Weekly food update

The last week, i know ive been good on the diet, and not really cheated at all. Im being loyal to my weetabix, bran flakes and now all bran breakfast and stuck to it. Im now kinda stuck in the "breakfast is the most important and best meal of the day", as it gets your body into the eating and getting rid of mode straight from the off. Also its the time of the day, where you can eat your carbs and get away with it, as it slowly releases the food into your body, so its ok to have bread and toast. I have crumpets as im finding brown toast a bit boring at the minute. I got on the scales this morning, and had a 3lb loss in the last 10 days. So im kinda chuffed, that i can diet without exercise and do well! Which is a 1st time ever! I cant wait for the new year, where im gonna be sticking to this diet of cereal and good hearty tasting meals,

Yesterday i got some seabass from morrisons, which was from £4 to £2 a hole fish! I love morrisons with there whoopsy bargains they have, which go off that date. But i can buy loads and just freeze them and take out the day i need them. Whole fillet of plaice £1! I also do it with the meat as well, got joints of meat and good pieces of steak for bargain prices. If i can freeze it, il buy il! Great tip for anyone. I bought some raw king prawns from sainsburys for 35p! from £3.25! Bargain and a half me thinks. Love getting good quality discounted food. People under estimate fish and shellfish, as alot of it is super healthy and very good for you as well. I would always try and get fresh seafood, prawns are about the only thing i dont mind getting frozen.

On saturday i did the seabass, with some fish seasoning, lemon juice, pad thai sauce, left to marinade and baked for 20mins in oven, and its lovely! Today i got some chicken legs, and took fat off, marinaded in sweet chilli sauce, teryaki, garlic, soy sauce, seasame seeds and baked in oven slowly for 3 hours, with some coleslaw and salad. Perfect! 2 good healthy heart recipes. Obviously you can use chicken breasts, but they are more expensive than legs, as i got 6 chicken legs for £2.90.

I also made a big pot of leek, potatoe and baby carrot soup. Basically onion and leek in a pan with a bit of butter, add flour and stock, then the potatoes and carrots (hole) and cook for 2 hours, crush the potatoes in the pan. Perfect hearty soup!! If you make alot, leave to cool, place in plastic tubs and freeze for another day. The vegetables cost me £2 to buy from morrisons, and a few herbs as well, parsely, mixed herbs, i added some mint and gave a lovely flavour, or perhaps some mixed herbs, and for that £2 you have spent, a big pot will do you about 5-6 good servings, maybe more.

I do have a good store cupboard of dry ingrendients, herbs & spices, sauces, rice, noodles etc, so usually i just need to buy the main ingredients for it. So it is wise to stock up on the dry ingredients, as they do last a long time in the cupboard.

Earlyer on in the week, i made some homemade burgers. I got some minced steak from morrisons, again on a whoopsy! So made them that day and froze them, £1.99 for the pack and made 6 burgers, so 33.33p a burger! Bargain! Nice roll, fresh lettuce, pickely cucumber (gherkin), sauce of choice, perfect! If you off the cards, then a burger on its own with the rest of ingredients as a nice salad. In the burger i put, finely chopped onion, garlic, ketchup, mustard, some breadcrumbs, but not many. Freeze or fridge straight away before you use them,

I am a firm beiliver of doing home cooked food, and doing it well, and if i can make it healthy and affordable, them im on the way to doing something ive always wanted to do. My girlfriend is a really good guinea pig, and you may say the luckyest girl in the world as she tastes all the healthy hearty tasty food i make! Think you must have at least 1 proper cooked meal a day, I hate ready instant meals and most of them are full of rubbish and crap anyway. Ive seen the size of the weight watcher meals, and i would need about 3 of them to make me feel full, there suppose to be lower in fat, but really, they are just smaller portions and not as tasty!

Im loving the sun paper at the moment. Every week, there is at least 2 good health articles in it. Gary Barlow put up his diet, after his take that split, he balooned upto 16-17stone, and hit the diet. His main way, was cutting down the portions, keeping the calories to a good level, and exericse alot. To me, this be a perfect way, except i wanna exericse full throttle than stop start all the time. January, il be hitting the running machine hard!

I was going to have a moan about stuff in live, but im gonna keep it on a good note. Tommorow, im heading to my mums and going to my old local pub, and as low fat beer is outta the equation. It be a few nice beers and some southern comforts as a mini bday treat!

General rant about life

At work today, i really just wanted to rant on about life and how it is, and how people are with life, and the stuff what just bleeding pisses me off! I do beilive in the "each to there own" and "it makes the world go round"

Now xmas is upon us, but it isnt upon us, it isnt the week before xmas, or xmas eve, where we all go panic buying the presents we forgot, or just been paid on that day and blown all our money before hand thinking its kinda cool to get hammered like a tit coz "its christmas" where really, you spend most of the year getting hammered, but fail to blame it on xmas!

So first rant, is why the frig have people put xmas trees and decorations up now! Just frig me sideways! (im not going to put any swear words up, or try to) that your life that much of a depressent, that you think its going to be xmas day at the beginning of november or something? Your gonna get that present tommorow of some1 who generally doesnt like you? Or no 1 will notice that your a fruit loop etc and think you just like xmas? Now i do love xmas, and so does my girlfriend, but im a beiliver that xmas kinda starts, when its advent calendar door opening, which is the 1st of december. As a child, our tree and decorations, usually go up about two weeks or so before xmas, and down a couple of days after new year. Now i read that someone put there xmas tree and decorations up at beginning of november "to see there 6-9month old babys reaction" Like he/she generally will remember wtf is happening and going on! Yes it may look nice, and the smile may last a hole 30sec's, but its pretty dam sad to be honest if thats your life!, but come on, ho hum, bah humbug me! Mayb in a few years, and wack em up in december, and the child can understand xmas alot more, What will it be, when they go down, and he/she doesnt smile as much, xmas all year round? Xmas is a special time of the year, some will hate it for other reasons, but, its a bit like your birthday, its a treat or that time of year, where its kinda your day, and xmas is kinda a small celebration what lasts a little longer. But its not to be celebrated in November! I hate for xmas to be de valued and i would put good money, most dont know the meaning of xmas.

Now im thinking, why do some people do put up xmas decs up early, or love xmas so much? I think a good general real reason why this year, is that. The way of life has gone up for the normal person, and xmas has started to bring more people together, as really, where all in it together, and is the only time of year, we all get to celebrate together. Familys havnt been able to go on holiday, as everything has gone up, more and more of us are having children or more children to the brood and a bigger reason to celebrate it. It does seem, there is alot more grieve in this world, and if nothing bad happens around xmas times, its the 1 time of the year, where you can enjoy it and try and forget your grieve. Ive always kinda said, if anything was bad to happen around xmas time, that id still celebrate it, but id go on holiday for it. But hopefully that'l never happen anytime soon. We all may hate this country, but i kinda like and enjoy a british xmas. If it wasnt for xmas, alot of buisness may go bust! Billion dollar Christmas industry supposedly! Christmas is also that 1 time of the year, where you can have a good drink and eat plenty of goodies which you may not all year round. I always remember as a kid, it was the 1 time of the year id have smoked salmon! So i wanna try and get some good smoked salmon and bring back them memorys.

Next rant.... Chavs! What is it with pregnant women, naming and calling there baby by a name, when its a smaller than a golf ball in your belly! "Oh hi, im 4 weeks pregnant and my baby is going to be called this" fb status" " baby is due in 10 weeks time, i cant wait to meet " Just jesus, fml" Yes, you have a few names you like, but my mum had different names for all her children, but changed 2 of them, cos they didnt look like that name when they popped out. Why do chavs's then suddenly name there babys name, after a famous persons baby name etc..... "yeah no 1 has heard of that name before have they....."

Not much of a food rant this week. But ive been quite good on my diet, and im ploughing through plenty of cereal and plenty of bog roll!

Another mini rant, ive worked out, all my outgoings for xmas in the next 4 weeks, plus normal bills and food shopping, 2 xmas nite outs, and ive worked out, im going to be paying out more than im earning! Which lead to a migraine that night.

Im going to do another blog, properly friday or saturday night, and put some of the stuff ive been eating and a few recipes.

Im not a xmas scrooge or a miserable person. But some stuff is just kinda pethetic and peoples lives can just be worst, and its a sad way of life. Last bit, if your gonna do xmas early, do it for the right reasons!

Food blog update

Its been a while,

Well got on scales, and for some reason ive lost a few pound in weight, result. But ive just been good on my diet, but not done the exercise. I know i said i would try the 5km, but at end of last week i had flu type symptons and last thing i wanted was to stay at work for even longer than i should, and just basically do nothing when i got home. So my plan, although i would like to find the motivation for the gym from somewhere, im going to try my best to stick to my diet, and come start of the year, itl be run till my tum goes dum dum gone!

On friday, i have 2 hole weeks off work! So what do i do..... Well i may try the wii out at home and bash boxing and tennis a few times a week, will have a fair bit of time on my hands, im off to Birmingham for a full day, and to doncaster for another day, then lincoln for 2 days at the end of the 2 weeks, i come back from that to my works xmas doo. 3 course meal and plenty of beer will flow thats for sure.

Ive been having cereal for the last 6 week or so, and now im just on the weetabix and bran flakes, and if i was honest, have you seen the share price of Andrex these days... Gone through bluddy roof! Ive even got myself a few as well. I dont miss bacon, sausage or black pudding in a morning, may have it as a treat every so often.

In my 2 weeks off, i may spend a day using old reciepts and then pricing up some low fat meals ive been making, even little snack wraps ive had, start taking pictures of all meals im making and recipes and to start a recipe section on this blog, and to blog more daily, no reason not to blog more, just upto me to do it more!

The next week im on lates all week, so itl be weetabix and bran flakes for breakfast, 1 seafood wrap for a lunch type meal, then ive got 2 soups to make, a breakfast tea as well! Then after each meal, im having a satsuma as well. So should be a good weeks food!

My partner has been trying to lose weight as well, and we have both agreed that no chocolate till xmas day!!!! Recently ive been more craving and wanting chocolate! I dont have much of a sweet tooth at all, i dont mind a pudding, but i love the starter and main course and if im not full il squeeze a pudding in, but dont try and make sure ive left room for pudding. I used to crave kfc and chinese takeaway! Every week on a friday, my lips would start to go for a chinese! But now every friday i have a morrisons pasta box and a crusty roll! Its like a cheats way on enjoyment without the fat and calroies of a chinese! Me and Janette was talking, and all i can remember is that ive had no more than 2 kfc's this year by memory, 1 of them was just popcorn chicken. I may of had 2 mcdonalds this year, but 1 of them was just chicken selects. I can honestly say, since i was 18, its been the best year food wise!

Im still wondering, how i will get through december and be good to myself!

Id love to be a genuis and invent low fat great tasting beer! As drinking beer, means you must have a takeaway at end of a night out!

Gotta start sometime

Well, ive started the food side of the dieting as of today. Yesterday, like most socialising , for if you go out, its pretty tough to stick to any sort of plan. But i really love most fish, so a fish and chips at harvester was the way to go, bowl of salad on side, luvly jubbly! Best thing with the harvester restraunts, is all there items have calories on it. So if any readers reading this, get your self down to one, and good way to dine out and watch them calories your eating.

So today, was weetabix and a crumpet (should be brown toast) but ive got about 24 crumpets in and need using, so thats they way forward. I do use butter, which is a good protein and ok to have in a morning than night time.

Me and Janette (if i say we, its me and my partner Janette) went to sainsburys at 10 last night, after the night out, and had a wander round. They had lots of meat on sale reducded, so 2 big pieces of sirloin steak was the way! Raw king prawns from £3.25 to 25p! Salad items, satsumas, all on special offers as well. Alot of the things we got on reduced we are freezing, and can take out, when we need to. I love morrisons for the reduced items, and we are heading there friday, and hope to stock up on alot of reduced meat.

Today, im going to make myself a grilled sirloin steak wrap with some salad, pickles and guacamole for my lunch at work. But tonight a good friend of mine is coming to ours and were heading to the pub, so try not to hit the crisps or pork scratchings, but calorie free beer? That is hopeful thinking.

I really need to start the exercising part, so tomorrow morning, im hitting the wii, and probably saturday and sunday im hitting the treadmill. Then as of next week, it'l be the start of my 5km distance training for the week. Im not going to just hit the 5km and give up, but its a minimum distance required.

My partner is also dieting, which really we should help each other, and we will, but as we both work full time, and work alot different shifts, its going to be kinda tough, except, if we go shopping together, we just buy good healthy decent food and no bad stuff.

Most things i make, i will take pictures and provide recipes as well.

One of the ideas, im trying to think of in my head, is to provide recipes and ideas for familys/parents or anyone dieting, of how to make good food on a budget and be healthy. After living outta home, ive realised how expensive fresh good food can be, and i feel for any parents or family with 1-4+ kids, how hard it is, and the little time you have. We looked after our niece for a day, she is 8, we planned to go out, i made homemade pizzas for us all, and then next day we went shopping and to cinema, and me and janette was drained when we came back! So after a day out with the kids etc, last thing you want, is to spend an hour preparing and cooking food, so its going to be as well, making good healthy food quick!

Exercising!

So, an exercise plan. As ive said in the 1st post. We have a small gym at work, which consists of a treadmill, walker, rower and a bike, with a multi-purpose weight machine as well.

My main port of call, is usually the treadmill, i found out about april/may time, that i like to jog! Which is kinda weird as i always hated running, and as walking fast seems to be boring, and take ages, and takes along time to to get anywhere, running seems to be the way for me.

My plan, for the next 2-3 months, will be a distance run. Going to try and walk/run/jog on this machine over a couple of days/nights a week, and do a total distance of 5km minimum a week. Then hopefully in february, itl increase to 7.5km, and them im April/May to 10km. Build it up to possible 15km next june/july time.

As well as running, im also going to use the weight machine and do several exercises on there, for the shoulders, back, chest, legs and stomach.

I really really want this to succeed and finally change my life around, and be alot more healthier and fitter. Ive never been slim or trim, and probably never will, but if i can make myself more heather, then il be really happy with myself.

The start of the food lovers way to diet

The Diet!

Hi, my name is Andrew Muir, age 26, at my worst i used to weigh 20stone, and after changing my life around i gradually lost weight, without having to diet at all, and got down to a lean 16stone or there abouts, after a crappy couple of months ive, popped back upto 17stone, and now is my time, to change my eating ways and life a little, but still enjoy what i am doing. Ultimatly this make take upto 12months and a target weight will be arounf 14stone. But id like to be at least 15stone, and be able to shop in all mens shop places for clothes.

Well ive done some thinking at work, and after this weekend, i wanna kick start this diet back into play somehow. My main problem is, i really need to exercise, but i reckon, im a winter depression kinda guy. It gets cold and dark, and last thing i wanna do is still be out at work and eat tasteless salads when i get in. Just wanna get home, whack heating on, eat good tasting hearty homely food and watch tv with the missus.

I bought the sun paper today, and in it was an article for a 10lb to lose for xmas diet. After reading it, it actually seems really plausable, plus it lets you eat carbs, eat good food, and gives you a breakfast lunch and tea plan with a difference. Gives you lots of options and also puddings as well. Which is a good thing, but bad thing is, im really off fruit totally, during the summer, i was eating strawberrys, plums, cherrys, apples all the time and loved them. But now my tastebuds are off them all together, and gone onto chocolate...

So yeah, not kinda good, plus to the fact my girlfriend does nights, and i get kinda bored, and we live next to a shop, so lots of factors = boost to nestle's share price and an increase in my waist again.

I have lots of thoughts of dieting and what you need to do to lose weight, but the problem is, having that plan, and sticking to it. But how do you stick to it, when you work, do different timed shifts, also try and be sociable and now as its winter, be super strong with it. Between now and new year, there will be at least 3-4 nights out between xmas events and people birthdays, trip away to Birmingham, then possibly twice to mansfield (not possible to diet properly).

So where do we go from here?

Im not to sure, but i know i really wanna re start it again. Im a cook, and i love to cook, i also love to eat more, which is the real problem, and love to eat good fresh food and meals. I am more savory than sweet, but, them bad times, im kinda a naughty sweet guy!

As off today, im exercising on the wii, and coming up with a plan on the diet side of it as well, and what this diet says i can eat and then come up with recipes for it.

One of my plans is to buy a griddle pan of some sort, as i dont like many veg, and the normal way is to boil/steam, and all i like that way is cabbage or mash potatoe. Other veg i like is roast veg's, but they aint to healthy. But with a griddle pan, i can try out courgette and aubergine which i both like, and just see what other vegetables i can eat. This diet does alow carbs as well, but im going to try and stay off potatoes and just eat wholemeal bread or toast, mayb rice and some pasta, but generally eat well, and keep off any fried or high calorie/fat foods. Thing is, i dont eat many fatty foods, just quite hearty foods!

End of August, i left home, and now ive gotta buy, cook and eat the foods i buy. To be honest, ive never eaten so well, We eat fresh food, fresh meat and veg, hardly and ready meals or convienence. In 10 or so weeks, we have had 1 takeaway, and only instand foods have been, Janettes ready meals for work, and some discounted meals for 2 from morrisons, which still need cooking in the wok.

1st part of my plan, is the dieting side, which should and will include, freshly cooked food on a budget still, following the diet guidelines, and then the exercise part will be the hardest to get back into. I cant really say it costs alot to exercise or gotta go far etc, as there is a small gym in my work which is free. The tools are there for me to use, but its wether i wanna pick them up and consistantly use them and stick to them on a regular basis.

Plan for my breakfast. This diet seems to go on portion control with having your 3 regular meals as well. Im going to try and implement it to try and fit in when im working my shifts, i do an early day shift 7-2.30, and a evening shift on 12-7.30. Then my days off, well at the moment, im only having 1 day off between a monday-sunday, so they shouldnt be a problem, but i do have 2 weeks of work starting arounf 19/20th, which will be tough, as i wont have the gym at work to go in, so exercising on the wii is a must.

For breakfast, when im on a afternoon shift, it is 2 scrambled eggs on wholemeal toast, or 2 weetabix or bran flakes, and to have fresh orange or apple juice, and when ive gotta take food to work, itl be weetabix and bran flakes with a couple of satsumas as well.

After an early shift, il probably have the dinner/tea, which can be most meats with vegetables, lamb/pork/sausage/bacon will have to take a back burner for a while, as the diet is chicken/lean mince/steak/fish/shellfish/turkey. Also you can have carbs as well, which consist off, small bread roll, wholemeal bread, pitta breab, tortilla wrap, baked potatoe, 65g of rice, 70gram of pasta, 200g of boiled/sweet potatoe. Its a carb/protein/vegetable diet, also you can have ricotta/cottage chese, block cheddar chese. There is other ingredients you can have, but i dont like any of these.

Could make a small lasagne, with cottage chese instead of white sauce, and use lean mince. Could make stir frys and use a little olive oil, and could grill your meat before hand and add to some stir fry veg and boiled rice or noodles. Sheppards pie, Grilled steak/salmon with some potatoes and roast veg. I will make a full list of the things i will be eating.

When im on a afternoon shift, il have breakfast in a morning, and then take some soft of meal with me, it could be something to warm up, or something which can be eaten cold, may be a cold chicken wrap, prawn and crabstick pasta salad, Can also just be a ham sandwich, plus i will take some fruit with me. When i get in at 7.30, its best not to eat, so il probably have a yoghurt and some fruit, If im hungry, i may have some cereal or scrambled egg, crumpets/toast.

Im going to try and update this blog regularly and see how it goes, sometimes its just good to get things of your mind which your unable to do vocally, Ive never really stuck to dieting or concentrated that much on them, as i just exercised and ate rather normally, But this diet, will be quite a routined plan of action, and a good chance il probably eat very well and still get enjoyment out of eating it.