny, add a little cornflour paste and stir over high heat for a few minutes. (If you just throw in cornflour without making into a paste first you'll just end up with lumps again.)

Then pour as much bechamel as you like over your cooked and drained pasta, and grate over plenty of your favorite cheese - I used mature cheddar, and lots of rainbow pepper cos i love it :) yum yum!

EDIT -- The pasta was called dischi volanti, my new favorite

Chickpea and red pepper soup

Mmm, just made this for dinner :) I found some chickpeas in the cupboard and thought I'd see what I could come up with, and this is the result! I found the recipe through a google search.

350ml (12 fl oz) chicken stock, divided1 (400g) tin chickpeas2 tablespoons tahini1 teaspoon Dijon mustard1 clove garlic, minced1 small red pepper, diced

1.

In a blender or food processor, blend 1/2 the chicken stock, chickpeas, tahini, mustard, garlic and red pepper until smooth.

2.

Transfer the blended mixture to a saucepan over medium heat. Mix in the remaining chicken stock, and cook until heated through. Turn this into a vegan dish by using vegetable stock instead of chicken stock.

My local shop didn't have any tahini left so I bought some sesame seeds instead and tried to make my own. Just toast the seeds, and grind them together with enough olive oil in a food processor to make a paste. (About 1/3 cup of oil to 1 cup seeds.) Although...I don't actually have a food processor!! So I used a pan and grinded them with a handheld mixer until blended as finely as possible. It was delicious!

Must buy a food processor though....  :/

Today's thoughts

I used to get really bad cravings for all sorts of foods. The cravings would come in waves - one week/month I couldn't get enough dairy in any form, another time I needed a constant intake of bread, etc etc. Since I completely stopped stressing about food I have found that I no longer get any cravings at all, and my diet is actually far healthier overall without even giving it a second thought! I think if you just relax and learn to truly enjoy your food your body will tell you what it needs and when without you having to worry about it.

Also, I've noticed that if i buy a large portion of something - for example, a family size chocolate bar or a large bag of mixed nuts - I tend to eat a much more sensible and healthy amount. In the case of the chocolate, I'd eat only a square or two of a huge bar, whereas if I bought a regular size bar I'd eat it all. Last week I bought a big tub of wasabi sunflower seeds and only ate a small handful at a time. And the thing is, i feel totally content eating this amount from a large source, yet if I buy a normal size pack it feels as though I'm supposed to eat it all - so I do, and then feel guilty. No more stressing, no more cravings :)

I can't wait for this scar to heal properly so I can start running again!

EDIT: not that I'm restrictive with my diet, I just don't like to fill my body with crap!

Kipper fillets and sweet potato with satay sauce

Today's dinner :) I cooked some kipper fillets and made the sauce while my sweet potatoes were in the oven. For the sauce, I used:

peanut butter

water

nutmeg/cinnamon/cayenne pepper

garlic

chicken stock

chopped onions

salt and pepper

nuts if preferred

basically just throw the chopped garlic and onions in a frying pan with a little oil and as soon as the oil is hot put in a few teaspoons or so of peanut butter. Use enough water to turn it into a smooth sauce, but not too much or it will become bland. Then add the spices and chicken stock (i actually used chicken bovril tonight), and add salt and pepper to taste. I put in some macadamia nuts too because they're my favorite :) Stir all together over high heat, reducing to a simmer once well mixed. Voila! Once it reaches your desired consistency it is done.

I had the sauce over one half of my sweet potato and just cinnamon on the other half, with my fish and some salad on the side. Oh, we also tried some salmon canapes which were delicious :)

Gym!

Yesterday I was finally back at the gym after my time off in hospital and I had a nice full body workout :) I still cant do squats or anything involving my legs too much but i worked out most muscle groups for 3-6 sets of one exercise per muscle just to get them going again. I can feel it today though :) Still no cardio or anything for a while though, just until I'm fully healed.. Don't wanna end up back at square one!

Phew!

Ah busy busy! Today was my first day of being teacher's assistant at the school i work at. It was fun, and a lot more relaxed than I expected! I'm working with year 1. I was also finally back to work at the restaurant since my operation. So that means I was up at 7.30 to be at school for 9, went home at about 1/1.30 for lunch and a shower and some quick stretches, then at the restaurant by about 4pm and finally home by about 11pm! My feet ache.. But it's been a good day :) Having a cup of hot chicken bovril now and then off to sleep so I can get up at 6.30 for the breakfast club tomorrow - it's already midnight!

A little bit of everything is good for you

On friday 4th of June just gone I developed an abscess...Lovely. Skip forward a week and I was in hospital to have it removed. Anyway, i'm fit and well again now but while there I had my blood pressure checked many times and found out mine is a little lower than average at about 110/70 if i remember right. Low blood pressure is generally a good thing, unless of course it's way below the healthy range. But i looked up low blood pressure (symptoms, treatments etc) out of interest and found it is the most likely reason for my palpitations and sometimes dizziness, especially when i stand up from sitting down. It also decreases blood flow to the brain which is why im a bit ditzy sometimes! And then I found...a way doctors apparently recommend to increase blood pressure slightly is to raise dietary salt if not enough is consumed. All this time i thought i was doing good by cutting out salt! i dont eat many processed foods, and the ONLY thing i ever add salt to (but LOTS of) is chips, which i hardly ever eat. so, a little salt is actually good for you! i honestly thought it was something that was okay to cut out entirely, like hydrogenated fats :/ so, from now on, i'll be happy to add a sensible amount of salt to any cooking :) lets see if i actually notice a difference to the way i feel in time.

Oh, also while in hospital, they put me on paracetamol and codeine, the latter of which i found i hate. It worked well as a painkiller but actually made me feel much worse in other ways - really nauseous, dizzy and extremely tired. i slept so much throughout the day on those. and the morphine..i couldnt actually feel a difference...

Prawn Pancakes :)

This is what i made for dinner tonight! We had some prawns and pineapple that needed eating, so I was trying to think of a way to combine them. I've been fancying some pancakes lately too, so I thought I'd put them all together and see what happened! I ended up having king prawns fried together with onions, garlic, salt, red bell pepper, pineapple chunks, fresh spinach and rainbow pepper, all wrapped in a chilli ginger pancake, topped with bechamel sauce and grated cheese. All homemade of course :P it was rather nice but way too filling hehe. Although I still went back for seconds :S 

Oh and the prawns were MASSIVE by the way. My dads a chef so it's always his mission to find the best ingredients but damn!! They must have been about 3 times the size of regular king prawns. You should have seen them in the shells!! Huge monsters. I should have taken a picture. Oh well. Having said that..I probably should have taken a picture of the meal to post up before I ate it. I'll do that next time.

Hellooo! Thanks for finding my page :) I haven't written a diary or anything in a long time so I've decided to start blogging! I'm into health and fitness, good food, world culture, photography, all sorts... So expect that and lots more :)