Google+ Forget dieting forever: November 2012

Our recipes and tips for cooking from scratch. Find out how we lost weight too.

Thursday 29 November 2012

Sandwiches

I made my own ham and egg sandwich and ate with crunchy salad vegetables. If I was in a hurry I would have bought a sandwich. You just have to turn the packet over and look at the number of calories inside. You may be surprised!! Eating bread is not restricted at all and we like to eat whatever we fancy.
I've bought some shin of beef (on the bone) from the butcher today. I can see this turning into a very tasty casserole, but it would make a fabulous curry too. It's a long time since we had slow cooked shin of beef with ravioli - so I have a feeling this is what we'll be doing with it over the weekend.

If you would like to know more about how we have achieved over 6.5 stone weight loss eating all this wonderful food - see OUR IDEA

Copyright © (c)forgetdietingforever 2012, all rights reserved.


Tuesday 27 November 2012

Salmon fishcakes

Our salmon fishcakes came from a BBC Good Food recipe, and were deliciously light. The only thing we did differently was to coat them in Panko breadcrumbs, as we didn't have fresh breadcrumbs to hand, then fry in oil.
This large fishcake was around 350 calories and was served with sweetcorn, peas and some watercress. The meal balanced out our heavier lunch, and we still have room for some ice-cream which we fancy.
We like to cook from scratch because it allows us to control the taste and content of our food. It's also cheaper and now we have got into making food, it's like second nature. We enjoy making our own food, but when we find ourselves pushed for time, we make some wise choices at the shops.

Sausage, egg, mushrooms, beans and potatoes

This was our lunch. The sausages were good - at least 85% meat content, fried egg, mushrooms, potatoes and beans. Yes, we were hungry! We cooked with vegetable oil and I estimate the total calories here to be around 650 calories.
To balance out our day, we are going to have some homemade salmon fishcakes for dinner.
Our philosophy is to eat what it is we fancy (but within our chosen calorie allowance - which today for me is 1500 calories). By doing that, we don't feel deprived or get cravings for anything. As we eat fairly varied and hopefully balanced throughout the week, a little bit of what we fancy isn't going to harm. We have maintained our weight loss and I'm still losing a little.

If you would like to know more about how we achieved over 6.5 stone weight loss eating food we love - see OUR METHOD
Copyright © forgetdietingforever 2012, all rights reserved.


Monday 26 November 2012

Mozzarella

This is one of our favourite lunches which we haven't had for a while - mozzarella on toast.We share half a buffalo mozzarella and serve with lots of tomatoes and basil. I put some garlic on the toast today. The whole meal is around 450 calories and is very satisfying.
Tonight we'll be eating chicken casserole with mashed potato and suet dumplings.
We're also making some salmon fishcakes for tomorrow's lunch.

If you would like to know more about how we achieved over 6.5 stone weight loss eating food we love - see OUR METHOD
Copyright © (c)forgetdietingforever 2012, all rights reserved.


Sunday 25 November 2012

CHASSEUR SAUCE with steak and chips

We were experimenting with a new way of cooking the steak. Alas, it was a bit overcooked because we took our eye off the ball. When we've perfected the technique we will post it. Luckily there was our fabulous chasseur sauce to make things better.
Rump steak with chasseur sauce and a mound of chips. We cooked our chips in the oven and saved on the calories. The chasseur sauce which will also go well with chicken, was simply mushrooms cooked in white wine and beef stock, with some chopped shallots, tarragon and parsley. The flavour was intense and fragrant - and I preferred this to a sauce with cream. We added just a small amount of butter to our sauce (while many recipes out there call for lots of butter). At around 650 calories this was a really filling dinner.
We managed a stroll and we have been keeping some records relating to exercise and weight loss. It's all very interesting, and we'll post that up at the appropriate time.

Losing weight eating the food we love!
REMEMBER: We all have a calorie allowance - and we like to post our main meals to show you what we are eating. You won’t find us posting every last morsel though – but we hope this gives you an idea of how far calories can go!
Read about OUR UNIQUE METHOD of weight loss and find out how we have lost weight eating the food we love.

Copyright © (c)forgetdietingforever 2012, all rights reserved.

Saturday 24 November 2012

Something simple

Normally on a Saturday night we like to spend time, play around with our food and hopefully come up with something different. Sometimes, like today, we're too busy - but, just to document what we did eat, here is our dinner.
Today, we've been busy and returned to one of our firm favourites. Roast chicken. This time we used a spicy, BBQ rub bought from the supermarket. We also had coleslaw - which we nearly forgot to take out of the fridge again! We're totally full and well fed. We roasted just half the chicken and there is even some of that left over.
We've been unable to go for our walk today due to the rain. We like to have a few more calories to play with (even though we get a full allowance today). After a cocktail or two we'll settle for a good glass of wine and hope the rain clouds move away for tomorrow. We've been reading some interesting articles about how exercise impacts (or not) on weight loss - and this has given us some real food for thought. We'll come to that later... scientists or not!

Want to know how our UNIQUE and innovative weight loss METHOD works?
Copyright © (c)forgetdietingforever 2012, all rights reserved.



Fish fingers!!

We've been out all day and hadn't really thought much about dinner. Porridge for breakfast kept us going until we stopped for lunch - a seafood sandwich. On the way home, we called into the local supermarket and picked up 150g of haddock and a large chicken.
We made these fish fingers and they were delicious!
We cut the haddock into 6 large fingers (or goujons if you want to be posh) with around 25g of fish each. These were dipped into seasoned flour, egg and then covered in Panko breadcrumbs (also from the supermarket). We're quite impressed with Panko breadcrumbs because they give a very crispy result without soaking up lots of oil. The drier texture is so much crunchier than if we used normal breadcrumbs. They took just a few minutes each side to shallow fry in the frying pan. We shared our starter and ate with some mayonnaise which was pepped up with cornichons (gherkins) and capers.
A fab starter at - we would estimate - around 150 calories each (that's allowing 150 calories for the breadcrumbs and frying).
Later on we're eating BBQ spicy chicken using the spicy rub we bought today. We're having corn on the cob, new potatoes and rocket salad.

If you would like to know more about how we achieved over 6.5 stone weight loss eating food we love - see OUR METHOD
Copyright © (c)forgetdietingforever 2012, all rights reserved.

Friday 23 November 2012

Friday lunch

Here's my easy carrot and lentil soup. I had this the other day, it was delicious. I added some chopped crispy bacon bits to make it more filling, and we each ate a couple of slices of toasted bread. (Literally grate 600g carrot, add 150g red lentils, cover ingredients with stock and 200ml of milk, sprinkle in chilli flakes (and any other warm spices you fancy) season and cook.  Season with salt and pepper, then blend and test seasoning again.)
We're off out the see some friends tonight, and before we go we're having some of our home made cottage pie. Freezers are great to store some of our hard work for later!
I'm not sure what we are going to have at the weekend, but we haven't been to the fish and chip shop for a while, so that's a possibility. It all depends on where we go and what we do. There are plenty of recipe ideas which should give you some inspiration. We've enjoyed all the meals photographed. Eating should be a pleasure - or how else would you feel satisfied?

Want to know how our UNIQUE and innovative weight loss METHOD works?
Copyright © (c)forgetdietingforever 2012, all rights reserved.

Tuesday 20 November 2012

Bread and cheese

A perfect combination -- and here's my very ordinary lunch. It's great that nothing is banned while we're losing weight, and having what we want is a BIG part of our success.
It's funny how we get into habits - and I used to think a cheese sandwich was high in calories! When I checked I found a boiled egg contained the same amount of calories as 20g of grated cheddar cheese - both with 80 calories. So today I opted for what I really fancied. Just be careful when buying shop bought sandwiches though - as some of these are loaded with cheese and can contain lots of calories.
For dinner, we are having the potato skins that were left over from the mashed potato at the weekend. I might sprinkle mine with cheese and eat them with baked beans, egg and mushrooms. The baked beans will replace the beef burger this time, as we've eaten quite a bit of meat over the last few days. Hopefully we'll manage a short walk before eating dinner.
After nipping to the shops to try on a couple of things, I am more excited than ever at the possibility of reaching a new clothes size over the next few months. This is mainly because of my waist getting smaller. Even I can see a difference - and being a woman, that's saying something! Roll on - or should I say roll off - downsizing.
So if you're fed up with diet failure - and (like us) just want to lose weight while eating all your favourite foods, take a look at OUR METHOD. Losing 6.5 stone has been such an achievement, but losing it this way has been a pleasure!!
Copyright © (c)forgetdietingforever 2012, all rights reserved.

Saturday 17 November 2012

Weekend menu

Today we're having salmon and scrambled eggs for lunch, which is very quick and easy. Tonight we are going to make crab cannelloni (the blogsite picture), followed by spicy Chinese style belly of pork with mash and pak choi.
Sunday will be easy - we hope to go out for a while, and a slow roast shoulder of lamb is perfect. I've got some rosemary in the garden which I'll use to flavour the meat, together with some garlic cloves. If we do a slow roast, we usually like to sit the meat on a bed of 'stock' vegetables - and use this to make a good gravy with later. We are having this with the usual roast and boiled vegetables. The good thing about a slow roast joint is that we can relax and not worry too much if we're late back.
An easy weekend for us, because slow roasting takes care of itself. We're having a look at making a dessert for later, and not too sure what this will be.  

Thursday 15 November 2012

FAT LOSS

We've both lost a lot of fat from around our bodies. But, noticeably, the fat has been lost in places that it was never lost before (when attempting yet another restrictive 'diet'). I know that sounds strange, but that's the reality. Take my other half - his first 3 stone weight loss didn't seem to make much difference to his shape. But, his shape seemed to change drastically over the next stone or so of weight loss. My shape has changed quite a lot recently too. Both of us are finding it difficult to fit into smaller clothes in our (once) favourite clothes store because the 'cut' doesn't suit our shape any more. I was trying on clothes today and quite pleased with the result. No, I was very pleased. There's still some way to go, but my new shape is becoming more noticeable - even to me now. I mentioned in an earlier post that my body 'fat' content today is LOWER than it was (weight for weight) when I was following some 'diet'.
What I love about the way we have lost weight, is that we haven't 'suffered' or deprived ourselves of anything. We've enjoyed ourselves, lived life to the full, and kept this little (or should I say big) weight loss project going along - simmering in the background. It takes patience, and a good leap of faith - but that's our choice and we're happy doing it, because it works. Every time we clock up a small calorie deficit, we now realise this is going towards our long term weight loss target.
When I used to 'diet', which would often involve quite a lot of low-fat processed foods, I lost a bit of weight, but my shape never really changed. Generally I would also take in some kind of aerobic activity too. Unfortunately, once the 'diet' finished I then always put all the weight back on. Now things are different. I ditched 'low fat' processed foods and choose walking as my preferred exercise. When I 'dieted' I would actively have to tell people I had lost a few pounds. But not any more - people are noticing our weight loss, and often approach us with the question... 'how much weight have you lost', and telling us we look great.
We were listening to a radio programme the other day, and someone was talking about the effects of sugar on the body. We had noticed lower-fat alternative processed foods seemed to contain higher sugar quantities. We also noticed that whenever we ate sugary foods, we usually wanted more. Now we are more aware, we just make sure we know what we are eating.
Going back to the fat loss, I really believe that because we are eating natural foods - containing natural fats, we feel more satisfied. I do not sit and think I need to devour the entire contents of the fridge or biscuit tin (like I used to when I was on some crazy diet). I feel satiated because I've eaten some really filling and tasty food. Because we know we can eat whatever we want to eat and no food is forbidden, it's easier to see food for what it is.
Fat loss has occurred all over the body - disappearing around the circumference as a whole. As I near my 'target' weight, I am now experiencing greater fat loss around my stomach area which is really exciting. My partner has already achieved this. I'm really excited about the fat loss, as I always assumed it was something that I would never achieve because of my age. It's this FAT LOSS that has most surprised me, and it has gradually disappeared without the usual 'diet' heartache.
If you would like to know more about our weight loss, then why not read about OUR METHOD.

Wednesday 14 November 2012

Simple spicy chicken

This was what we ate for dinner tonight. The chicken breast was coated in spicy peri-peri seasoning. 4 or 5 minutes either side was enough for these big pieces. With a peppery rocket salad, potatoes and sweetcorn, our meal came to around 450 calories (certainly no more than 500).
Tomorrow we're have the cottage pie which I began preparing today.
We went for a short walk this evening - and gained a few extra calories!
Eating food we love, helps us to feel satisfied.

If you would like to know more about how we achieved over 6.5 stone weight loss eating food we love - see OUR IDEA
Copyright © (c)forgetdietingforever 2012, all rights reserved.


Mid week menu

We've been eating soups and casseroles from the freezer - but tonight we're having peri-peri chicken breast with new potatoes and salad. You could use CAJUN spice or peri-peri, both are delicious. and always a favourite.
I bought a small chicken and removed the breast for tonight's meal. The remainder of the chicken went into the pressure cooker, covered with water and I added one grated carrot, onion and leek plus a few herbs and some garlic. I've already cooked this for around half an hour (in the pressure cooker) and the strained liquid and meaty bits will form the base of a soup.
I've also cooked the base of a cottage pie today, and I'll finish it off for tomorrow's dinner by topping with mashed potatoes. I love this easy meal, as we can go for a walk and come back to something warm and filling. Lunch tomorrow will either be a chicken soup of some sort or a salad.

Monday 12 November 2012

Boiled gammon

After soaking a 1.5kg piece of corner gammon, I placed it in the pressure cooker and topped with COLA. Thirty minutes later it was cooked. Ten minutes later we were eating it with our salad. I enjoy easy cooking like this, and the taste is so much better when cooked from fresh ingredients.
I've been wanting to try ham cooked in cola for a while. The result was slightly sweeter than how I usually cook my gammon (with water/stock vegetables). But, it wasn't any more succulent - so I would probably stick to what I know, at least I can then use the liquid as a base for a good soup if I wanted to.

If you would like to know more about how we have achieved over 6.5 stone weight loss eating all this wonderful food - see OUR IDEA

Copyright © (c)forgetdietingforever 2012, all rights reserved.


Sunday 11 November 2012

Venison with blackcurrants

We did plan a cottage pie, and bought the ingredients to make it... but on our shopping trip we came across this bargain! Couldn't resist - and a couple of venison steaks entered our shopping basket. Venison seemed to be everywhere we went - so it must be a seasonal thing as you don't normally see it. The cottage pie has moved to its new slot next week!
We served the venison on a bed of stir fried cabbage with cream and bacon bits. We had some left over gnocchi, and as this was delicious, we decided to have that too. The blackcurrant sauce was simply a reduction of (tinned - would you believe) blackcurrants in fruit juice. We added a little sugar to taste and boiled to a nice sticky consistency, then pushed it all through a sieve. It complimented the venison perfectly.
Today we get to eat a full calorie allowance again. We added to that allowance by going for a longish walk - for around an hour - giving us both another 240 calories or so to eat.
If you would like to know more about how we have achieved over 6.5 stone weight loss eating all this wonderful food - see OUR IDEA
Copyright © forgetdietingforever 2012, all rights reserved.



Saturday 10 November 2012

Blackberry souffle dessert

We used up the blackberries in this blackberry soufflé. It tasted like sherbet. Delicious, low in calories and so easy to make!
After looking for online recipes, we took an average of all of them. We think the secret is to get the egg whites very stiff. Then mix a third of the egg whites into the blackberry mixture, and then fold in the rest. Try to knock out as little air as possible.
Calories... it's Saturday, we have a full allowance!! Having said that, there are probably around 250 calories each...

Fish with onion sauce

Well, I suspect you've guessed - but our fishmonger didn't have any halibut, so we had to choose cod instead. Never mind, it didn't ruin anything - the cod was succulent.
We adapted a recipe for onion sauce by James Martin. The dish included mussels, which we love.
For the onion sauce - to serve two - we chopped one onion (very finely) and cooked in butter until brown. Then we added some finely sliced leeks, a couple of mushrooms, a pinch of curry powder and half a teaspoon Pernod and cooked with the lid on for 5 minutes until soft. Next, we added about half a glass of dry white wine, boiled, then simmered until the liquid had almost disappeared. This was then left until we were ready to eat.
The half a dozen mussels (per person) were cooked and left until serving.
We added the mussel liquor to the onion sauce and reduced again until the liquid had almost disappeared. Then finally we stirred in 50ml of cream and some dried parsley, boiled then added the cooked mussels and simmered through.
Most of the calories were in the sauce. We used the butter sparingly, and would estimate the whole dish to be somewhere around 500 calories. Cod is very low in calories - 120 calories for each portion. The gnocchi was light and fluffy and a few fried pieces really complimented the dish. Here's how we made the gnocchi last time.
We enjoy our food - and what we have done over the last 20 months, is continue to enjoy our food while losing (lots of) weight. We are now healthier, happier and the weight has NOT gone back on. We believe DIETS do not work in the long term. We found a METHOD of weight loss that bypassed the need to go on yet another silly diet. All the food we eat has been documented on our blog. We hope you enjoy what you see.

If you would like to know more about how we have achieved over 6.5 stone weight loss eating all this wonderful food - see OUR IDEA

Copyright © (c)forgetdietingforever 2012, all rights reserved.

Gammon

We bought a lovely piece of corner gammon from the butcher and will use this to make several meals.
For lunch, we decided to take two slices (around 150g each) of the gammon, and fry this with egg and mushrooms. With a couple of slices of toast our lunch came to 450-500 calories.
The rest of the gammon is going into the pressure cooker with a bottle of coca-cola. It should take just 30-40 minutes to cook. I've never cooked it this way before, so it will be interesting to see how it turns out. Hoping the resulting ham will be moist and tender!

Weekend plan

We're going to try a couple of new dishes today and our menu goes something like this:

Lunch  is going to be some gammon ham which I'll cook in the pressure cooker. I'm interested to see how well it turns out, as it should only take around 30 minutes to cook. The cooking liquid is probably going to be coca cola, as I've read this works well, and it would make a change. We'll either have gammon and eggs or some sandwiches at lunch.

Dinner tonight is fish and we're going to try a different type of fish - halibut (if we can get it) with mussels in an onion sauce. We'll also be making some of our own gnocchi to go with the dish. The gnocchi should keep for a meal next week, and we'll use just a few pieces tonight.

Also for tonight, we're going to attempt a blackberry soufflé to use up the blackberries I bought and still haven't eaten because they were a bit tart.

Tomorrow we're making a cottage pie as we have lots of potatoes that need using up. If it's as delicious as it was last time, we'll be happy.


Wednesday 7 November 2012

Braised belly of pork


Pork belly, mash and pureed (frozen) minted peas. I was organising my freezer when I came across a couple of portions of our home made braised pork belly.  What a delicious treat for midweek - after defrosting, all we had to do was heat thoroughly in a frying pan. We even had a couple of portions of fluffy mash tucked away in the freezer! 
I'm not sure about the number of calories? But, most of the fat was rendered out, and the result was more like shoulder of pork.  
To cook, we removed the skin/ribs from the pork belly and placed the meat in a large stockpot filled with our favourite stock vegetables (or whatever you have to hand).  We used: carrot, onion, celery, garlic, leek, bayleaf, thyme and rosemary (no salt and pepper).  Cover the meat with stock or water.  If you have the ribs, throw them in too. The more flavours you have at this stage, the tastier the dish.  We like to use beef stock.  Bring to the boil and simmer for as long as you can - the longer the better (we simmered ours for 5 hours). 
When cooked, remove and place meat on a flat baking tray.  Place another flat baking tray on top and add some weight to press the meat together.  After the long cooking, a lot of the fat has disappeared and this 'pressing' stage compresses the meat.  
Leave for a couple of hours until ready to serve.
To serve:  Cut into squares and simply fry in a pan containing a little oil/butter.  Season as you go along!  Cook until the meat is heated through and the outside is nice and crispy.  
This is an economical dish as it can serve a large number of people at a small cost. When we made ours, there was around 8 large portions - some of which were frozen.

If you would like to know more about how we have achieved over 6.5 stone weight loss eating all this wonderful food - see OUR IDEA

Copyright © (c)forgetdietingforever 2012, all rights reserved.


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