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Happy Wednesday everyone, hope your week is going very well!

I’ve decided to show you my eats from last Friday as I remembered to take pics of almost everything, plus my eats fitted in nicely with this months WIAW theme of greens! I started the day with a mug of warm water and the juice from half a lemon plus an orange as a pre gym snack:

I headed to the gym and did a 5 minute warm up on the cross trainer followed by a Base phase workout from Female Body Breakthrough and 20 minutes of HIIT on the step machine and bike. I came home and got ready for work then made some breakfast. I’d been feeling a bit tired the last few days and wanted to make sure I was eating plenty of iron so I made an ‘iron bomb’ smoothie:

This contained kale, 2 nectarines, a scoop of vanilla sun warrior, 1 tbsp of black strap molasses (for added iron), maca powder, ground flax, water and ice then topped with a chopped dried fig (for more iron), hemp seeds and goji berries (goji berries are high in vitamin C which supports iron absorption). I had that bowl plus another half a bowl full! I also made a cup of Bi Luo Chun green tea, kindly sent to me from my sponsors Teavivre:

This has a lovely deep almost smokey taste and its the most beautiful loose leaf tea that looks almost like moss! I know that tea and coffee can hinder the absorption of iron but I’m never sure if that’s the same with green tea – will have to check that one out!

We had decided to set a day aside at work to have a good spring clean of the office which meant that we could all come in our scruffs. I wore my boyfriend jeans and fave Converse!

For lunch I had a big salad of romaine, green pepper, red cabbage and carrot topped with some of my leftover Magic Mix crumbled on top:

I got 6 meals out of that recipe and it kept very well in the fridge all week! Mid afternoon I stopped for a snack of roast salted soya nuts and a pink lady apple:

Once the office was all organised and the bags of rubbish and recycling sorted out I headed into town to stock up on fruit and veggies for the weekend. I went to my favourite green grocers, they have a brilliant selection of fruit and vegetables for excellent prices:

I actually didn’t get those blueberries in the end but got a box of strawberries for 99p instead! Here’s my haul:

All of this for £12! It included:

• bananas
• 6 pink lady apples
• 4 coxes apples
• a huge piece of fresh ginger root
• bunch of beetroot
• cauliflower
• box of strawberries
• broccoli
• celery
• cucumber
• a head of kale
• spring greens
• romaine
• large bunch of parsley
• big savoy cabbage

Of course my haul included a lot of greens! I decided to make use of the kale in my dinner, I ate it raw and just massaged it with a dressing made from sweet white miso and hemp oil. To go with it I roasted some butternut squash, cooked some millet and rescued some chickpeas from the freezer mixed them all together and added some dried cranberries and parsley to the mix:

It tasted wonderful! For dessert I had two sliced persimmon, a chopped apple and half a bar of conscious orange raw chocolate:

I also snacked on several un pictured apples while watching New Girl and reading my book!

I ended up eating kale twice that day which is fine by me as I love it so much! As someone that eats a mostly vegan diet I like to have at least one serving of leafy greens a day to ensure I’m getting plenty of calcium and iron. My favourite way to eat my greens are:

• Green smoothies of course!
• Steamed and sprinkled with soy sauce
• Juiced up with lemon and ginger
• Raw with some kind of nut or seed based dressing like tahini
• Stir fried – my current favourite being stir fried and then simmered in full fat coconut milk with ginger and spices

As someone who needs a lot of volume in what they eat to feel satisfied, greens are perfect for adding to meals for additional fibre and satiety for not too many calories. I just can’t get enough of my greens!

What’s your favourite green veggie?

I’ve been feeling exceptionally spring like this week, we have been enjoying some amazing weather. All of a sudden I’ve started craving things like crisp green apples, refreshing smoothies (well I kind of always crave those), strawberries and asparagus. I can’t wait for the spring to really kick in!

Pretty sunrise!

This has been a good workout week:

• Sunday – AM outdoor run approx 3.5 – 4.5 miles, 30 minute power yoga flow
• Monday – AM 5 min cross trainer warm up, strength workout B from Base phase of Female Body Breakthrough, 10 min HIIT step machine, 10 min HIIT bike
• Tuesday – AM free style yoga, PM 20 min HIIT, Body Pump
• Wednesday – AM 5 min cross trainer warm up, strength workout A from Base phase of Female Body Breakthrough, 10 min HIIT step machine, 10 min HIIT bike
• Thursday – PM Yoga class
• Friday – AM 5 min cross trainer warm up, strength workout B from Base phase of Female Body Breakthrough, 10 min HIIT step machine, 10 min HIIT bike

My yoga class last night was really good, we did some tougher poses that really challenged me and left me feeling really stretched! Food wise I’ve been using up that magic mixture all week, firstly spread inside a herbed socca served with lettuce and alfalfa sprouts:

I also had some spread on home made raw juice pulp crackers with a pile of veggies for lunch:

I’ve also been using up some tins of Amy’s soup I’d been sent ages ago for review:

This was the vegetable and barley soup topped with sprouts and alongside some Lydia’s raw crackers. I also had a tin of the lentil and vegetable soup with blue corn chips on the side for dinner last night:

Both were pretty good for a tinned soup! Of course no week of mine would be complete without a green smoothie or two! I had a massive craving for one yesterday morning so made a light one in a glass to accompany my raw granola and coffee:

The smoothie contained spinach, alfalfa sprouts, a pear and a nectarine blended with water and a few drops of vanilla stevia. I had it along with a bowl of Living Intentions raw cacao granola and some home made almond milk. I also had a green smoothie post workout, a chocolate pear and ginger one made with the amazing new stevia sweetened Chocolate Hemp protein powder from Good Hemp, spinach, sprouts, pear, fresh ginger and topped with dried pear, buckwheaties and bee pollen:

Snacks wise I’ve been enjoying apple and carrot with raw tahini for dipping…

…nectarine and frozen raspberries with home made almond milk…

…and persimmons with raw matcha green tea cookies and a glass of almond milk:

The best raw milk and cookies ever!

Oh and I have to give a special mention to this amazing Gourmet Raw brownie I tried:

This is the Carob Hazelnut and it is amazing, tastes like Nutella in a bar!

On my weekend send off Love List this week…

Popchips! I loved these when I visited NYC and they are now available here in the UK. I was very kindly sent these to review and can’t wait to try all the varieties. They are available from these retailers. Also…

March arriving – and seeing the light at the end of winter // Pinterest – I’ve become even more obsessed this week! //Having a spring clean in my work office and feeling organised!

What have you been loving this week? Are you feeling full of the joys of spring yet?

A few months ago I was pottering about on Tumblr when I came across a fantastic blog called Hipster Food (if your vegan you must check it out!) They had posted about a mixture of cooked lentils, oats and other ingredients that could be made ahead of time and kept in the fridge to be used in various meals throughout the week. I thought this was a brilliant idea and booked marked the details in my Evernote. I’ve always been a fan of cooking up big batches of food at the weekend to eat through the week to save time and this was right up my street. I’ve called this recipe Magic Mixture because it really does have so many uses and can be the base for lots of different flavour combinations.

The Magic Mixture Basic formula (adapted from idea on Hipster Food, vegan, makes about 5 cups):

• 4 cups of cooked beans mashed or blended (with a little water if needed – this would be about 2 tins if not cooking from scratch)
• 1 cup of ground oats
• 1/2 cup of ground nuts (raw or roasted depending on your preference)
• 2 tbsp of ground flax
• 2 tbsp of soy sauce
• 2 tbsp of oil of choice
• Seasonings of choice
• Fresh herbs (optional)

I decided to go with a bit of an Italian pesto flavour. This is what I used for this batch:

• 4 cups of cooked red lentils (2 cups dry lentils cooked in 4 cups of water – as red lentils breakdown in cooking I didn’t blend)
• 1 cup of ground oats (just regular oats processed)
• 1/2 cup of ground pine nuts
• 2 tbsp of ground flax
• 2 tbsp of soy sauce
• 2 tbsp of hemp oil
• 2 tbsp Italian seasoning
• 1 tbsp of garlic powder
• 1/4 cup nutritional yeast
• fresh basil

I started by grinding the oats and nuts in my food processor and setting aside while the lentils cooked…

…once the lentils had cooked and become quite thick I added them to a big bowl along with the oats and pine nuts…

…then I mixed together with all the other ingredients…

…added some chopped basil…

…and left to cool before refrigerating…

Once it has cooled you can keep it in the fridge all week and use it however you like! It firms up quite a bit as well. Here’s a few ideas for how you could use it:

• As a sandwich spread
• Wrap filling
• Baked or fried into a lentil / bean burger
• Baked or fried into ‘meat balls’ for pasta
• Baked into ‘falafel’ and stuffed into a pitta bread
• Crumbled into a salad
• As a topping for a baked potato
• As a dip for veggies
• Spread on crackers as a pate
• Transferred into a loaf pan and baked

I think I’m going to get 5 – 6 meals out of this mix. So far I’ve eaten it warmed up and piled on top of a baked sweet potato accompanied by roast asparagus:

As a pate spread on raw crackers, as pictured at the top of the post. I also baked some of it into balls (200c for 30 minutes) and served them on top of some salad for lunches:

This really is quite delicious, the mix of ingredients and flavours I used for this batch go together brilliantly!

The great thing about this recipe is that you can really play around with the flavours and ingredients. How about using nut butter to replace the ground nuts and oil? Or using chickpeas and adding ground cumin and coriander for a different twist? It is also very very cheap – beans and lentils are super affordable and if your looking for a cheap nut then I would try sunflower seeds or peanut butter, yum!

How would you enjoy the Magic Mixture?