Food and Cookbook Deliveries

Hello everyone, happy Friday! I hope you all have nice plans for the weekend? :)

I have been a lucky girl in the last couple of weeks - I've received lots of deliveries (some paid for, a couple not) - I love getting post, especially when it's to do with food!! :-D

First, two weeks ago we got a veg box for the first time in a while...

Fruit - pineapple, melon, apples, pears, bananas and nectarines:

Salad - tomatoes, carrots, mushrooms and lettuce:

Veg - potatoes, swede (edit: or even a celeriac...thanks to whoever pointed out my typo!!), cabbage, onions, courgettes and runner beans:

They also sent us a freebie box containing cooked beetroot, eggs and spinach - all things I use regularly:

Thanks 5 a day box!

Next up is an order I placed on Amazon and was very excited to receive - cookbooks from three lovely ladies!

The first book I read was Mama Pea's Peas and Thank You. I love the mix of family stories, great recipes, and photos in this book. I have already made Cashew Carrot Ginger Soup (p.67), Teriyaki Tofu (p.163), and Macaroni Cheese (p.183)...all delicious!

Next up was Tina's Carrots 'N' Cake. I'm half way through reading this at the moment. There aren't as many recipes or any photos, but I'm really enjoying learning more about Tina - she tells her life story in a very down to earth way. The recipes she does share sound easy to make and delicious - I have plans to make her Edamame Guacamole (p.115) and the Chocolate Pumpkin Loaf (p.128) very soon!

Finally, Lindsay's Happy Herbivore Cookbook. I've only had time to flick through this one so far, but what I have seen looks great! The book, like her blog, focuses on low-fat vegan recipes, and has a good mix of recipes and photos - I do like to see what the finished result is meant to look like. I particularly like the sound of her Mexican Chorizo (p.147) using my favourite - quinoa - and I can't wait to make the Pumpkin Cheesecake (p.221) - I'm loving all things pumpkin at the moment!

Do you have any of these cookbooks? Or any other cook books you've read recently and would recommend? I'm glad I bought all these books, although Liam might not agree, haha - I do already own a lot of cookbooks!!

My next delivery was brought to me by my Dad - he went to Wholefoods in Kensington for me! :-D He managed to find a lot of the things I asked for, plus a few other snack bars he chose by himself - thanks Dad :) He got me Lucuma Powder and Maca Powder...

I haven't used these yet, but I will soon - I keep forgetting about them when I'm making smoothies quickly in the mornings!

He also bought me three jars of Dark Chocolate Dreams...

I'm already most of the way through the first of these jars, but seeing as I've had these for nine whole days already, I think that's pretty restrained (!) I did have a little incident with the jar and a spoon earlier this week, mmm, love it.

The final thing my Dad bought was lots and lots of snack bars:

So far I've eaten two Pulsin' raw chocolate brownies, which I love, one Pulsin' bliss bar which was quite nice, but I missed the nutty chunks that the brownie has, and one Cliff crunchy peanut butter bar which I wasn't so keen on - it tasted a bit too "protein bar" for me. Will try again soon though, I want to try one of the Mule bars next too - I've never had one of those before.

My final deliveries came from iHerb. Yesterday a package arrived which I hadn't ordered nor been charged for. I was a bit confused so I emailed iHerb - turns out an email had got lost somewhere in cyberspace saying that this was a gift for a previous post I'd written about them! Thank you so much iHerb! :) They sent me Justin's chocolate peanut butter, almond flour, and coconut palm sugar crystals...

I wanted to dig in to the Justin's chocolate peanut butter straight away, but then I remembered that I already have a DCD jar open so I restrained myself - having two jars of chocolate peanut butter open at once would be asking for trouble!!! Justin's will be next though! :) I did use the coconut palm sugar on this morning's breakfast - pumpkin porridge, topped with coconut sugar, blueberries and desiccated coconut...

This reminded me of the porridge covered in brown sugar I used to have as a child, but with a slightly lighter taste. Liam liked the look of the sugar crystals too, so I will see what he thinks later. Also, look at the coconut - I bought a few of those jars to organise my cupboard a bit better, need to buy some more jars though as I filled them all too easily!!

The final delivery came this morning - another iHerb delivery, albeit one I'd actually ordered myself this time. It still took me by surprise though - in the past, my iHerb orders have taken 13-14 days to arrive (using International airmail delivery). The gift parcel I received yesterday took 3 weeks to get here, but I only placed this order 9 days ago! Speedy! I mainly ordered to replace my beloved peanut flour which I'm almost all out of, but I couldn't resist making the weight up to 4lbs by adding in a small bag of apple crisps and a bag of freeze dried strawberries...

I can't wait to try these. I'm trying to avoid snacking today as I'm going out for dinner with Liam tonight (a very rare occurrence!) but I'm sure at least one of these bags will be opened tomorrow.

Phew, I hadn't realised quite how much money I'd spent over the last couple of weeks! With Liam's new job, he will be taking a slight pay drop, so I should probably be a bit more careful with my spending from now on. Some foods have become "essentials" to me now though!

Have you shopped at iHerb or Wholefoods before? Any foods that you buy time and time again? I've never been to a Wholefoods myself (sob!) so I have to rely on my Dad to shop for me - I do always ask him to pick me up some Dark Chocolate Dreams though, love it. On iHerb, I always stock up on vanilla Stevia drops, peanut flour and coconut butter as I don't like running out of any of those things. Because of the 4lb weight limit for cheaper delivery, I end up placing a small order every few weeks, which is when small products like the apple crisps also creep in!

Home Sweet Home

When we got home this afternoon, I was greeted by this on the doorstep...

My iHerb order a day earlier than I was expecting!

This is the 3rd time I've ordered now, and I use airmail delivery (much cheaper, so long as your order weighs less than 4lbs). The last two times my order took 14 days to arrive...yey for only 13 this time!! Although I'm not so sure about the freebie - some kind of mushroom coffee??! It's the same as I got in my 1st order, and last time I received the hot chocolate version...Has anyone received the same samples? And tried them??

Aside from the freebies, my order looked like this...

Peanut butter filled pretzels (a random item I added in because I had some weight allowance left!!), lots of stevia - I'm loving stevia sweetened coffees at the moment! I bought two more bottles of vanilla stevia drops, and one bottle of cocoa stevia drops to try. And finally, a jar of sunflower seed butter - I've heard great things about this so I have high hopes!!

We had a great time away - I will write a few blog posts about it over the next few days - but I think we're all glad to be home. The kids are certainly pleased to have more space to relax in!!

The mobile home we stayed in was nice, but a bit on the small side!

Once we'd unloaded the car of all our suitcases etc (there would have been no room for any shopping else!) we headed to Waitrose to re-stock our fridge! After a few days away, eating lots of stodgy carbs, all I really wanted was fruit and veg! We picked up some bargainous grapes...

Because of the 2 for £5 offer, the reduction made the grapes 22p total for both packs...gotta love staff shopping!! :) These went straight in the freezer - I have been loving frozen grapes recently, so refreshing!! We also picked up reduced plums and blueberries, as well as full priced nectarines, apples, bananas, spinach, courgettes, sweet potatoes etc...lots of fresh produce for us to enjoy this week!

We did also pick up some convenience food - Liam and I were both way too tired to contemplate "proper" cooking tonight, so fresh pasta it was!

Two packs of goats cheese and caramelised red onion fresh pasta that were on offer, and roasted pepper pesto sauce that was reduced...I was loving the bargains today!! This made a simple, delicious dinner that was ready in just a few minutes...

I loved the pesto sauce - lots of yummy pine nuts in it! :)

Question time! Whilst I'm talking about food and orders, does anyone have any suggestions for foods to buy from Wholefoods Kensington?? My Dad went to Wholefoods Soho for me a while ago, but this time he is going to be closer to the Kensington one and apparently that one is bigger? :-D I wish I could go myself to browse all the aisles, but as I can't I need your recommendations - my Dad will need a list with pretty specific product names or he will be lost!! Can you get Cliff bars there? I've never even seen them in 'real life' so don't know which flavours you can get in the UK/which are best? And what about Pulsin' bars? I've seen them on quite a few UK blogs, a raw chocolate brownie flavour? I'm not a big fan of protein bars (well Trek ones are the only ones I've tried) so am I likely to like these? So many questions! I liked most of what my Dad bought me last time, but some things (like bee pollen!!) have sat in the cupboard unused so I want to try to just ask for things I'll love and use this time!!

Sunny Weekend

Today is miserable. The weather is grey and rainy. The forecast predicts sunshine for the next 4 days, and then rain again on Saturday. Sigh. And I've eaten way too much food already and it's only 4 o'clock as I start writing this. So I'm going to ignore today and look back at the weekend instead, which was much better!

Saturday got off to a great start with the arrival of my iHerb order!

PB&Co White Chocolate Wonderful and Cinnamon Raisin Swirl, plus a bottle of coconut extract. I also got a random freebie...

has anyone had this before? It seems to be some kind of coffee with mushrooms...I'm a bit dubious to try it to be honest!

I did however get straight on to the very important job of peanut butter testing! First up, White Chocolate Wonderful...

This was super smooth, and super sweet. It reminded me of the fluffernutter sandwiches I used to have as a child! Delicious, but only for those with a sweet tooth!

Next, Cinnamon Raisin Swirl...

This was quite gritty, as if it had brown sugar in it (it doesn't). I've developed a bit of a love-hate relationship with this one...I'm not entirely convinced I love it (it also has a bit of a claggy/sticking to the roof of your mouth texture from the cinnamon) but I keep going back to it - I basically love the taste, and the raisins in it, but am not overly enamoured with the texture of the peanut butter. Shame.

My iHerb order arrived just as I was about to have breakfast. But after numerous spoonfuls of peanut butter (and a latte flavoured with coconut extract) I was rather full! So I had breakfast closer to lunch time instead... Cocoa-banana "porridge" made with quinoa flakes, sweetened with agave nectar and topped with White Chocolate Wonderful...

This was...interesting. I was quite surprised when cooking the quinoa flakes that they opened/spiraled out in the same way that quinoa does. But having said that, I quite liked the texture, and loved the fact they had so much volume - less flakes than I usually use oats produced much more in the bowl...this should have been like a lovely breakfast pudding. The problem was the taste - despite the cocoa, banana, agave and sweet peanut butter, the quinoa flakes still had an overpowering savoury taste that I just couldn't get past. I finished the bowl, but it wasn't particularly pleasant. So any savoury recipes that feature quinoa flakes?? I'd imagine the texture is too liquidy to use in place of regular cooked quinoa, so not really sure what to do with the rest of the bag!

Saturday afternoon, we went to a family fun day out which is sponsored and run by one of the local churches - aside from the alcohol and ice cream van (neither of which we needed) everything was completely free!! The sun came out from behind the morning's clouds so a great afternoon was had! There were so many things for the children to do - three different bouncy castles...

bracelet making...

biscuit decorating...

balloon animals...

face painting...

as well as colouring, free cakes, soft drinks and bacon rolls (Liam was happy as he got to eat mine!) and organised races/tug of war etc. There is also a little play park right next to the field, so baby had a go on the swings before we went home...

Such fun. By the time we got home it was almost the children's bedtime, so quick dinners were in order. I had brown rice pasta with sweetcorn, creme de st agur and chunks of goats' cheese...

Not the most attractive photo, or indeed meal, but it was rich and flavourful, just what I fancied.

Sunday got off to another good start with a yummy breakfast. Gluten-free sweet bread rolls (from my Goodness Direct order), one with PB&Co White Chocolate Wonderful, and one with Cinnamon Raisin Swirl...

with some frozen grapes on the side - the sunshine was out already!

For lunch, the others had leftover tuna sweetcorn pasta so I could have whatever I wanted...that'd be a whole jug of cold smoothie then!

200g frozen berries, 150g frozen pineapple, 250ml milk and some coconut extract... you bet I drank this straight from the jug, with a straw of course to be civilised!! :-p

I then made the most of the sunshine in the garden while the children napped. It was so hot out, bliss! I made sure to wear a strapless top to avoid any more silly strap lines before the wedding day, sensible, see! :) I had some more frozen grapes to cool me down...

I find I eat so much better when the weather is warmer - I naturally want to eat lots more fruit & veggies!

By the way, does anyone into gardening want to identify this tree for me? I'm guessing some kind of plum...

presuming it is a plum tree or something similar, will they be ok to eat? I remember last summer we ignored the tree and eventually the fruit went all sticky and attracted loads of flies...annoying as well as wasteful!

Anyway, back to the food! After a while in the sun I came inside to cool off, and eat of course. More peanut butter...

and mushrooms with houmous...

Once Liam got home from work, we went to a BBQ at his Auntie's house. No photos of my food (they thought I was weird enough not eating meat!) but I ate lots of salad with a few vegetable kebabs they'd made, and some basil tofu I'd brought with me. Plus several plastic cups of Pimms! Liam's Aunt has a huge garden, which the children loved, especially as it included a trampoline!

There was also birthday cake for Liam's cousin, baby was getting a bit tired by this time but still managed to eat cake!

Phew, another good day and another late bedtime - we didn't get home until gone 8pm when the children are normally in bed by 7pm! All good fun though, nice to make the most of the sunshine :)

And with that, I will finish this post. As I've mentioned, today hasn't been so good weather or food-wise. I'm off to circuits in an hour or so though so hopefully that will help to get me back on the healthy track! How have all your weekends been? Favourite thing you've done? From a selfish point of view, mine was probably the time in the sun by myself when the children were sleeping, bliss! Both afternoon outings were good too though, the children had so much fun which is great to see.