A couple of days ago I received this box of Fruity Date Porridge from Rude Health to sample and review.

Love the style of the packaging! I thought this would make a great pre workout breakfast so I made up a bowl with half a cup of the porridge mix and 1 cup of oat milk.

The texture was lovely and creamy – much nicer than the usual standard scottish porridge oats I use. I topped it with some strawberries, blackberries and a couple of tablespoons of full fat greek yoghurt.

I was really impressed with the taste of the porridge, the addition of the dried fruit is lovely and adds some sweet chewiness. I’ll be eating my way through this box and then doing a full review. I have also been given some boxes to GIVEAWAY to some lucky blog readers – so watch this space!

Before I went to the gym this morning I thought that I would try my new Yerba Mate tea that I ordered from Tea pigs last week. I was quite apprehensive to try this as apparently you will either love or hate its smokey flavour which some compare to tobacco! Here’s some information on Yerba Mate tea and its benefits:

‘Yerba Mate (pronounced yerba mah-tey) is native to South America, where it is drunk as a natural stimulant to increase focus and alertness while helping with detoxing and weight loss.’

When I took my first sip I thought it was ok, but by the end of the mug I had really enjoyed it! I did feel quite alert afterwards but I can’t really say if that was all due to the tea.

I headed to the gym, and as my muscles in my right leg are still pretty tight I decided to give the HIITs a miss and just do some constant rate cardio instead. I did 1hr15 on the cross trainer, step machine and bike followed by 2 sets of abs exercises including full sit ups, bicycle crunches, side reaches, plank etc.

When I came home I decided to get experimental and try out my new Matcha Green Tea powder which I’d also ordered from Tea pigs last week. As a huge lover of green tea, its flavour and nutritional benefits I have been dying to try this. Its not cheap, and you only get a tiny box but its very potent stuff, each serving is only 1/4 teaspoon.

 

Here’s some information on Matcha Green Tea and its nutritional benefits:

Matcha is 100% top quality organic ground green tea leaves

• 70 times the antioxidants of orange juice
• 90 times the beta carotene of spinach
• vitamins A, B and C

Drinking matcha can:

Boost metabolism between 30-40%

Raise energy

Elevate mood

Lower cholesterol

Be anti-ageing

Help prevent heart disease

The powder can be mixed with a small amount of water, milk or juice as a ‘matcha shot’ or can be added to smoothies and even in baking and cooking. I decided to try it out in a protein smoothie:

Vanilla Matcha Protein Smoothie (makes 1 serving)

• 1 serving of matcha green tea powder
• 1 scoop of vanilla protein powder (I used vanilla whey)
• Milk – I used oat milk
• 1/2 teaspoon of Xanthan gum (to add thickness)
• 3 ice cubes.

Add all ingredients to a blender, wizz then serve.

 

This was so good! It was also the first time I’ve used xanthan gum powder and it is amazing stuff. This turned out so thick and creamy and so satisfying. I think I’m going to really enjoy using the matcha powder. A little later I also had half a cantaloupe melon.

We were invited to my parents for a barbeque this afternoon. I was very happy as I haven’t been to a single barbeque this summer! We were luckily as the weather was good. We were also joined by my sister, my brother in law and little nephew.

My naughty little hunger monster was out in full force, I was pretty hungry as it was late afternoon before we got to eat. I started with a plate of salad, some roast vegetable couscous and a small beef burger (which my Mam had made with lean minced beef) topped with some ketchup and fried onions.

I then had more salad and couscous, a chicken breast and red pepper skewer and a little caramelised hummus…

…then another plate with more salad, another chicken and pepper skewer, a little coleslaw and more hummus.

I had a difficult decision to make, as there was some gorgeous looking chocolate mousse cake and some fruit salad left that I really fancied. I made the decision to indulge in a very large slice of the chocolate mousse cake and a couple of bowls of the fruit salad, but on the condition that I wouldn’t eat anything else for the rest of the day. 

The chocolate mousse cake was so worth it! I did feel like a bit of a glutton after all that food, but when I look back at the pics (a great benefit of food blogging) I realised that most of my plates were full of veggies, salad and lean chicken. In any case, the rest of the evening I’ll be sticking to green and herbal teas.

While the Tea pigs products I’ve talked about today were all purchased myself, I was also sent some samples a little while ago to review and include in a GIVEAWAY. As I have been sent quite a few goodies recently I’m thinking of having one large GIVEAWAY with a couple of runner up prizes. This will be up and running before the end of September so please keep visiting the blog to make sure you don’t miss out!

I can’t believe we are only a day away from September. We had to turn our central heating on today as this morning it was a bit chilly. Now that I’ve satisfied my barbeque craving I’m more than happy to welcome the autumn with open arms.

I am off to brew up a big pot of lemon and ginger tea to drink while I sort out my autumn / winter handbag! I have so much junk in my current handbag and purse its going to take me ages to clean out. Do you use the same bag everyday or do you change it up? I have to carry a large bag for work but then I prefer to use a smaller bag at the weekend. I’ll post some pics of my bag and its contents in tomorrows post as I always find the little things that people carry round with them everyday so interesting.

If you’ve been off for the bank holiday in the UK hope you’ve had a great one, if you’ve been working hope you’ve had a good day too!

Thanks to everyone who entered my giveaway! I really enjoyed reading all of your favourite porridge toppings and I can’t wait to try some of them out. Here are the winners:

Emma, Jessica, Tam, Olivia, Becky and Roz. Congratulations everyone! Please email me at keepingslimgettingstylish@gmail.com with your address and I’ll post your sample packs of Rude Health Fruity Date Porridge straight out!

I’ve had another lovely chilled out time today. The hubby was working so I decided to walk to the gym in the snow. It was beautiful but unbelievably cold, even though I was dressed like a yeti. Before I left I ate an orange and some Bear strawberry fruit yoyo’s along with my every day mug of warm water and lemon juice.

At the gym I ran 3 miles of speed intervals then 2 miles at a steady speed and the last mile as fast as I could (total 6 miles). I didn’t hang about to do anymore cardio as I knew the walk in the snow would be tiring enough! From the gym I walked to the little out of town shopping centre near me and picked up some groceries, more Christmas gifts, and a couple of thick jumpers and a fair isle hat and scarf for me. The jumpers aren’t anything special – just practical, i.e. warm! I’ve recently realised I have very few warm clothes. The hat and scarf set is lovely – I’m sure they will be featuring in my next outfit of the day! The lovely Cait commented on my last post that I maybe a ‘committed self gifter’ I couldn’t agree more! That’s the trouble with Christmas shopping, you always see things for yourself. Luckily I have a little budget for things I need, plus Christmas money from my parents :-)

By the time I got home it was lunch time and I was starving! I made a big bowl of the most delicious Cherry Almond Porridge – 1/2 cup of power porridge oat mix, 1/2 cup of vanilla rice milk, 1/2 cup of water, 4 tablespoons of liquid egg whites, 1 teaspoon of brown rice syrup, 1 teaspoon of natural almond flavour, defrosted dark cherries and flaked almonds.

 

Am-az-ing. I also made a big pot of Amaretto tea which I had with some agave to sweeten and vanilla rice milk. Lush.

I spent the afternoon roasting up sugar pumpkin from my veg box and cooking up pearl barley for my ‘grain of the week’ – I have some really lovely ideas for healthy and tasty recipes with these two so check out next weeks posts! I also made a pot of Carrot, Ginger and Orange Soup – recipe to be shared later in the week too!

Mid afternoon I had a bowl of French Onion Soup (which had been in the freezer) along with two small sliced pears with cinnamon and ginger.

For dinner I had a Roast Root Veg Sunflower Seed Pattie with steamed greens and black kale, raw carrot sticks and ketchup and a little soy sauce.

I’d made the pattie by blending up my roast sweet potato, parsnip, beetroot and red onion from Friday nights roasted root veg with feta in my food processor then added some sunflower seeds and shaped the mixture into patties. I refrigerated the pattie so it would firm up then fried in coconut oil on both sides till browned and warmed through. It was really tasty, the coconut oil gave it a nice added flavour as well.

Desert was two chopped apples and some Green and Blacks 70% dark chocolate:

November review and December plans

As this is the last Sunday in the month, although not yet Dec, I’m going to do my monthly review.

This month I have:

• Kept up with my weekly spinning and yoga classes
• Ran 15k each week (split between a 5k during the week and 10k on a weekend) – even when I really wasn’t feeling it!
• Lost 3lbs and half an inch off my hips
• Changed up my HIIT sessions and increased the resistance levels on all gym equipment
• Included more whole grains in my diet by having a ‘grain of the week’. I’ve continued with my new vegetarian diet and have had quite a few days when I have eaten vegan
• Signed up for next years Great North Run!

Just like October and September I have continued to lose weight without really trying and without weight loss being a goal. Since September I’ve lost a whopping 12lbs! I have found that my binges have been under control and I’ve been able to eat more mindfully which combined with the new vegetarian diet could be why I’m continuing to lose weight. I know that I’ll gain a few pounds over Christmas so I’m happy that I have some wiggle room! I’m also finding that monthly rather than weekly weigh ins are much better although I have had a couple of sneaky weigh ins when I feel I’ve over eaten to see if I’ve gained. This needs to stop as it really doesn’t help me on my quest for finding some balance and being able to maintain a healthy weight. I’ve also gained half an inch on my waist but I think this may be down to a bit of bloating.

I’m also very happy that I’ve managed to stick with my running goals even when I really wasn’t up for it. I’m very happy with what I have achieved this month!

Decembers Goals

• Enjoy the festive season!
• Retain some healthy balance whilst still indulging
• Continue with regular exercise

I would usually plan a monthly workout schedule but this month things are going to be busy so I’m going to plan out my workouts on a weekly basis instead. I’d still like to try and workout 6 days out of 7 apart from Christmas week, do some form of running (without setting myself any mileage targets or challenging myself to run outdoors) and get some strength training in. My yoga class has now finished until the New Year but I’d still like to try and fit some in at least once a week as well as some spinning classes. I think having a flexible approach for a change is going to be refreshing and will enable me to be ready for getting down to business come January. I’m also really looking forward to a bit of detoxing come January too.

Current stats:

• Weight 9st 2lbs
• Waist: 27.5 inches
• Bust: 35.5 inches
• Hips: 34 inches

What have you achieved this month? Do you have any goals for December?

Happy Thanksgiving to all my US readers! I wish we celebrated Thanksgiving here in the UK, I always feel I have a lot to be thankful for :-)

Today has seen a big change in my plans due to the weather:

View from my living room this morning, so pretty and festive!

As the snow is pretty bad up in the North East I’m working from home today and won’t be able to make my last yoga class this evening :-( I know I could have travelled to work and Newcastle if I really needed to, but when I have the option of working from home instead of spending twice my normal time travelling I think that makes more sense. Its a shame we don’t handle bad weather here very well, everything seems to come to a stand still! Anyway, as I had a little more time this morning I decided to warm myself up with this wonderful bowl of creamy porridge:

Orange, Cranberry and Macadamia Creamy Porridge

I started thinking about what I use to make my perfect porridge. At the moment the ingredients I tend to use for my basic porridge mix are:

• 1/2 cup of oats or porridge mix like Rude Health Fruity Date Porridge
• 1/2 cup of non dairy milk or fruit juice
• 1/2 cup of water
• 1 tablespoon of oat bran
• 4 tablespoons of liquid egg whites

All cooked on the stove top with the egg white mixed in at the end. A big dollop of yoghurt stirred in also adds extra creaminess! You can then get really creative with flavours, fixings and add ins. Here’s some of my favourite porridge flavours:

Chocolate berry porridge with raw cacao nibs (frozen berries, cocoa powder, brown rice syrup)

  Chocolate Pear and Hazelnut (cocoa powder or chocolate flavour protein powder with hazelnuts and chopped pears)

 Apple, Cinnamon and Almond Butter

 Matcha Green Tea with Berries (1/2 teaspoon of matcha green tea powder with defrosted frozen berries)

  Plum, Dried Fig and Cinnamon

Pumpkin with cinnamon and coconut

I’m getting hungry just looking at these! Of course one of my favourite porridge mixes is Rude Health Fruity Date Porridge – see my review here. So when the lovely Neen asked me if I would host a little giveaway on her behalf while she’s busy getting hitched I was more than happy to do so!

I have 6 sample size boxes of Rude Health Fruity Date Porridge to giveaway:

All you need to do to enter is leave a comment to this post with your favourite porridge topping / add in / flavour combos. I’ll pick winners at random. Deadline to enter is 12am GMT Saturday 27th November, good luck!

This weekend I quite fancy creating a Chocolate Cherry Almond Porridge, yum! I can’t wait to see what ideas you give me too :-)

Well I’m off to check out some Wellington Boots online – apparently this weather is here to last so I need to get myself properly prepared!

I really enjoyed movie night with the hubby, Kick Ass was a brilliant film, we both really enjoyed it! I thought I’d post up a quick photo of last nights desert – some of my Strawberry Frozen Yoghurt and baclava sweet pastries.

The yoghurt turned out so well! That recipe is a keeper. It doesn’t ‘scoop’ like a regular ice cream – you have to almost cut a slice once its softened, but then when its in the bowl it turns into a more ice cream like consistency. I’ll be making up some more with a different flavour to stash in the freezer. I ended up eating all of the baclava too, they were just so delicious! I felt a bit of a glutton afterwards though.

Today I feel like I had my best run to date. I wanted to run a little later in the day than usual as the Great North Run doesn’t start until 10.40am. My long training runs tend to be first thing in the morning so I thought it would be good to do a run a little closer to this time. I was up at 7am and had a delicious bowl of Rude Health Fruity Date porridge made with 1/2 cup of the oat mix, 1/2 cup of water, 1/2 cup of soy milk and topped with half a sliced banana and a heaped teaspoon of smooth peanut butter.

Before I went out I also had a cup of teapigs yerba mate tea and one of my samples of Beet It Shot for extra energy and fuel. I also took half a bottle of cherry powderade diluted with water with me.

I set out and ran 8 miles in 1hr16. I was really happy with my splits too:

I had hoped to get all my miles in under 10 minutes and I was pretty close. This really felt like my best run yet, I felt strong, I pushed myself to run faster and everything just seemed to ‘go right’. Exactly what you want a week before a big race!

Lunch was really tasty, I made up one of my low calorie, high protein egg white spelt wraps using some of my Two Chicks liquid egg whites:

I used 7 tablespoons or the same amount as 3 large egg whites mixed with 2 tablespoons of spelt flour then fried like a big pancake. The two chicks made the wrap turn out much better than it does when I use plain egg whites, and along with reducing waste when using regular eggs (I usually bin the yolks) I think I’ll be buying this again. I filled my wrap with a posh pork and leek sausage, leftover roast butternut squash, beetroot chutney and a little tomato ketchup. I served the wrap with some more left over butternut, sugar snap peas and slices of cucumber.

 

This was just so good, the combo of sausage, sweet squash and sharp sweet chutney was the bomb! I also made myself a smoothie in a bowl containing half a banana, frozen blueberries, scoop of vanilla whey and soy milk. I topped it with half a pack of We Are Bear Cocoa Cherry Pie Granola.

Fantastically yummy! Like a big bowl of ice cream. The granola tasted great too. Mid afternoon I thought I would try making my own gingerbread spiced latte. To begin I made a small cup of my hazelnut and cinnamon coffee (but I guess any strong coffee would do). I then heated up some soy milk and added a heaped teaspoon of mixed spice, 1/2 teaspoon of cinnamon and a teaspoon of agave syrup. I used my little electric milk whisk to froth up the milk then added this to the coffee in a big mug.

A pretty good home made version of the Starbucks favourite I think! If I’d had some ground ginger I would have added that too.

For dinner I made up a new soup recipe:

Roast Tomato and Pepper Soup with Chilli (makes 3 servings)

• 450g of tomatoes halved
• 2 1/2 large red, yellow or orange peppers
• 2 white onions roughly chopped
• 2 tablespoons of olive oil
• 2 cloves of garlic
• 500 ml Vegetable stock
• 1/2 teaspoon of finely chopped chilli (or more to taste)

Pre heat the oven to 220c. Place the tomatoes, onions, de seeded and sliced peppers, peeled garlic cloves and olive oil into a roasting dish. Make sure all the veggies are coated in the oil then roast until softened and browned (about 30 minutes). Put the veggies into a large pan and add the vegetable stock and chilli. Blend until smooth then serve.

Another wonderful tasty soup! So cheap to make as well, I used basics branded tomatoes and peppers. This was really filling too. For desert I made up a simple fruit plate of strawberries, a sliced pear and a sliced apple.

I’ve done even more cooking today too: home made hummus which turned out really well and an apple berry cinnamon compote (to use up some odd tasting braeburns) – I’ll post the recipes tomorrow in case anyone’s interested :-)

One week today I will hopefully be sitting eating pizza after completing the Great North Run! I can’t believe that it is only a week away. I have started to pack my kit bag in preparation (yes I’m an organisation freak). I’m excited and nervous all at the same time, I think as soon as I cross the start line and get on with the running I’ll be happy. I do get a bit of anxiety around being late for things or forgetting things – no doubt I’ll be a nightmare next Sunday morning while making my way into Newcastle!

Oh well here’s another weekend done and dusted – I’ve had a lovely time and have managed to get lots of things done. I’m busy posting old clothes on ebay right now! Hope you’ve all had a fab weekend, catch you tomorrow! x

This morning I was up bright and early for my first session of the 30 Day Shred. I haven’t done it in a couple of months and I was a little nervous as to how tough I would find it! I did level 1 and 2 back to back and I was shattered by the end of it. I find this a little tougher than the Davina DVD’s I’ve been used to!

Breakfast was utterly delicious. I made another Butternut Smoothie but as there wasn’t a lot of roast squash left I added half a frozen banana. The combo worked perfectly and it was just as delicious as the last one I made.

I topped my smoothie in a bowl with two tablespoons of Rude Health Granola which I have kindly been sent to try out. The granola was lovely, it has a crumbly, buttery texture.

Today I've been in a long planning meeting, when we broke for lunch I was happy to see that the community cafe had a few healthier options on their menu. I had a delicious bowl of homemade chicken and barley soup.

I’ll definitely be trying to recreate this soup recipe! When I got back to the office late afternoon I was starving so popped to Asda to get a snack. I bought a little tub of 0% Greek Yoghurt and these packets of dried fruit.

I thought these looked really good, they’re 100% dried fruit and also came in mango and cherry. They were on offer – 2 bags for £3. Total Greek Yoghurt was also on offer at a slightly reduced price if anyone's interested!

I chopped up two little cox’s apples and topped them with the yoghurt and a few dried strawberries.

This was lovely but you can really tell the difference between the 0% fat and the other higher fat varieties, I think I shall be sticking to a bit more fat and the added creaminess in future!

For dinner I made some courgette ‘pasta’ using my spiraliser and mixed it with some tomato, mushroom and quorn mince sauce with added basil and olives on top. I also had a big serving of spinach.

Love my veggie pasta, so much lighter than regular pasta which just leaves me feeling bloated and heavy :-(

For desert I had some dark chocolate buttons and a cup of green tea with mint leaves.

The chocolate was so tasty I went back for the last 3 buttons! I also had a small chopped apple with cinnamon.

Do you work out to DVD’s? What’s your favourites? I have a selection of Davina McCall DVD’s and the 30 Day Shred which I tend to rotate each month.  As I get most of my cardio at the gym I like to be able to do DVD’s at home which incorporate plenty of strength training.

I’d love to try something new, anyone have any recommendations?