Hello everyone, hope you are well! I’ve had a funny old couple of days to report on. Yesterday I was hit with a mystery tummy bug so I feel like I’ve been playing catch up with myself since then! Monday had actually got off to a good start with pancakes for breakfast:

Strawberry and Coconut Grain Free Pancakes (vegan, serves 1)

• 1/2 cup of gram / chickpea flour
• 1 tbsp of coconut flour (optional)
• 1 tsp baking powder
• 1/2 cup of non dairy milk (I used kara coconut milk)
• 1/4 cup of water (don’t add this if you are not using the coconut flour)
• 1/2 tsp of coconut extract or 1 tbsp of desiccated coconut
• Oil for frying (I used coconut oil)
• 1 punnet of strawberries
• 1 tbsp of softened coconut butter
• 1 tbsp of syrup – maple / agave etc (I used coconut nectar)

Begin by mixing the flours and baking powder together in a bowl. Add the coconut milk, 1/4 cup of water if using and the extract / desiccated coconut and combine well. Heat a frying pan to medium high, add the oil for frying then pour out the batter to your desired pancake size. While the pancake is frying you can add a few chopped strawberries into the batter before flipping. Keep the pancakes under the grill to keep warm as you use all the remaining batter. Plate up the pancakes spread with coconut butter and top with chopped fresh strawberries. Pour over your syrup and dig in!

These were delicious, the subtle coconut flavour pairs so well with the sweet strawberries and the pancakes themselves are lovely and spongy with an almost custardy taste from the gram flour, yum!

We decided to have a trip into town for a coffee, it was chucking it down again! Outfit of the Day:

Trench: Debenhams, coral tee: Topshop, turquoise and gold necklace: Forever 21, tan leather belt: Topshop, tan leather bag: Mango, turquoise ring: Forever 21, skinny jeans: H&M, tan leather boots: ASOS.

I got the trench out again, hope this weather improves soon!

Lunch was leftover roasted veggies with a baked sweet potato, hummus and salad. It was delicious, I’m not sure if this is what made me ill but 2 hours after eating this I started feeling very poorly indeed :-(

However I am lucky as whenever I tend to get a poorly tummy it never seems to last much longer than a few hours. By 7pm I was craving peanut butter so I knew I was on the mend. I decided to make myself a Cure All Green Smoothie:

This contained romaine, spring cabbage, frozen banana, frozen mango, ridiculous amounts of crunchy peanut butter, coconut water (for rehydration), spirulina, ground ginger (can help combat nausea). I then topped it with chopped crystallised ginger (again, for the nausea) plus freeze dried berries and chocolate covered sunflower seeds, cause a girl needs some form of chocy when she’s feeling sorry for herself! This was perfect though, it really settled my poor tummy. After I ate this I started feeling so much better, I was actually ravenous so had a bowl of granola with apple and coconut milk too.

This morning I felt almost back to my usual self so started the day with Yoga For Runners. I followed that with a green juice containing cucumber, celery, lemon and ginger. A little later I had this wonderful bowl of muesli:

Two chopped apples, my home mix muesli, brown rice puffs and kara coconut milk. I love how the chia seeds and oats in the muesli absorb the milk!

This evening I headed to the gym and did 30 minutes of cardio intervals on the usual machines before heading to my body pump class, unfortunately the instructor didn’t show up! I was gutted as I had been really looking forward to the class. I ended up just doing a few squats, lunges, rows etc with the bars on my own instead.

Dinner was whole wheat spaghetti with spiralised courgettes and a lentil, tomato and mushroom sauce topped with fresh basil and olives:

Such a great meal! Dessert was a pumped up version of my raw cacao coconut frappe in a bowl as I used a scoop of chocolate sun warrior protein powder instead of the cacao for the added protein post workout:

So good!

I know that for a lot of people dry toast is all they can stomach when they are ill but that green smoothie really did the trick for me! What is your cure all meal when you’ve been ill?

Hi everyone, how we all doing? Have you had a good weekend? Mine has been pretty good despite being a bit of a catch up weekend. I have managed to do a lot of tasks that needed to be sorted including completing two assignments for my Diet and Nutrition advisors course, washing, ironing, cleaning etc. Oh what a glamorous life I lead!

I decided that I would get my long run out of the way first thing on Saturday so I set out nice and early and got into a good running groove. I was astonished when I looked down at my Garmin at the 6 mile mark and saw my pace, I was doing really well! This pushed me to keep up the pace for the rest of my route and I ended up doing 11 miles in 1hr 40 with an average pace of 9.05. This was my personal best run ever! Considering that last week I did the same route only slightly shorter (10 miles) and had an average pace of 9.40 this was just awesome! It also means that if I can keep to that kind of pace I will be able to achieve a sub 2 hour half marathon :-)

Well tasty weekend eats have included:

Giant smoothie with romaine, spinach, small frozen banana, pear, 2 apricots, 2 tbsp of choc-a-lot Vega protein powder, hemp milk, ice, maca, mesquite, xanthan and guar gums then topped with treacle granola and gojis:

Yummy as always!

My home mix muesli with hemp milk, strawberries and blueberries. I had a big muesli craving and this giant bowl hit the spot!

Green juices (in my new Kilner jar for storing home made nut milks) cucumber, celery, broccoli, rhubarb, lemon, ginger. I had a couple of random rhubarb stalks in the fridge to use, they juice very well!

Awesome socca wrap: herbed socca wrap fried in coconut oil with parsley and basil filled with sunflower seed butter, chopped apple and alfalfa sprouts with rest of apple and a chopped red pepper:

So so good, I’ve discovered that the perfect ratio for getting the socca the right thickness for a wrap is 1/3 cup of gram flour mixed with 1/2 cup of water – this makes it a bit thinner than the half and half mix.

Salad beast containing romaine, red pepper, carrot, sugar snaps, cucumber, alfalfa sprouts, raw rosemary crackers with Appetite for Reductions Green Onion Miso Dressing:

I liked this dressing, although not as much as other dressings I’ve made recently from Choosing Raw.

Smoked sesame tofu with buckwheat on top of stir fried (in coconut oil) pak choy, broccoli, mushrooms and cauliflower with Green Onion Miso Dressing and shoyu:

This was delicious, the stir fried veggies were great and went really well with the sauce.

More smoked tofu, this time with roast broccoli and asparagus, buckwheat and a spicy lime ginger peanut sauce (1 tbsp of smooth pb, hot water, lime juice, lazy chilli, fresh minced ginger, shoyu), nom!

Cacao Coconut Frappe made with instant coconut milk:

I really don’t have the words to explain how good this is!

Reese miniature dark chocolate cups snackies:

What can I say, these are just little pieces of heaven. I can’t wait to melt them into a bowl of porridge!

So much deliciousness this weekend :-) I’ve also made a tasty dip and soup – more on those tomorrow!

Since I’ve spent the majority of the weekend on the sofa in my sweat pants and therefore have no Outfit of the Day for you, I thought I’d share a couple of items on my current fashion wish list:

High waist mid wash denim shorts – Dorothy Perkins £23

I love these high waist style shorts for a twist on a classic.

Cropped striped blazer, People Tree@ ASOS, £85

I really fancy a nice striped blazer that can be dressed up or down. This cropped style is gorgeous but I’ll probably look for something more affordable on the high street. Silver sandals – Topshop, £28

I just love these style of sandals! Again, I will probably shop about and see what I can find – I also love jewelled sandals for a bit of bling.

Essie Nail Polish in Mint Candy Apple

This is my favourite nail colour at the moment, so fresh and spring like!

I just hope that the weather gets warm enough to wear these soon! I’m dying to be able to wear shorts and sandals but its just been too cold recently.

What’s on your current fashion / make up wish list?

Hello everyone, hope you’ve had an enjoyable weekend! Anyone been up to anything exciting?

I have had a lovely weekend despite the rain, yesterday I met the lovely Jessica for a coffee. Jessica was absolutely adorable, I felt like I already knew her so well! I feel like I could have talked to her for hours about blog related stuff, and just like when I met Nicky, it really is great to be able to talk to someone face to face who understands the world of green smoothies, protein powders and kabocha squash!

I tried to dress at least half decent on Saturday but I was having a bad hair day along with the fact that my wardrobe is now filled with summer clothes not best for this wet weather! OOTD:

 Nautical hair pins: Accessorize, anchor necklace: Accessorize, striped tee: Zara, black blazer: Oasis, wide tan belt: Topshop, orange bag: Dorothy Perkins, skinny jeans: H&M, black boots: New Look.

I avoided the rain yesterday and ran this morning instead. I changed up my usual route a bit to one that included a few hills. I have to say I really had to drag myself out this morning but once I was out I felt loads better. I did 11.2 miles in 1.41 with an average pace of 9.05. Not my fastest recently but still pretty good!

Saturday’s breakfast was an amazing bowl of Cherry Almond Oats! I used 1/2 cup of scottish oats and 2 1/2 cups of water cooked in the microwave with 1 tbsp of ground flax, agave syrup, defrosted frozen cherries, almond extract, almond butter and flaked almonds:

I also enjoyed a big mug of sweet black amaretto tea with this. It was a fantastic breakfast, cherries and almonds are a match made in heaven!

I had a huge post run tropical green smoothie containing lots of kale, half a large pineapple, frozen banana, scoop of vanilla sun warrior, spirulina, maca, mesquite, coconut water, ice, xanthan and guar gums and topped with hemp seeds, coconut shreds and desiccated coconut plus freeze dried berries:

This was such a good smoothie, so sweet from the pineapple and coconut water!

I’ve had a big craving for giant veggie packed meals this weekend. I had a really good salad today containing romaine, carrot, red pepper, cucumber, sugar snaps, red onion, roasted soya nuts, pumpkin seeds, cranberries, humnut sauce (hummus, nutritional yeast and water mixed into a dressing) and lots of braggs liquid aminos:

I’ve had a voracious appetite this weekend that only big volume meals like this have been able to satisfy! 

For last nights dinner I decided to give the smoked tofu another try and stir fried it with black rice noodles, kale, asparagus, spring greens, asparagus, diakon, carrot, ginger, shoyu and gomasio:

I actually much preferred the smoked tofu stir fried and crispy this time, delicious!

This evenings dinner was 2 Linda McCartney veggie sausages with a baked sweet potato, steamed greens, broccoli and asparagus plus miso gravy:

The miso gravy was a bit of a randomly concocted mix of barley miso, sweet white miso, arrowroot, hot water and a pinch of dried sage, it was fab! Those sausages are one of the only faux meat type products I really like so are nice to have occasionally.

I’ve also had some tasty desserts including my raw cacao coconut frappe thickened up and served in a bowl topped with coconut flour sauce (coconut flour mixed with water and coconut nectar for added sweetness) and chopped chocolate adora calcium disc:

This was so good, another volume meal to fill me up! I also rescued one of my veganised sinless brownies from the freezer this evening:

Perfectly fudgey!

Today I feel like I’ve never stopped, I had my lovely Dad round for Father’s Day plus I’ve been doing a bit of work from home as well as another assignment for my Diet and Nutrition Advisor course. We have been watching movies as I’ve been working, James fancied a Simon Pegg and Nick Frost fest so we have watched Shaun of the Dead, Hot Fuzz and we are about to watch Paul. Perfect rainy weekend activities I think! As well as movie fests I also love spending time in the kitchen on a rainy weekend, especially baking! What is your favourite way to spend a rainy weekend?