Saturday evening, 31-08-24: broadening my range of foods

Good evening, everyone!  

I wasn't able to get to Jen's SW group this week so I ended up going to Sarah's early morning Saturday group instead.  I really wanted to be weighed because at the moment I feel I'm walking a bit of a tight rops between increasing my intake of healthy oils and fats and staying within my Happy Zone weight (within half a stone with my target weight right in the middle).

I was thrilled to have lost a pound and I won the raffle too!

I know it's early days and I will have no idea whether it's helping the cholesterol situation for a few months but one week in, upping my healthy oils and fats intake hasn't sabotaged my healthy weight.  It's a relief and very encouraging.

What I ate today

Back to a more diverse range of breakfasts this week and what a great start.
I used oats rather than the usual SR wholemeal flour 😇, one medium egg, a good dollop of Greek yogurt, some water to get the desired thickness, sweetener and vanilla and - a new one - one tsp chia seeds.
By the time I was ready to cook the pancakes, the seeds had softened and thickened the batter more and the resulting pancakes were delish (and more filling than usual - maybe that was the chia seeds)!

I just layered them with more yogurt and served with strawberries, raspberries and grapes with a sprinkle of sweetener.

Half a healthy extra B for the oats, half a syn for the tsp chia seeds and one syn for a very little bit of olive oil for frying.  I brush it over the pan with a silicone brush and it is quite surprising how little you need - they don't have to swim in the oil.

For lunch I 'hydrated' some bulgur wheat (like cous cous and with chicken stock powder and garlic granules, chopped apple and a tsp pumpkin seeds and put together a falafel bowl.  That pinky stuff is just feta and garden tomatoes/sun dried tomatoes - the feta didn't melt properly.

I thoroughly enjoyed it and loved the bulgur wheat - really nutty tasting and it had 'substance'.

I finished off the apple for dessert.

I would say half a healthy extra A for the feta, half a healthy B for breadcrumbs in the falafel, one syn for the seeds and three syns for olive oil that I used to cook the falafels and brushed over them before I reheated them.

This was the bean and tuna salad - mixed beans, a can of tuna, some red onion, a few olives, a bit of oil, some lemon juice and a tiny squeeze of honey plu the usual garlic, tarragon, salt and pepper and I popped the feta on top as an afterthought
It was really lovely on a bed of mixed salad.

Afters was a couple of plums.

One healthy extra A for the feta and I'm saying five syns (that is generous, it is probably less)  for all the additions because I only had around half of it.

Summary

one and a half healthy extra As

one healthy extra B

ten and a half syns

My meal plans for tomorrow:

B:  fruit, yogurt, a sort of home made muesli mix with toasted oats, pumpkin seeds and a few chopped nuts

L: chicken piccata, garlic greens, roasties; fruit

A BBC Good Food recipe:  https://www.bbcgoodfood.com/recipes/chicken-piccata-garlicky-greens-new-potatoes

D:  cheesy bean and tuna toastie, side salad; fruit

Yes - I can have toasties on the Mediterranean way of eating - keep the cheese moderate, use wholegrain based bread and be sensible about any other fillings - I have bean and tuna leftovers so I'll mash that down a bit and spread it in.
And I can brush some garlicky olive oil over the outside to get a deliciously crunchy outside!

Can't live well without my toasties!

Exercise:  A nice walk, weather permitting

The extra bit.

I'm seizing the opportunity to broaden the range of foods that I include in my diet and for the next two weeks I am going to concentrate on three grains (or sort-of-grains).

Bulgur wheat:

You cook the fine version (which I have) in the same way as couscous - in other words, you don't, you just soak it in boiling water with flavourings/seasonings if you want.

Google tells me that 

"Even just one serving of bulgur has a good amount of lean protein, fiber, and micronutrients, like B vitamins and manganese. For a quick fix of this whole grain, add bulgur to your favorite soup or salad."

Quinoa:

I have avoided quinoa because the first time I tried it I was totally put off by the little root thingies that emerged, like little worms (urgh).  However, common sense tells me not to be so silly and everything I have read about the Mediterranean diet tells me that it is packed full of good things so here I am giving it another go.

It's not exactly a grain, it is classified as a 'pseudo-grain', I gather.  Apparently it can do everything but raise people from the dead!  Rather than regurgitate a whole load of info, here's a link to an article, if you're interested.
I really do need to give it a fair go.

https://www.healthline.com/nutrition/8-health-benefits-quinoa#nutrients

 Chia seeds

If you're in the least bit interested in basic nutrition, you will have come across chia seeds.

I have never knowingly eaten chia seeds until this week when I added some to I forget what now and some to today's pancakes.  

This is what BBC Good Foods gas to say about them.  Lots of 'May . . .' and a few things I might need to take note of such as the wisdom of soaking first (which I didn't really do this morning) and the possibility of interfering with medication.  One to monitor.

https://www.bbcgoodfood.com/health/nutrition/health-benefits-chia-seeds

So my aim for the next fortnight is to include these three in my planning as well as keeping up the changes from this past week and continuing to monitor my weight.