There's a lot of love in the air

I'm loving a lot of things in life at the moment.

Breakfast: Fruit salad
Lunch: Raw pepper, tomatoes and cucumber with Houmous
Dinner: ??????
Snack: 2 slices of malt loaf

I loved the small packet of Maltesers I had yesterday - I genuinely savoured them and oddly, I felt really full after eating them which is certainly different to how I used to be. I could easily eat a 'Family sized' bag which was about 4-5 times the size of a normal portion and eat more afterwards, in fact I thought nothing of eating an entire dinner and then 'snacking' on a large Family sized bag an hour or so afterwards. I enjoyed them, I really did. It won't be a daily thing, not even a weekly thing, but if I want another bag next week... then I need to stop feeling so guilty about it.

So yes, I loved the Maltesers yesterday, I also loved my dinner. I haven't had Turkey in any shape or form since Christmas day, however I saw the 'Paprika turkey breast steaks' and thought they sounded OK, so bought a packet. I cooked both last night and gave one to my Boyfriend when he came round as he's on his Atkins-esque diet so can eat meat. I had my steak with baby roast potatoes and a lot of steamed veg. I thought it would taste OK, it tasted better than OK, it tasted absolutely gorgeous. I'm not keen on hot / spicy things, but it wasn't spicy at all, it was very nice and incredibly filling. As Turkey is even more healthy than chicken, I'd certainly recommend trying turkey, especially if it's marinated in something interesting.

I'll definitely be buying more turkey in the near future - I'm not sure it would go in a salad, but there's only one way to find out! So yes... I've currently got a lot of love for turkey as well as Maltesers.

Breakfast this morning was por... aha! No, it wasn't :-) It wasn't my obligatory porridge at all, it was an amazing fruit salad that I made myself after nipping to Sainsburys with my Boyfriend last night. He wanted to get a bulb from Halfords and as we were out and about, I suggested we nip into the supermarket quickly. As I'm working from home today, I decided I wanted something different to porridge, so thought I'd make a fantastic looking fruit salad. It tasted amazing, however I think if I were to eat it every day, I'd be overdosing slightly on fruit sugar and I'm not sure it would fill me up as much as porridge would - Maybe greek yogurt and less fruit would be better? Either way, I still really loved it.

So yes, love for fruit salad as well :-)

I'm loving the fact I only have ONE MORE DAY at work after today and to celebrate I have bought some 'classy' Prosecco, which I plan to drink when I get back from work on Friday. Not the entire bottle mind you, but sitting on my sofa, with a glass of Prosecco and thinking 'That's it... no more, I'm done' after a number of crappy months at work is something I'm really looking forward to doing. So there's certainly love for my life - and I'm really loving the fact I'll be having 4 weeks garden leave starting on Monday!

After eating my breakfast, I decided I'd be productive by straightening my hair and hoovering the house - it's only a small 2 bedroomed house, so hardly a mansion, but I find it hard to relax unless it's tidy and for the last couple of days, I've noticed 'bits' on the floor which annoys me. 

Despite 'working from home' today, there wasn't any work to do at all, apart from reply to a couple of emails, therefore I spent most of it watching Horror Movies and political dramas (SAW, Sinister, BBC Adaptation of 'The House of cards'), waiting to head off to my friends house as she's having a 'Rock Star' party with a few of her work friends and invited me over as well. I'm not overly bothered about the Rock Star part (PC game, I believe.. like Guitar Hero, never played it as prefer things on the Play station!) but it will be nice catching up with her... She's the friend who is divorcing her nasty Husband and is stupidly shagging a married man at the moment.

Lunch was my usual, with raw pepper, tomatoes and cucumber. However unfortunately Sainsburys seems to be out of 'Moroccan topped houmous' which is frustrating, so I decided to opt for the caramelised onion one instead - more fat, sadly, however I actually enjoy this one as opposed to the 'roasted red pepper one', which I find a bit, 'meh'...  I've actually really enjoyed eating less processed food today, so I'm thinking of continuing this next week. 

I'm off to my friends shortly and have absolutely no idea what she's making for dinner tonight - It may be 'finger food', I'm hoping it's not pizza or takeaway. I don't want to be antisocial, however I'm going to bring a couple of slices of malt loaf and a Bakewell tart nakd bar in case it's all total junk, in which case, I could have a small amount, but eat some more healthy options that I'll keep in my handbag... 

I guess I'll find out soon!

Why would you eat revolting food?

If you're going to eat chocolate, at least eat nice chocolate, right?

Breakfast: Oats so simple Golden Syrup porridge
Lunch: vegetable tempura / Chilli beef with sticky rice
Dinner: Baked paprika turkey breast, roast new potatoes with steamed veg
Snack: Packet of maltesers

Today has been an interesting day – Rather than ‘Cloudy with the chance of meatballs’ (I’ve never seen the film, I just find the title really random) it’s been more, ‘A voyage of self discovery’, although I appreciate that makes me sound like my Drama Friend, so won’t go on and on about it!

After I posted last night, I decided I’d continue to be productive and decided to clean out a lot of rubbish in my car. It’s certainly not dirty, however as I’m the only one who drives it and usually the only person in my car, I’ve got my gym kit in the back seat, a bag with some empty tubs in it, a couple of bottles of water thrown onto the back seat… etc etc. One of the paper bags I grabbed had a couple of unused Birthday cards in it.. I’d bought them for friends, forgotten I’d bought them, bought more cards and used them… As well as the two birthday cards, there was also a bag of ‘Mozart chocolates’ that one of my work friends had brought back from Germany for me – about 4 months ago.

Now, I’ve got very little will power when things are literally in front of me – which is why I’ve not been buying chocolate, crisps or icecream as not having them in the house removes that temptation for me. To be faced with marzipan chocolates is sheer torture as 1. I like marzipan and 2. I like chocolate. When I discovered them, I put them back in the bag and took them into my house to throw them in the bin.. except, I didn’t throw them in the bin as all I wanted was – Marzipan chocolate. It was almost as if I’d gone from not being hungry to being starving and the only thing that could possibly sate my hunger were these chocolates that I’d just discovered in my car…

I sat on the sofa, and ate one – It was quite unpleasant actually. Being in a car for the last 4 months and some of those days being over 30 degrees had meant that the chocolate had blanched. They were also really crumbly and tasted incredibly artificial… I ate another, and another, having to eat them over the actual bag as the chocolate was so damaged, it wasn’t sticking to the marzipan. After the 6th one, I finally came to my senses. Why on earth am I eating something that I’m not enjoying? They’re revolting… they’re actually not nice and considering I’ve not had chocolate for WEEKS, why am I bothering to eat really disgusting chocolate? If I eat chocolate, at least make it nice chocolate for crying out loud…. And that was it, I threw them in the bin.

I then took them out the bin so I could take a photo of them :-) And then threw them back in the bin, which is where they have stayed….

I don’t feel guilty and actually, I’m fine today – I’m not feeling as if I need to punish myself, nor eat a lot of unhealthy food – One thing I was wary of is that my lovely work colleague and I were having lunch today and had decided to go to our favourite Thai restaurant as it’s the last day we will ever work together at the company (I’m working from home tomorrow and she’s on holiday on Friday) I was actually feeling quite anxious about the choices I would make on the menu – What were the healthiest choices? Would I go crazy and pig out as I ate the minging chocolates last night? How can I ensure I stay focused on my healthy eating yet go to a Thai restaurant for lunch?

Well, I think I did OK - not amazing, but not totally badly - My lovely friend and I had 2 courses. For starters, I had vegetable tempura. I was weighing up tempura over chicken satay with peanut sauce, which I know isn't the most healthy thing in the world, but tempura batter is fried? But what if I don't eat the satay sauce? But then the chicken would be dry, surely?

I had no idea, I made an educated guess as to what would be the healthiest and now I'm back at my laptop, I can Google it to see if I was right.

Estimated calories and fat
Vegetable tempura - 320 calories / 18g of fat
Vegetable spring rolls (3) - 167 calories / 6g of fat
Chicken satay (3) - 250 calories / 5g of fat
Prawn tempura - 116 calories / 1g of fat

Different websites say different things, so I'm certainly not going to believe the figures above 100%, however it's safe to say that I think I chose one of the most lardy things on the menu... Hrmm. I honestly didn't think it would be that bad, after all, it's got the word VEGETABLE in it! It's certainly a lesson to me and something I'm happy to learn - So, the next time I go to a Thai restaurant, I'll probably choose the chicken satay or the vegetable spring rolls as opposed to the vegetable tempura.

The main course was Chili beef with vegetables and sticky rice. I usually had a massamum chicken curry, but as it's made with coconut milk, I assumed that it would be rather high in both fat and calories and on this occasion, I was actually more accurate. 

Estimated calories and fat
Massumum curry - 295 calories / 12g fat
Chilli beef with rice - 354 / 4g fat

I know from the above it looks like I was wrong - however the Massumum curry is just that.. the curry, and doesn't incorporate the rice. Stick the calories on from the rice and it's more than the chili beef...

Either way, it's more than I usually eat for lunch and after we'd eaten, we actually took a detour to Marks and Spencers to allow me to grab some vegetables for tonight - I picked up some marinaded turkey breast yesterday so my plan is to have that with some roast baby potatoes and steamed veg for tonight... As well as picking up some vegetables, I decided to pick up some maltesers - I don't even know why I did it, however I think there's something in my head that I'm trying to work through - as if I can eat chocolate 'if I want to', and it's not a bad thing... I'm not a bad person and so what?

They're currently still in my bag and I've not stuffed them all in my face.....yet. Tomorrow I'm working from home again, so I'll pick up some really healthy food for lunch and not grab anything unhealthy. 

I think I'm getting nervous as it's just over 2 days until I leave my job and I'm feeling a bit unsure about stuff. It's silly really, I've managed to hold it together for months when I've been having a really awful time at work, so to lose it now and go back to my old habits would be absolutely stupid. 

So tomorrow is game face - Get up, be healthy and get focused.