Healthy(ish) Friday vs Sugary Saturday

I had been planning to do this as a comparison style post for each meal, but realised that would limit my inane chatter...can't have that! Let's just say the last 2 days have been very different to each other. And as I'm currently sitting here feeling very bloated and yucky, I think it's safe to say my body prefers me to eat more healthily!

Yesterday's breakfast was a gorgeous bowl of porridge. I kept the porridge simple - just oats, milk and vanilla extract - then topped it with (ugly but yummy) grilled banana, flaked coconut and Meridian peanut butter...

I got this idea when searching blogs a while back for porridge combinations, from Clean Eating Chelsey, looking at it again just now to find the link...a) her's looks way better than mine and b) it was a pumpkin porridge version...I'd only remembered the topping. Healthy, filling and delicious nonetheless...this kept me going until lunch...

...which was an amazing salad...most of a bag of Co-Op's Beetroot Salad - shredded beetroot, red chard, spinach and apollo leaves - topped with a huge chopped avocado and prawns mixed with mayonnaise...

this was so pretty! And tasted divine! I love the combination of creamy avocado and prawn mayonnaise anyway, but the addition of interest salad just made it even more special! :) I discovered after eating (doh!) that it was 600 calories due to the size of the avocado - it was filling but not that filling! It was still pretty healthy though so all good :)

Unfortunately when Liam went to work, my afternoon descended into a sugar spiral...

the chocolate was lovely, the flapjacks unnecessary...especially as I ate all 4 in about 15 minutes (doing the trick of leaving the box on the table each time so I had to get up to get another one, else it would've been quicker!) oops! I'm calling it research though - my Mum bought these for me and asked me to make her a healthier version...so I get to eat the flapjacks laden with condensed milk, demerara sugar, honey and  golden syrup...before making a healthier version not for me...thanks Mum!! :-p

Last night I had planned to make Laura's Socca for dinner, but after all that sugar I wasn't particularly hungry and didn't have the energy to cook dinner and do baking for Mum...so baking won. I did lots of picking on leftover vegan fudge etc though so didn't go hungry!

So, baking...

Re-vamped apricot and almond flapjacks

150g butter
100g apricot fruit spread/jam (I used Meridian's which is sweetened with fruit juice rather than sugar)
40g black strap molasses (although this gave a bit of a funny taste so will try something different next time...is Sweet Freedom ok in baking?)
250g porridge oats
75g apricots, chopped (I used Organic ones my Mum had "donated" for her baking, so lovely natural colour)
30g almonds, chopped

First, get the butter, fruit spread and molasses...

and melt in the microwave until smooth (you could do on the hob, but pans are harder to wash up and we have no dishwasher!)

while this is melting, chop up apricots and almonds...

add oats, fruit and nut into melted butter/jam/molasses mix and mix it all together...

into a greased cake pan (mine always seems to be too big!)...

and into the oven at 175C for about 25 minutes until it comes out looking like this...

score into pieces (mine made 8 flapjacks for Mum, plus a rough edge for me!) and leave to cool before storing in cake tin...

I'm really pleased with how these turned out. I don't normally make flapjacks at all, let alone experimental ones! Mum informs me that these were really yummy, not particularly sweet which she liked as she's not a sweet fan. She'd like me to keep experimenting until I perfect them though (!) suggesting that next time I try adding some honey to make a stickier consistency!! Lol. It's very frustrating baking and not getting to eat it, but I suppose it is good for my waistline, and she does pay for the ingredients so I can't complain!

Whilst I was making flapjacks, the blender was also whizzing...

making another batch of Katie's sugar free chocolate fudge...

multi-tasking at it's best! This was for Mum again, next time she'd like me to add raisins please!! I don't mind really, her and her partner are both running in the London Marathon this year so are wanting healthy snacks to go alongside their training. I like experimenting and as I'm the only one in my family who would eat these creations, its a good thing they head my Mum's way instead - unlike them I'm not running miles and miles each week to earn the calories to snack all the time!! :)

After all that baking, I was exhausted though so off to bed I went, ready for a "family day" today. It was my first Saturday since I left work - so the first day all 4 of us could spend together since New Year's Day (when the shop was shut), my daughter was so excited to do lots of things together!! And on that note...

...on to Sugary Saturday...

Unlike yesterday's healthy bowl of porridge, today's breakfast was my daughter's choice - pancakes! I only had one as we didn't eat until 9.30am and I was going out for coffee at 10am (more on that in a minute). I had my pancake with lemon juice and sugar...

Yum. I remember as a child my Mum hardly ever used to make pancakes. But on pancake day she would make them before school and after. I used to scoff between 5-8 pancakes (depending on how much batter she made!) and still be ready for more when I got home later! I think my daughter is taking after me - she had 2 pancakes this morning and was very disappointed to learn there were no more left! (she's only 4 so is a slow eater - Liam had scoffed the rest by the time she'd finished her 2nd!!)

This morning, as mentioned above, I went out for coffee and cake. With my Grandma and my little sister. I had a latte and some kind of chocolate-raspberry cake...

this cake was amazing, so rich and chocolatey...

Delish!

After coffee we hit the food shops - Waitrose and Lidl. I bought lots, more than my Grandma and my sister (doing shopping for my Mum) combined! Some of the things I bought...

reduced Bear Granola Nibbles, Sweet Freedom, Vanilla Chai Latte, Agave Nectar, Xanthan Gum, plus some over-packaged veggies...

satsumas, raspberries, mushrooms, peppers and broccoli...as well as the usual milk, cream, kitchen roll, potatoes, bread etc. I seem to have been buying loads of food recently...and this month is the first month in a while that we've gone back to writing down everything we spend...not looking forward to finding out the end of month total!!

This afternoon the 4 of us went swimming, something we haven't managed to do in quite a while. We all had a great time - the baby managed to last about 25 minutes before shivering so much that Liam took him out, and our daughter was even more excited than usual as she was bought her first ever pair of goggles (pink and purple of course!!) so spent lots of time underwater until she began to feel a bit ill!!

After stopping off at Mum's to sample the flapjack (verdict - yummy, but not sweet enough for me) it was time to go home and get on with some more cooking & baking - sugary baking this time! To round of "family day" we had a special dinner planned (including the rarity of pudding other than fruit or yoghurt!) - roast gammon...

and dauphinoise potatoes...

served with broccoli...

followed by a chocolate chip version (Liam doesn't like fruit in puddings) of bread and butter pudding...

mmm stodgy goodness...

Yum!

We've all had a really good day. I'm definitely looking forward to getting back to healthy eating tomorrow though!

And with that I'm going to finish my post abruptly. I'm finally feeling less bloated, 3 hours after stopping eating! But I've just noticed that my laptop's battery power has been slowly decreasing - it says "18% available (plugged in, not charging)" Any ideas?? I've had it before when a power cable/box has died, that the laptop doesn't recognise that it's plugged in at all. But I find it slightly worrying that it recognises that it's plugged in to the power, but isn't doing anything about it?!! Off to back-up all my photos in a panic!!!