Weekly Blog #2

After the success of last week, I went into this week with the knowledge that I have a mere 4 1/2 stones to lose to get to my goal weight.  EASY.  This week has been rather easier as I haven't had much in the way of social plans - no meals out and having a friend over for lunch on Saturday meant that I could feed her food that worked for me (Jamie's butternut squash, prosciutto and pecorino salad again...except I forgot that pregnant people can't eat prosciutto.  Whoops.)

 

This is what I've been eating this week:

 

A noodle soup made from the delicious stock from last week's roast chicken.  I managed to get the stock tasting like BoneDaddies' tonkotsu stock (a feat in itself, given that it comes from an entirely different animal) and promptly ruined it by adding WAY too much chilli.  I love chilli, but I managed to blow my head off .

 

The noodle soup was pretty low in points and I needed to save as many as possible to test drive my new crepe maker which I bought for my Pancake Day party next Tuesday.  Pancakes, it transpires, are not too bad on the old diet, so long as you don't use a lot of oil.  Happiness. 

 

 

I found some orzo in a jar on my shelves - I'd totally forgotten that I'd bought it.  I had it cold for lunch with some sugar snap peas, leftover chicken and a sauce made from a little bit of pesto and some light philadelphia - scuzzy as hell, but I like it.  In fact, I like it so much I had it 3 times this week, the other two times the sugar snaps were replaced by mushrooms which was actually far nicer.  Perfect stodgy comfort food.

 

 

Dim sum at home - I got these from Ocado.  Not nearly as good as the real thing, I grant you, but pretty tasty nonetheless and insanely low in points.  All these dumplings came to 9 points.

Thursday night was the low point of my week.  I'd taken a steak out of the freezer in the morning which was still rock-solid when I got home.  I was in a bit of a crappy mood anyway (it's been a bad week for me, mood-wise) and my instinct was to throw in the towel and get a takeaway until I remembered that I had to spend a minimum of £10 to get them to deliver.  There was just no way that I could order a relatively healthy takeaway for £10, I'd have had to order extra food that I didn't need...so I gave myself a good talking to and made boiled eggs.  They patently were not steak.  However, it meant that I got to have the steak the following night after my first crochet lesson.  I didn't get home until 9.30, hence the slightly strange but quick accompaniment of orzo with chilli, garlic and olive oil.  It was DELICIOUS.

Another roast on Sunday and a new discovery - white pepper!  It's DISGUSTING.  I discovered that it both smells and tastes of farmyards after I'd liberally applied it to my mashed potato (I'd run out of black peppercorns) which rendered it fairly inedible, so I saved a good few points there. 

My final meal of the week was a far tastier noodle soup than the one that had started the week.  I didn't add any chilli or coriander and I chucked a couple of eggs in instead which were the best bits.

My real breakthrough this week was coming to the realisation that the stress and anxiety of thinking about what the hell I could buy to eat if I didn't take my own lunch into work actually outweighs the hassle factor of making lunch the night before.  It's entirely possible to make lunch in 10 minutes flat, including cooking noodles or pasta (so long as you choose the right shape e.g. orzo or soup pasta or giant couscous), chopping vegetables up into tiny, crunchy and appealing pieces AND making a sauce of sorts. It's true.  I did it in 8 minutes on Thursday night and that included washing up as I went along.  Step over Nigella, I am the true domestic goddess.

Anyway, I lost just shy of 3lbs this week which means I've lost a grand total of 11.2lbs in 5 weeks.  I'm pretty pleased with that.  I just wish my clothes would start feeling a bit looser and my face would get a bit thinner.  HURRY UP.