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My weekend starts today and I’m so pleased – I really feel like I need and extra couple of days off this week!

I started my Wednesday at the gym with an awesome treadmill workout. I’ve gradually been increasing my speeds each week so it now looks like this:

• 5 min – 6.0mph (warm up)
• 5 min – 6.6 mph
• 5 min – 7.1 mph
• 5 min – 6.8 mph
• 5 min – 7.3 mph
• 5 min – 30 second intervals 6.8/7.8mph

I was a sweaty mess after this! I then did 30 minutes of intervals on the cross trainer, step machine and bike followed by my abs and core – I’m still rocking that 2 minute plank!

Breakfast was wonderful! I made a delicious porridge with 1/4 cup of oat bran, 1/4 cup of viva pure raw chia super food porridge mix, 1 cup of home made sesame milk, 1/2 cup of water, 1/2 cup of blueberries then topped it with 2 tablespoons of cashew butter and a few fresh sliced strawberries:

This was so good, I loved the creamy texture of the porridge and the flavours from the super food mix tasted amazing.

Lunch was a bowl of my Pea, Broccoli and Pesto soup, a RAW Italian cracker, a pear and an orange:

Mid afternoon snackies were some hummus and carrot and cucumber for dipping. Dinner was last nights Tomato Pearl Barley Seitan Buddha bowl with spinach, raw carrot and basil:

Loving this Buddha bowl meal!

Dessert was two frozen chocolate peanut butter avocado cups and 2 chopped apples:

I added a couple of tablespoons of peanut butter to the usual avocado, agave, raw cacao mix and these tasted divine!

I plan on enjoying my extra couple of days off this week getting caught up on a few things around the flat, doing a monster grocery shop, a big cook up and spending some time just relaxing and reading. I have quite a few books at the moment from the Library:

The China Study:

I’ve always wanted to read this as its been referred to on so many vegan blogs. I’ve started reading some of it and its so interesting. It basically discusses a large body of research that shows how eating a mainly plant based diet can help to prevent a range of illnesses such as cancer, diabetes and heart disease.

Babycakes:

I’m in love with this book already! So many fantastic recipes for vegan baked goodies: cupcakes and brownies here I come!

The Everyday Vegan:

I love Dreena Burton’s Eat Drink and Be Vegan cookbook so fancied checking this out as well.

I also have a book on Vegetarian Sports Nutrition from the lovely Alison to read – I’ve had a quick flick through and know I’m going to find it very useful. I also have some reading to do for the next assignment for my course.

For some reason I tend to enjoy reading cookbooks and more factual books at the moment, I must get back into reading some good fiction!

What’s the last book you read? Have you read any of the books above? What did you think?

It was a perfect autumn morning when I woke up – bright but chilly and fresh. I’m so happy that its now officially autumn!

I started my day with a speedy run on the treadmill at the gym. I did:

0 – 0.5 miles – 6mph

0.5 – 1 miles – 6.5mph

1 – 1.5 miles – 7mph

1.5 – 2 miles – 6.5 with 30 sec sprints to 7.5mph

2 – 2.5 miles – 6.2mph

2.5 – 3 miles – 6.7mph

3 – 3.5 miles – 7.2mph

3.5 – 4 miles – 6.7 with 30 sec sprints at 7.7mph

I knocked that out in just under 36 minutes. I was really happy that I managed to increase my speeds in the 2nd half. I headed home and then stretched with some Yoga for Runners.

I was working late tonight so I decided to start work a little later than usual which meant I could enjoy a lazy breakfast. I made a wonderful smoothie -

Laura’s Supercharged Smoothie (serves one hungry person)

• 1 ripe banana
• Handful of spinach
• 1 1/2 cups of mixed frozen berries
• 1 large tablespoon of crunchy peanut butter
• 1 small pot of Total 0% fat Greek Yoghurt
• Splash of soy milk

Optional supercharged ingredients -

• 1 tablespoon of wheat germ (for more info on wheat germ see here)
• 1/4 teaspoon of matcha green tea powder

For topping: (optional)

• 1/2 teaspoon of raw cacao powder
• 1/2 teaspoon of desicated coconut
• drizzle of maple syrup

Put all the ingredients in a blender and wizz until smooth, serve in a bowl with toppings. Devour!

This was exactly what I needed after my run, perfect for refueling as it contains a great mix of carbs, protein and healthy fats plus antioxidants and vitamins.

For lunch I had some leftovers from last nights dinner: Stir Fried Cauliflower with Tahini Sauce with mixed salad.

I also had three fresh figs

Mid afternoon I snacked on two sliced jazz apples sprinkled with cinnamon and maca powder.

I didn’t get home until 7.30 so I just warmed up some soup for dinner – Courgette and Watercress. I couldn’t even be bothered to put it in a proper bowl!

I then had a couple of frozen chocolate avocado cups sprinkled with coconut for desert.

I’ve also just had another apple to try and fill me up!

Yesterday I was very excited to receive this amazing selection of Dorsets Cereals goodies. I have muesli:

And cereals:

I can not wait to try these varieties out! I’m already a big fan of the Berries and Cherries and Roasted and Toasted muesli. As usual I’ll review as I go then a box of whichever variety is my favourite shall find its way into my big GIVEAWAY prize!

So autumn is here! I love autumn, its pretty much my favourite season. Here is why:

Bright, fresh mornings:

The colours:

 

The fashion:

 

Fruit crumbles (yum!):

Halloween:

Bonfire Night:

 

All images from www.weheartit.com

What’s your favourite thing about autumn?

I can’t believe that its Thursday already! This week seems to have flown over, at least it is not long until the weekend :-)

On Wednesday morning I hit the gym before work for one of the toughest workouts I’ve done in ages! I started with 30 minutes on the treadmill:

• 5 min – 6.0mph (warm up)
• 5 min – 6.8 mph
• 5 min – 7.3 mph
• 5 min – 7 mph
• 5 min – 7.5 mph
• 5 min – 30 second intervals 7mph:8mph

I thought I was going to die by the time I got to the 30 second intervals at the end! I followed that with 10 minutes x 3 of intervals on the cross trainer, bike and rowing machine (total 30 minutes) and my abs and core exercises. This was a proper lung busting workout. I always push myself when I workout, but for the majority of workouts its more around level 6 - 8 on my ‘scale of difficulty’ – the treadmill section of this workout was at level 10! What ‘level’ do you perform most of your workouts at?

Today I was up early again for a quick 15 minute yoga flow from Slim Calm Sexy Yoga – I was feeling really tired but once I’d done this I felt much more awake. Tonight I was at the gym for some upper body weights (the same as in this post) and 30 minutes of intervals on the cardio machines.

My eats have been quite lovely as usual! I indulged in another green smoothie yesterday for breakfast:

This contained kale, 2 pears, frozen strawberries and blueberries, chocolate sun warrior protein powder, maca, mesquite, spirulina, water and xanthan and guar gum for thickness. I topped it with some Rude Health granola, pistachios and flaked almonds. Yummy!

This morning I had a porridge craving so I made up some Rude Health Fruity Date porridge (1/2 cup of porridge, 1/2 cup of hemp milk, 1 cup of water on the stove) and added a chopped apple, some black strap molasses, pumpkin seeds and goji berries:

I picked up the jar of molasses (a by product of refining sugar) on offer last week as I had read that it is a good source of iron as well as calcium. Eating it with the apple and goji berries will have also boosted my intake of the iron as eating vitamin C rich foods with iron rich foods supports its absorption. A quick warning though – the molasses have a very strong taste – it was lovely once stirred in with all the other ingredients but on its own = not so nice! Have you tried blackstrap molasses before? What did you think?

Lunches have been the same smoked sesame tofu salad with peanut, lime and soy dressing (peanut flour, lime juice, soy sauce) plus fruit:

Still loving my salad beasts! This dressing would go equally as well with chicken instead of tofu for non veggies.

Dinner both evenings has been roasted beets, sweet potato and broccoli with mixed seeds, parsley and a balsamic mustard dressing on top of a big pile of spinach:

Sometimes I forget how good simple roasted veggies can be, this was absolutely delicious!

I’ve also enjoyed some frozen chocolate peanut butter avocado cups…

…and a carton of vanilla soy milk blended with some mixed frozen berries and xanthan gum to make a lovely dessert:

I saw some little cartons in the health food shop and thought I’d give them a try:

I don’t buy soy milk on a regular basis now as I don’t want to consume too much soy and prefer to eat my soy as tofu, tofu yoghurt and whole soya beans The carton contained 9.5g of protein – so great for after my workout and tasted fab, especially blended with the berries!

At the weekend I decided to place on order with Goodness Direct as they were offering a pretty good discount deal. While the offer was available I thought I might as well stock up on a few of my harder to find favourite items plus a couple of new things:

I stocked up on more coconut flour, tamari and sesame rice cakes x 2, soya sauce ramen noodles x 3, cocoa mint nakd bars x 4, Suma salted organic crunchy peanut butter, Alara in the garden goji and cranberry muesli, Lizzies treacle and pecan granola, organic soya beans x 2, tropical wholefoods apricot kernals, and a free little snack packet of pumpkin seeds. I’ll be doing my Clearspring review soon but as you can see I love the rice cakes and ramen noodles so much I wanted to buy more! I’m also looking forward to trying the muesli and granola as they both sound delicious!

Although my cupboards are very well stocked my fridge is now barren so I can’t wait to make a trip to the shops tomorrow to re stock on fresh fruit and veggies :-)

Hope you have all had a good week, and everyone here in the UK has enjoyed the nice weather!

I’m still pretty buzzing from that ace workout yesterday, and this evenings was pretty tough too! What was the last super tough workout you did? What made it so tough?

Hello everyone, how are we doing on this fine (but utterly horrible and rainy) Sunday?

I’ve had a pretty brilliant day thanks to the Great North 10K this morning! I was a bit worried when I woke up and saw the horrible rainy weather and to be honest I was on a total downer on the way there and was just not feeling it, especially as I had told my Mam and Dad to just stay home due to the weather.

Perfect pre race breakfast: oats and 10 grain hot cereal mix cooked with water and home made hemp milk, one chopped banana, 2 crumbled raw chai almond energy balls and some agave syrup

Luckily the pre race excitement kicked in and made me feel so much better! The race has been set in Sunderland the last few years has moved to a new home, starting and finishing at Gateshead Stadium.

Gateshead is really my home town and I was especially looking forward to running along the Gateshead quayside past the Baltic Art Gallery (one of my favourite spots) and the Tyne Bridge. James was accompanying me and we parked a short walk from the Stadium. I made a beeline for the toilets as soon as we got there, finding an empty disabled loo to avoid the long lines. I have to say this aspect of race organisation was pretty poor, most of the toilets within the stadium were out of order! After that I made my way to my starting area, I was in the second wave, and unlike the Great North Run I managed to get there in plenty of time! It was chucking it down and quite cold at this point, James was able to wait with me on the other side of the barrier with an umbrella to keep me dry as long as possible!

Once the race got under way I thankfully warmed up and really got into my stride. The first 3k was spent fighting the urge for the toilet, but after that I was ok. I just focused on keeping a good strong steady pace. The rain also let off which made it a whole lot more enjoyable! Towards the end I saw that my pace was pretty good, and entering the stadium I could see that a sub 50 minute time was achievable (which I had never dreamed I could manage, all my times have been around the 54 minute mark). I absolutely sprinted as fast as I could across that line, finishing in 49.57!

James managed to catch a shot of me on my way to the finish line!

I actually felt ready to puke after that! When I looked at my Garmin and saw that I had managed it I was so completely elated :-) According to the Bupa Great Run site I came 66 in my age group and gender which I think is bloody brilliant!

So there we have it, my first successful 10K! I have to say that I really enjoy the 10K distance, obviously I loved the Great North Half Marathon but the 10K seems like the perfect distance to test speed and endurance, at least for me!

Since coming back from Brighton I have been craving raw foods, especially green smoothies, in fact I’ve had one each day! I have been craving less sugary foods so they have tended to include hemp protein or sun warrior and topped with raw nut butters rather than the more indulgent PB&Co nut butters and sweeter spiru-tein protein powders:

Spinach, frozen banana, 2 scoops of vanilla sun warrior, coconut water, barley grass powder, mesquite powder, ice, xanthan and guar gums and topped with raw nut butter sauce using 2 tbsp of raw almond butter mixed with water, goji berries and pistachios.

Today’s post run ‘green’ smoothie containing spinach, beet greens, 1 small raw beet, frozen cherries, home made hemp milk, chocolate sun warrior protein powder, raw cacao powder, barley grass powder, maca, ground flax, ice, xanthan and guar gums and topped with flaked almonds, freeze dried berries and raw brazil nut bliss sauce.

I’ve also been enjoying the usual big salads:

Salad containing romaine, carrot, red pepper, spring onions, sugar snap peas, cucumber, basil tofu and sauerkraut (which I am loving right now!)

Salad containing romaine, red onion, sugar snaps, peppers, carrots, cucumbers, raw crackers and green goddess dressing.

I’ve also been experimenting with some of the squash I brought back from Brighton, first up spaghetti squash!

Spiralised courgette, roast spaghetti squash, roasted tomato and red pepper sauce with lentils and yellow pepper, steamed broccoli and spring greens with shoyu all topped with fresh basil.

I really loved this squash! I don’t see how anyone could realistically use it as a spaghetti alternative, but in its own right I thought it was delicious. I also roasted up the glorious giant kabocha squash I found, so happy to have some to keep me going!

Lots and lots of roast kabocha with adzuki beans and millet, steamed broccoli and spring greens with shoyu and a delicious drizzle of green goddess dressing.

Even though my cravings have tended towards the green and leafy variety I’ve also enjoyed some lovely raw desserts:

Double decker raw tart: frozen sesame chocolate tart on the bottom and frozen chocolate avocado tart on the top, nom!

‘Super food’ pudding: frozen blueberries, home made hemp milk, raw cacao powder, purple corn powder, ice, xanthan and guar gums topped with cacao nibs.

I made the most amazing batch of raw hemp milk using Lana’s quick and easy method with new ingredient sunflower lecithin and sweetened with coconut nectar and it has been amazing!

I have a pretty crazy return to work next week with a couple of late nights and lots of meetings, I think I’m going to enjoy the rest of my day and make the most of being able to chill out!

If your a runner, what’s your favourite race distance? Have you tried spaghetti squash and if so what did you think?

Oh and before I forget, I have been lucky enough to have Keeping Healthy Getting Stylish featured on the Channel4 Food website! How cool is that?!

Hope your all having a great weekend :-)

Thanks for all your lovely comments to yesterdays post! So glad that you are digging the new blog name :-)

Yesterday I made up a batch of my home made almond milk and now that I have some raw cacao I thought it would be fun to make some raw chocolate almond milk! I had some for breakfast with fresh strawberries, Bear Coco Cherry Pie Granola and brown rice puffs plus a vanilla coffee:

This was so good – kind of reminded me of coco pops!

Lunch was leftover wheat berry and feta salad from the weekend with baby spinach and alfalfa sprouts:

I also had a nectarine and grapes:

Mid afternoon I snacked on half a 9 Bar. I didn’t go for the full bar as when I ate the full size last week it felt a bit heavy in my stomach while I was at the gym:

At the gym I did 30 minutes of HIITs and my abs and core exercises including a 1 min 45 sec plank (!), 40 sec side planks then 20 x full sit ups, bicycle crunches, regular crunches, side reaches and mountain climbers x 2 sets. I also did my 30 minute spin class.

Dinner was spiralised courgette with spelt spinach tagliatelle and a tomato and green lentil sauce with garlic, basil and nutritional yeast:

So delicious and filling!

Dessert was two frozen chocolate avocado cups topped with a little blob of almond butter and two sliced apples:

The almond butter tasted great with these, got to love all those healthy fats!

February review and aims for March

February has been a bit of a funny month. It started with some controversy after I posted about my January detox and continued weight loss. I responded with my Finding Balance post. My aim this month was not to lose any more weight and I’m glad to report that I have maintained last months weight of 8st 11lbs (123lbs). I did have a sneaky weigh in mid month and I had gained a couple of pounds probably due to eating out a few times but obviously by the end of the month that has dropped off again.

I have tried to make an effort to eat a little differently including adding in a few more carbs. I’ve ate more pasta and couscous this month than I have in the last year! I’m not going to lie, I have found it difficult and I am still struggling with anxiety when the numbers on the scale increase. I think the more I focus on health over size and weight the better. Next month will see me doing more running and therefore fuelling myself better along with having a crazy appetite after runs so I do hope to see a gain.

Anyway, with all that aside it has been a good month! My training plan has worked well for me and dropping the yoga class mid month was definitely the right thing to do. I have also enjoyed my dumbbell workouts – I’m very happy with the definition in my arms and shoulders:

Yes, I have some mini guns ;-) I feel a bit weird posting pics of my little muscles but I’ve worked hard for them!

February achievements:

• Maintained weight
• Gained muscle definition
• Started running outdoors again
• Signed up for Diet and Nutrition Advisor course
• Changed blog name :-)

Next month I’m looking to increase my outdoor running mileage in preparation for starting a proper half marathon training plan, start body pump classes and work yoga into my general routine. Here’s a rough plan, but as always this is flexible depending upon circumstances, how I’m feeling, work commitments etc:

• Monday – gym workout: 30 min HIITs, 30 min spin, abs and core
• Tuesday – AM – Yoga Podcast (20 min), PM - Body Pump 50 min
• Wednesday – gym workout: 30 min speed work on treadmill, 30 min HIITs, abs and core
• Thursday – AM – Yoga flow from Slim, Calm, Sexy Yoga (20 min), PM gym upper body dumbbell workout, 20 minutes HIITs
• Friday – AM – gym workout 30 min HIITs, abs and core
• Weekend – Long outdoor run – working up from current 6 miles to 8 miles, optional yoga DVD workout

I’m just going to focus on upper body weights in addition to the body pump class as now that I’ll be back to running seriously I don’t want to max out my legs.

Stats for February:

• Weight: 8st 11lbs
• Measurements same as last month
• Average pace on long runs: 9.45
• Total mileage (outdoors): 18 miles

Aims for March:

• Gain or maintain weight
• Continue working towards my overall 2011 goals
• Focus on health over weight or size
• More outdoor running
• Learn to meditate – more on this to follow in a coming post!
• Increase my plank and side plank hold times (currently 1 min 45 sec / 40 sec)

How has February been for you? What have you achieved? What are your aims for March?