Getting into the pool again

Despite having a short break last week, I took today off, mainly to meet up with my aunt for lunch at The Parson's Nose. My mum came along too. We had a pretty good lunch, steamed mussels, haddock and peas and blackberry and apple crumble with ice-cream for me, and an espresso to wrap it up. I took advantage of my day off in other ways, as I was really tired this week, I took the chance to have a real lie in, until 9 am, then I headed to the pool for a long overdue watery workout. I got there about 10 and swam about 12 or 14 lengths (wasn't counting). It was hard! Mostly to get my breathing right. After a while though, a group of school kids arrived so I had to either decide to leave the main section of the pool and go to a sectioned off lane (where even the slowest is too fast for me) or go to the diving pool, which is about 10m squared and 4-5m deep. It's used alternatively for diving and aquajogging. I swam around a few times but got fed up trying to breathe so tried some aquajogging, but I didn't bother with the belt. It was a great workout, and combined with swimming in the diving pool, I ended up spending 55 min in there (I took a 5 min break to stew in the sauna). I really enjoyed it as I was in the water with the great resistance it offers but no impact and yet I had my head out of the water. I think this might be a good way to workout through the rest of the winter and give my dodgy right hip and left foot a rest while maintaining my running fitness. A great workout with none of the cold and wind of winter, and despite the intensity, I found it really relaxing! Next time, though, I will use the belt, as I think it's really essential for maintaining good form. I think it will be an end to my frustration with watery workouts- I love water, but I really do suck at swimming.

After the workout, I was pretty hungry, as with the lie-in, I hadn't had breakfast. So I enjoyed my huge lunch! I had no appetite for dinner later in the day, I had a bit of ginger cake with yogurt and raspberries when I got peckish this evening:

I'm now enjoying some friday night wine while catching up on blogs etc.

Here are a few random eats from earlier in the week that I didn't post about:

Homemade muesli

Rolled oats, flaked almonds, dried blueberries, vostizza raisins and banana chips. Eaten with frozen raspberries and yogurt.

Ginger cake, baked in the oven with tinned peaches and frozen raspberries as a quick fire dessert, served with Green & Black's ice-cream that I battled through rain and gale to buy.

Have a great weekend! I intend to hit up the aqua jogging pool again, and hang in my new favourite coffee shop in Belfast: Espresso Elements. Sorry Starbucks, think my coffee addiction found its true soul mate:)

Indulgent Sunday

After such a nutritious evening meal, I woke up to coffee (after a big glass of water had made its way down). Oh well, it's sunday. I added a little naughty to this, a teaspoon of drinking chocolate mix (basically sugar and cocoa powder). I sipped on it and while bashing up some pre-soaked brown rice for porridge.


I stirred in a sliced banana and cinnamon sugar, and topped it with plain soya yogurt. I thought apples and raisins would have been healthier, but I was craving the creamy sweetness of banana and some cinnamon set it off wonderfully.




After a nice walk this afternoon, I called into the offlicense (liquor store) at the top of my street, The Vineyard. A colleague in work gets me to pick up Sierra Navada. Unfortunately, they were out, it's very popular because they're the only stockists in Northern Ireland. While there, I couldn't help picking up these:



I'm keeping the spiced cider for my birthday, but I had the banana bread beer tonight. It wasn't bananey at all, but it was nice beer anyway. It was a barley based beer.

After such low fat and relatively low protein meals (miso soup and rice), I was in the mood for some fat. I made some tofu scramble with a big scoop of homemade pesto to fatten it up. I added in some mixed spice seasoning, turmeric and 1/4 cup nutritional yeast to a block of silken tofu, mashed it up in a bowl, and added to the pan.







Mmm. I was naughty and had more bread. This is quite nice bread, it's choc full of flax seeds. I think gluten twice a week shouldn't do me much harm, but I can take it or leave it. It's nice to have the freedom though.

While my super hot dinner was cooling, a did a little cheaty gluten free baking. I'm still a bit unsure about gluten free flours, as vegan baking is a minefield big enough, so I tried out this Hale & Hearty brownie mix. There are instructions on the back for a vegan version, but I veganised the ordinary recipe with Orgran No Egg, sunflower margarine and soya milk. I added frozen black cherries in to the mix.


These turned out so good! Very light, no funkiness from the gluten free flours. There were little flakes of chocolate in the mix that melted completely. I topped it off with vanilla Swedish Glace and some chocolate sauce (syrup and cocoa powder and a little soya milk heated up)


I really enjoyed my food this weekend, for the first time in ages! My tummy is a bit bubbly after all that food and beer this evening, compared to after the soup last night that sat with me perfectly. But I think the pleasure of the richer food is worth the little bit of bloat it causes, as long as it's an occasional treat. Sensory/mental stimulation isn't the main point of food (that's the problem with emotional eating) but getting enjoyment out of food is deeply human, it affirms we're beings with more than just a physical experience.
All in all, it's been a very relaxing, enjoyable weekend, leaving me ready to face the week ahead!