Category: General ramblings

I was contacted by Legal & General asking them to take part in this campaign, and it really got me thinking.

I think when I was younger one thing I was good at was resisting peer pressure. I was never bothered by fashions or what the “cool kids” were doing, and quite liked being different. I think that served me well, and although I am not the most confident person, I am usually confident in my convictions still.

However, of course there are things I would like to have changed. I think I would have told myself two things; to experiment with cooking a bit more, and to find exercise that I enjoyed.

To explain the first piece of advice a bit, I never liked meat at all, and turned into quite a fussy eater. While doing my GCSE’s I had to write a project about a specific diet, so I chose vegetarianism and showed my mum that in fact you could be vegetarian and also still get a balanced diet (she was very worried about my iron levels, which to be fair at one point were very low and I kept going dizzy and feeling faint), so she then let me. She was really good, buying meat replacement foods and things, but I wasn’t a fan and ended up eating a pretty limited diet of mainly pasta with tomato sauce, or beans on toast.  This wasn’t helped by my time at uni- I had long days (9-5 lectures, or teaching placements) and it was an hours bus ride each way, plus a cycle or walk to the bus stop. Often by the time I got home I was too tired and would just have a bit of toast, or at one point I had a phase of having rice pudding and fruit for dinner. Not good! Now I feel I eat a much more varied diet, and I am more willing to try new foods, and I am sure I am healthier too. So I would encourage my younger self to explore new foods to find a bit more balance.

Relating to the second piece of advice, I was always pretty active, but never really found anything I loved. We did lots of family walks and bike rides, and I even did a 5 mile fun run when I was about 10, with my Dad and a friend. I quite liked cycling, and cycled a lot before I learnt to drive, but I was always very nervous on the roads. When I started work I felt I had stopped being so active, so I started going swimming, but I didn’t particularly enjoy it. I am not a strong swimmer, whereas the rest of my family are. I have a huge scar at the top of one of my legs from being smashed against some rocks whilst swimming in the sea in Turkey (we had been on a boat tour, and the boat anchored and you could jump off the boat into the water and swim, but then another boat came into the bay and created these huge waves- everyone else was OK but I was not strong enough to stay away from the rocks- it was very scary anyway- it put me off more). I find swimming so exhausting, plus the chlorine stings my eyes, and my hair soaks up the water and would smell for days after even if I washed it several times. I then attempted the gym, but the equipment was just so boring and I was just plodding along wishing the time away. It was much later that I decided to try to run a 5k- I kept this a secret in case I didn’t manage it, but I did, and at some point during that training plan I started to really enjoy it. Now I consider myself a runner, but to my teenage self this would have been hilarious and unbelievable. I would tell myself to believe in myself a bit more, and give it a go.

What would say to your younger self? If you are on twitter there is a hashtag  #youngerself for taking part in the discussion.

So, the last week of the summer holidays has been and gone. I spent three of the days at work (plus time at home catching up on bits too), but of course have managed to do some non-work related things too.

Of course there has been some running. On Tuesday I had a rather late lunch, and went on a run too soon after, so the 4 miles were not the most enjoyable. Lesson learnt.

On Wednesday I was off to Sweatshop- we did 3 laps of the uni, which could be boring, but luckily someone who runs at a similar speed to me was there (she is a bit faster, but is happy to run at my pace) so we had a nice chat and catch up.

On Thursday I went to pump- the instructor is off for the next three weeks so I decided to go heavier on some of the weights- triceps, squats, chest- regretting that in the morning!

I am still doing the Kinetic Revolution- here is my page if you fancy a nose.

Some food pictures :

I bought an avocado saver (only a few pounds from amazon) and finally got around to using it. Enjoyed half an avocado on rice cakes with some black bean dip (which was super tasty- Black bean and caramelized onions, with roasted red peppers and other tasty stuff in there too).

Bought some coconut collaborative yoghurt from Ocado (saw them in a Waitrose in Kings Cross randomly, but not my local one yet). When I first tried coyo, I liked it. But after that first time each time I tried it I have felt a bit sick. Even bought some again the other week to try it, and I still felt rubbish after. Not sure why. Then decided I would try this stuff- the seed one comes with a little pack to sprinkle on, which I nearly didn’t find. I like it more than coyo, and I also like the smaller pot size. Not sure I will be buying it regularly though.

Tried to take a pic- this one had no use by date, but they all have a date when they were made, so I think I was safe to eat it. 

Andy made a sweet potato chilli- I love this! He has it with brown rice, I have mine with avocado. So tasty (and even better after being frozen and re-heated- we have 4 weeks worth in the freezer now).

Hummus Chips. Another Ocado purchase. These are sundried tomato and basil flavour. Nice, but I don’t get what the fuss is about.

Ordered a trial pack of the “adult” mylks as I loved the chai one so much and fancied trying the green tea flavour. They are taking up space in the fridge at the moment!

Attempted to make a London Fog latte. Earl Grey teabag, vanilla syrup + heated milk.

Almond milk does not froth up like soya milk does. Funny grey colour but a cosy drink for a grey evening.

Why don’t more companies make sour cherry dark chocolate?

My parents keep giving us cheese, so had yet another salad (although I love it, I am not complaning) to use it up- rocket and other leaves, tomatoes, sundried tomatos, avocado, balsamic and fig glaze, wenslydale+cranberries cheese, hummus on a spare rice cake.

French toast is still my new love.

 This morning I went to parkrun with my brother. Last week I ran 28.34, and the week before 29.34, so we were chatting about what a coincidence it was. I tried to run harder, but the start is pretty narrow and now over 300 people are coming regularly, which means it is a bit of a bottleneck. As it is a lapped course, it also doesn’t really empty out until my final lap (as a lot of people have finished by then)- I felt I spent the whole time trying to get past people, and didn’t really get into a stride. I glanced at my watch once, and then decided that it makes me too stressed so I flipped it around so I could not see it. Anyway, crossing the line I knew it was 27 something, but later on got my text to see that my time was 27.34! Exactly one minute faster than last week, and 2 than the week before! What are the chances of that happening? My “subtract sixty seconds streak” will be coming to an end next week I suspect!

Anyway, after popping home to see my parents, I came home for breakfast and then helped Andy with decorating the spare room- I volunteered to do by the skirting boards (as I hate the step ladder) but all that crouching down wore me out (and took a lot longer than I first imagined too- so fiddly)!

Are you a fan of decorating? I don’t mind the actual painting, but I really hate all the moving of furniture that goes before and after. We don’t have a lot of space, and now our living room is full of the shelving units and other stuff that we had to move.

On a side note, Andy’s old phone used to show the weather each day, and light rain was classed as “sprinkles”, which I think sounds so much nicer.

But this post is about a different type of sprinkle.

Sainsbury’s kindly sent me some salad sprinkles and I have been enjoying them on so many meals.

Salad 1:

Pea shoots, cherry tomatoes, avocado, tomato salsa, hummus and Italian sprinkles.

Salad 2: Sliced cos lettuce, cherry tomatoes, avocado, salsa (yes, bought salsa so had to use it on most salads!), hummus and oat cakes, pine nut sprinkles.

Salad 3: Roasted vegetable cous cous, mixed leaves, cherry tomatoes, salsa again, halloumi cheese (grilled for a few minutes), pine nut sprinkles.

Salad 4: Pea shoots, cherry tomatoes, sundried tomatoes, avocado, wenslydale+cranberries, sour dough with sundried tomato+basil hummus (which is my favourite hummus- I am always very happy when I manage to buy some), Italian sprinkles.

Salad 5: Caramelised onion and black bean dip + avocado on ryvita, spinach, tomatoes, pine nut sprinkles, balsamic dressing.

The toasted seed and pine nut one was my favourite- containing sunflower seeds, pumpkin seeds and pine nuts) as it was simple and added such a good crunch.

The Italian style sprinkle was lovely too, with mixed seeds as well as dried red onion and sundried tomatoes for more flavour. Each packet was listed as one serving, but I found them to be pretty generous (25g is a lot of seeds!) so I would say you could easily have them over 3 or 4 meals.

They also sent me a dried fruit & honey seed sprinkle but I keep forgetting to buy yoghurt to put it on, so I shall look forward to that another day.

Do you love a bit of crunch on your salad? If I go to a place with a salad bar I will always add something for crunch, but at home I don’t tend to. We have pine nuts which we have on pesto pasta, so I don’t like adding them to salads as then they get used up too quickly! I also like it when you can add a few dried cranberries or raisins, but again when I make salads at home I forget about add-ons like that.

* I was sent the salad sprinkles in exchange for a blog post, and was sent a voucher to purchase additional salad items with.