Category: Fitness

Jillian Michaels’ Body Revolution Kickstart, Days 1-2

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It’s the end of the second day of Jillian’s seven day kickstart to the Body Revolution, and I am really, really tired. I cheated and jump started the workouts on Wednesday, when I got my kit through, but I had to wait until Friday to get all my groceries. So, I decided to do an extra couple of days of doubled-up exercise before I actually began the programme, and I’m really feeling it today – my fourth day of hour-long exercises. I did not want to get up today, but I did, because I had to go into town with my parents to help my mum pick out some new clothes. Then, I got back and did workout 2 and cardio 1. I have to do them back to back, otherwise there’s just no psyching me up for it! I was totally prepared to half ass it, but Jillian managed to shout me out of that idea, and I gave it as much as I had.

So, that’s where I am with exercises – I thought it was a bit of a pushover at the start, to be honest, but now I’m rethinking slightly! I think a lot of Jillian ‘veterans’ find the first couple of workouts to be fairly easy, but I know she’ll be stepping it up a notch towards the end of this month. I was particularly unhappy to hear the phrase ‘jump lunges’ – probably my least favourite exercise bar cardio in plank (mountain climbers and the like!).

Food wise, it’s going really well actually. I started off on Friday with some delicious bacon, eggs, tomatoes and… avocado…
Nitrate free bacon
Jillian demands nitrate free bacon, so that’s what I got. Very expensive, and thick cut too. I much prefer thin cut bacon, but weirdly it seems like the more expensive the bacon, the thicker the cut. I’d happily pay for thin cut fancy bacon but you can never seem to find it! This was hard enough to find anyway, I had to search through all the product details to find one that’s nitrate free. An unfortunate side effect of this is that the bacon comes out slightly grey when you cook it – the pinkness is mostly due to the addition of nitrates.
Bacon, Avocado and eggs
Still, I’d eat it… wouldn’t you? I added some delicious lemon pepper that we bought on holiday in Cornwall last year. I knew that would come in handy! I wasn’t just buying it willy nilly, promise!
Halzephron Lemon Pepper
Even though there’s not really much reason to do this, I’ve been logging my calories with MyFitnessPal as well as following the diet. I was fairly concerned when my breakfast came up as 343 calories, rather than the 269 calories it was listed as. Yikes! Luckily, it seems as though the rest of the recipes come in way under the estimates given… Or at least, my versions do!
Lunch was the grilled salmon citrus salad – loved this. I really love salmon!
Salmon citrus salad
I probably shouldn’t have, as sodium is a bloater if ever there was one, but I used a simple Japanese recipe to perk this up and really bring out the flavour of the fish. I salted it 15 minutes before eating, then right before cooking, just wiped the salt away, and grilled it. The flavour is amazing.
Salmon citrus salad 2
I have to confess, I slightly overcooked this, so I’ll keep the cooking time to a minimum the next time I make it! It came in at just 184 calories, which is amazing – and I felt full until dinner. Well, the story there is that I didn’t get to eat breakfast until 1pm, so lunch was at 5… Let’s say, I broke Jillian’s ‘no eating after 9pm’ rule right out of the gate, and I also managed to end up eating my snack *after* dinner. I only have myself to blame! I had an epic cleaning session with my mum on the Friday morning, so I just didn’t eat until late. Oh well – you can’t always control the circumstances, but you can control the damage, right? Right!
Dinner was more fish, this time, tilapia!
Raw tilipia
I really like fish, and capers, and rosemary… So this was delicious! The rocket was pretty ropey, though – wild stuff from Ocado, it was absolutely full of insects and had to be washed several times and picked over leaf by leaf before I was happy to eat it. I wasn’t so crazy about having to do this, but there was no way I was chucking it all out!
Rosemary citrus Tilapia
It came with the now-familiar salad with dressing and tomatoes – something makes me think I’ll be sick of lettuce by the end of the week! I tried to buy plenty of varieties, so let’s hope I can stave off the boredom. I also bought Waitrose’s low fat essential vinaigrette, which I quite like, and some low-fat Caesar dressing (in place of Ranch, which really isn’t common in the UK) for the Chef’s Salad later in the week. Again, the calorie count for this was much lower than was listed, at just 184 calories. Then, after that, I had my snack of hummus and veggies.
I am cheating somewhat here, because I just can’t give up tea. I have milk in it, which amounts to a serving of dairy, which on the days where I also have yogurt, is not recommended in the plan. I also have a couple of sugars and some sweetner along the way… GASP! No one’s perfect. That’s right, not even me – I just seem perfect. Big distinction! Needless to say, any failures as a result of this are squarely on me. No one can say I wasn’t warned. I am prepared to face the consequences of my tea drinking like a true Englishwoman – with a stiff upper lip!
Today was Saturday – I cheated again a little bit with my breakfast and had the Greek yogurt, cinnamon and almonds – WITH HONEY! Yes, a teaspoon of honey. I’m so sorry… No, I’m not, because sour Greek yogurt actually makes me feel a tiny bit sick, and I can’t eat bacon and smoked salmon all week long, as much as I’d love to.
Lunch had to be out, because I was in town all day, but luckily, Pret a Manger came to my rescue with their tuna salad, a fair substitute for the Chef’s Salad:
Pret tuna salad
It does help that I *love* this salad, and it’s only about 315 calories with the dressing included.
Now, another confession – I had a cappuccino when I was out. I counted this as my snack, does that make you happy? I sure hope so, because by the time I got home I was starving and exhausted, but I had to grit my teeth, knuckle down, and exercise until I felt like I was going to black out. It was 8pm before I ate, but if that’s okay with Jillian, then I’m counting it as a minor victory. It did help that dinner was steak.
Peppercorn steak on wilted spinach with tomato salad
Mmm, steak! I put steak seasoning on some sirloin and fried it with cooking spray. I’m not grilling a steak in our grill – it’s a pathetic, fake grill and I only honour steak with the mightiest of kitchen utensils – the frying pan. The salad of tomatoes and olives was delicious, and the spinach was pretty good too. Although the recipe title says it comes with wilted spinach, the recipe itself doesn’t really get you to wilt the leaves (other than with the heat of the steak sitting on top), so I took the liberty of wilting them in the pan while the steak was resting. Calorie count: 299 calories.
So, two days down. I’m definitely missing puddings and Coca Cola Zero, although I’m not missing carbs that much. I could eat some fries and bread, but I’m not going to kill my cat to get them. I can’t believe how satisfied I’ve felt just eating various types of salad and a protein portion every meal, it’s really eye-opening. Having the recipes has definitely helped me stay on track in that respect, but then it’s still early in the process and I’ve not had to repeat any meals yet… So, we’ll see! But so far, other than my weary body and aching muscles, I’m feeling very positive and motivated to continue!

Jillian Michaels’ Body Revolution: Preview

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I finally ordered Jillian Michaels’ Body Revolution! I’ve been hankering after this for a long time, and I’m so pleased that I finally got around to getting it. It’s very pricey compared to Jillian’s other products (at £99), but I think it’s a worthwhile investment…

Collection

The programme lasts for 90 days, and contains 12 different weight workouts and three cardio workouts. The reason I was keen to try this particular programme is that it alternates muscle groups – something which Jillian’s other DVDs don’t do. The idea is that you work one group of muscles, and then give them time to rest so that they can rebuild stronger. As I understand it, when you lift weights, you create tiny tears in your muscles, and it’s the rebuilding process, when your body repairs itself, that actually makes your muscles stronger. With more intensive workouts like the 30 Day Shred, you don’t stop to rest between working out groups. I hope that the Body Revolution actually tones my muscles more than I’ve experienced in the past – but first of all, of course, I need to do the workouts first!

The kit comes with three cardboard sleeves, pictured above, which have the DVD collection inside. There are also various booklets that go with it, including a meal guide for her 7-day kickstart programme.

Kickstart cover

Inside are a range of meals for breakfast, lunch, dinner, and snacks for you to eat during a week-long period at the start. Jillian is very clear that you only do this once during the 90 days, as the diet is restrictive, and the exercise schedule is pretty intensive.

Kickstart menu

This is the diet plan I’ll be starting tomorrow, along with the exercise plan. I’m waiting for my shopping to arrive! I’ve bought items to make most of the things listed – the recipes are in the back of the book – so we’ll see how I go from tomorrow… The hardest thing will be avoiding tempting Easter treats! The recipes aren’t low in calories, but I do think they’re very low in carbohydrates. Hopefully there’s enough protein in there to keep me going!

Kickstart workouts

Here’s the workout plan for the first week – I’ve cheated a little bit and I already started yesterday, doing cardio 1 and workout 1. But I aim to start properly tomorrow and then work through until next Friday. Over the weekend I’ll perhaps do cardio again and rest on Sunday, so that I can then start Phase One as it should be on the Monday after Easter.

Here’s what the first month of work outs looks like:

Phase 1 workouts

As you can see, it follows a neat pattern which is pretty easy to understand! I really want to make sure I start it on a Monday, because having a real, set in stone schedule is very important to my ability to stick to it. I think that if I alter the schedule in some way, I’ll start making excuses as to why I can put off doing one of the work outs, so I want to eliminate that risk before I even start! Anyway, each block of exercise is approx 30 minutes, which really isn’t a lot to ask in a day!

Phase 1 discs

This is what I’ll be staring at for the next month! This is the inside of the cardboard sleeve for Phase One.

Here’s the explanation of what exercises are on each disc:

Phase 1

I’ll be back tomorrow to review the first day on the Kickstart plan!

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Graze Nibblebox and Lightbox reviews

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I have to say, Graze have really stepped up their game. The company creates boxes of nibbles and snacks that they send to you (postbox friendly!) on a weekly schedule (or daily, depending on how much you like Grazing!) so you can eat healthily at your desk.
Box

Anyone who has ever tried dieting for any length of time will be able to tell you that healthy eating and low calorie eating are not the same thing. Avocados are a case in point. Full of healthy fats and vitamins, these beautiful little fruits will set you back 160 calories for 100g – about double the calorie count of an apple. Thusly, addicted as I was to Graze’s delicious offerings, I eventually had to cancel. The boxes could be as much as 800 calories a time, and although you’re not supposed to eat them all in go, I have to confess there were times when the lot would disappear over the course of a day. At the time, I wrote to the company to tell them that I had to cancel because of the high calorie content of some of their boxes, and although they promised to look into it, I have to confess I didn’t really believe them.

Inside box

So now it’s time to eat my… well, not words – thoughts? Anyway, since I’ve been gone, Graze has been busy, and so when I got an email offering me some half price boxes as a New Year offer, I was bowled over by their new ranges when I actually checked the site out. I think when I had left Graze was introducing breads, but now they have a delicious range of crackers and dips, and delightful looking bakes, including an entire range dedicated to my favourite British institution – high tea!

Afternoon Infusion

Yes, when they say high tea, they mean it quite literally – they even send you the tea bag! And, it comes guilt-free.

Apple and blackcurrant crumble

As you can see from that logo on the packet in the top right, this is from the Graze Light range. When you sign up, you can select a nibblebox (which I tried first) or one of the Graze nutritionboxes, which comes in three types; the eatwell box, boostbox and lightbox. The lightbox has all of the same great goodies as the nibblebox, except no dark chocolate, or flapjacks. You’ll be sent trays that contain between 50 and 150 calories each (and you get four trays in each delivery).

Sticky Chocolate Pudding

Here’s another little treat I had in my last Graze box – sticky chocolate pudding. For 176 calories, you get a mix of milk chocolate drops, jumbo raisins and green raisins – not too naughty at all, in my opinion! I also highly recommend the Korean rice crackers – it was Graze who originally got me addicted to these beauties, and for that I am eternally grateful to them!

I’m delighted with Graze’s new range – but a little bit disappointed that they no longer offer fresh fruit. I can understand why, because there were times when my fruit turned up a little – well, fizzy. And, sometimes it felt a bit ridiculous working from home and eating grapes that had been posted to me when there was a whole bowl of fruit in the kitchen! Still, I hope that they can include the option for fresh fruit at some point in the future when they can source stuff that stays fresher for longer.

If you want to try Graze yourself for free, use my code! Type in 6KDFWFW at Graze.com, or follow this link: http://www.graze.com/uk/p/6KDFWFW. You’ll get a free Graze box when you sign up, and I’ll get £1 off my next order – now there’s incentive for both of us! Each Graze box costs £3.89, and you can cancel any time you like.

If you already get Graze boxes, let me know what you think!

Graze box

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Fitness Trackers: SlimKicker

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One of the easiest ways to stay in shape, or lose weight to begin with, is to use an internet based fitness tracker. I’ve had great success using MyFitnessPal (and have also tried Spark People and JillianMichaels.com) but I was recently contacted about SlimKicker.com, so I decided to check it out.
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Unlike MyFitnessPal, which encourages a minimum of social interaction, SlimKicker.com really tries to get you involved in the online community, and uses a point reward system to get you to give your fitness and nutrition a boost. Apart from the obvious bump in motivation, this is a brilliant idea because it encourages you to switch up your routine, and try new things. Turning fitness into a game is a sneaky way to get you to work out without realising it! Today, I decided to take on the wall squat challenge, which asks you to do ten wall squats a day for seven days in order to earn 500 points.
Wallsquats
There is even info on the correct form for these squats, and recommendations for how to make it harder – if needed! It might seem simple in the grand scheme of things, but starting off small is the best way to go – how many of us have started ambitious fitness regimes only to see them crumble in the first week? The challenges are divided up into types – willpower, emotional, nutrition, fitness, giveaway and user created. They also have difficulty levels, ranging from 1 all the way up to 20!

You may well ask what the purpose of collecting points is – that’s where the reward system comes in. You post a picture for yourself of your reward, which you give yourself when you reach a certain level. I haven’t quite picked my reward yet, but the website offers suggestions such as a girls’ night out, a cheat meal, a massage, etc.

Rewards

One of the handiest things about MyFitnessPal was always the app, which meant I could add things easily as I went through the day. Luckily, SlimKicker also has an iPhone app, so I downloaded that right away!

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Through the app you can check your profile, log your food, record exercise and weight, and check your progress, as well as manage your challenges and interact with your friends.

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As I’ve been lacking a little in the motivation department recently, I’m going to try out this new app for a week and see if it helps me keep on track!

What fitness trackers do you guys use? Do you find they help you keep to your plans?

(Psst, don’t forget, UK readers can enter my competition to win 12 share bags of Popchips here!)

Alibi Pretox drink: an introduction

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I was recently sent a complimentary box of Alibi pretox drinks to review on the blog, so I thought I’d follow up from my health kick on the 1953 vintage diet to review them!

Now, I’ve never been on a detox in my life – I only occasionally eat rubbish with any regularity (usually during the party season) and I rarely drink, so detoxing doesn’t quite have the urgency to me that it might have to someone who really parties hard (but I am definitely up for trying a detox at some point!). So, the idea of a ‘pretox’ sounded great – prevention is better than a cure, right? And, if all you have to do is sip delicious drinks, then I’m up for it!
Alibi pretox
Alibi comes in two flavours, Sparkling Citrus and Sparkling Pomegranate – which, as you might have guessed, are both fizzy. The citrus flavour is heavy on grapefruit and lime, and very fresh, whereas the pomegranate flavour is a little sweeter. I have to admit, I much preferred the pomegranate when I first tried them, but the citrus has really grown on me. I guess I associate the flavour of grapefruit with health, so that added mental boost gives it a bit of an edge!

Citrus Cut Out

Of coure, there’s more to these drinks than just a nice flavour. They contain 11 vitamins (including 100% of your RDA of vitamin K), three minerals, five herbal extracts and beta glucan (to boost your immunity), making them a great supplement whether you’re dieting or not. The sweet taste comes from stevia – which is sweeter than sugar but contains less calories. I know that artificial sweetners are a bit controversial – I use them a lot, but I am always looking into alternatives, and stevia is definitely something I’ll be trying more of in future.

The whole concept of Alibi is that it’ll boost your body’s defences with its healthy supplements – and I’m definitely a supporter of the idea that dietary supplementation is wise, especially given that the average diet is fairly low on fruit and veg. Even when you’re actively trying to lose weight, it’s always good for your peace of mind to know that you’re still getting some vitamins and minerals from somewhere. Of course, you can’t just drink this instead of following a healthy diet, but it’s great to have an extra safeguard in place.

Unlike many other health or diet drinks, this isn’t low calorie, because it doesn’t contain anything artificial. Coming in at 99 calories, though, it’s hardly going to break your calorie allowance, and you can drink it without worrying about putting weird chemicals into your body!

I’ve been drinking Alibi daily for just under two weeks now, and definitely enjoy my daily dose! As for results, I can’t claim anything earth shattering has happened – but then, I’ve also not been feeling as run down after Christmas as I thought I’d be, either. It was definitely nice to be able to drink something ‘healthy’ that felt like a treat following the Great Christmas Binge, and if you already enjoy fizzy drinks (don’t we all?!) but feel guilty every time you pop a can, substituting Alibi for your normal soda mught be a good way to supplement your diet!

Alibi is available from many stockists in the UK (list here) including Waitrose, Holland and Barrett, GNC and more. You can buy online from Ocado for £1.59 a can, or in packs of 12 from Amazon for £11.99.

Pomegranate Cut Out

The 1953 Vintage Diet: Days Five and Six

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I had to skip a day of the diet on Sunday, as it was my nan’s birthday and we had a lovely roast to celebrate! However, I did follow the diet on Saturday, and I have again today – but I’ll be stopping tomorrow as I have a Hello Fresh delivery coming, and I don’t think they got the memo on what was hip to slim with in 1953!1953diet2

So, on Saturday, I was following Wednesday’s plan, but with my own, cunning changes. As this was the day after deadline, I had an amazing lie-in – I don’t do anything by halves, and I woke up at about 11am. This meant I wasn’t really hungry until lunch, so I had cheese, biscuits and an apple, and saved the mushroom omelette for dinner – where it transformed into a fried egg and some mushrooms on the side, to go with my gammon, pineapple and tomatoes. Very satisfying and delicious – although I must say, I really miss my carbs. This is purely psychological, as it seems weird to me to have gammon without chips. Sigh…

Today, I did Sunday’s plan. THAT’S RIGHT! It was a liquid fast! I have never done one of these before in my life, and I have to say I have been pleasantly surprised at how easy I’ve been finding it. Yes, I could eat something right now – but I’m not actually hungry, even at half ten. I never thought I’d be able to make it a day without food, because there are times when I get weak and faint if I skip breakfast. Somehow, a combination of the fruit and veggie juices and my usual teas and coffees have seen me through.

At lunch time, I had a bottle of amber juice from Sainsbury’s, which contains white grape, orange, carrot, lemon and lime. Dinner consisted of a glass of tomato juice, and a bottle of purple juice, which contains apple, red grape, beetroot and cherry juice. With my teas and coffees, it’s been a scarily low calorie day for me today – but, I certainly haven’t done anything strenuous, and more importantly, I’ll not be continuing this tomorrow, or making a regular thing of it.

(I really feel like adding this in here – if you find yourself skipping meals, bingeing, fasting, detoxing etc, regularly, you may have an eating disorder. Please seek help if you feel like you even begin to go down this road – do not think for one minute I am advocating regular fasts or liquid diets as a way to boost your health or lose weight. Always talk to your doctor before you follow any dieting plan.)

Thus ends my 1953 vintage diet. Despite what many people think, I don’t believe for one minute that ‘the olden times’ were a golden era for a positive body images, nor a haven from the diet-obsessed culture we live in today. Hollywood stars were famously thin (even Marilyn Monroe, heralded as a ‘size 16’ would be a size 6 or 8 in modern times – you’d have to be blind, or conveniently overlooking her incredibly tiny waist to consider her a patron for fuller figured women, quite honestly). Take a look at movie costumes of the period, and you’ll see that women were under just as much pressure then as now to be skinny – and even Photoshopping had its origins in this era, as airbrushing was just as ruthlessly efficient at removing excess fat and smoothing over blemished skin. Yes, the body shape may have changed, and curvier women certainly had their heyday in these golden decades, before the androgynous looks of the ’90s kicked in, but these shapes were often created with a combination of hefty support garments and strict dieting regimes (read about Marilyn Monroe’s really rather odd diet here, for example).

Cropped screenshot of Marilyn Monroe from the ...

Cropped screenshot of Marilyn Monroe from the trailer for the film Gentlemen Prefer Blondes (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

The 1953 diet dispenses with carbs in the evening, just like many modern diets suggest, and have you load up on protein where possible, to keep you feeling full. The concentration on milk, fruit juices and processed bread are probably the area where the diet looks the most dated – fruit juices really are empty calories, and most nutritionists would rather you ate the fruit than drank the juice. Also, having a pat of butter on your toast every morning is hilariously quaint – but again, considering how unhealthy many tout margarine as being, I can almost see this coming full circle in time.

One thing conspicuous by its absence here is advice about exercising. There is one small note prompting readers to write to Diana Day for some exercises to accompany the diet, but there’s really no other advice on the subject. Was this written for housewives doing physical labour all day long, and therefore diet wasn’t needed? You could certainly argue the case. I’ve heard many a fitness guru state that diet is far more important than exercise, though – as Jillian Michaels often says, you can wipe out an hour in the gym with just one slice of pizza.

In short, there’s nothing new under the sun, and there’s certainly nothing new when it comes to dieting. While I think I’m probably far more educated about nutrition than the average 1953 housewife following this diet, we can still learn a lot by looking backwards – as long as we’re not wearing rose tinted spectacles when we do it! Now, you’ll have to excuse me, because all this talk of food is starting to make me hungry…

The 1953 Vintage Diet: Day Four

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Yesterday was my fourth day on the vintage diet, and as it was my deadline day, it was hectic from start to finish.

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As usual, I didn’t cook anything for breakfast beyond toast, and decided to morph the bacon into ham, and throw in some tomatoes to make a massive salad for lunch. The only veggies I had suitable for a salad were carrots (most of my veg is frozen – so much cheaper, easier and sometimes healthier than fresh!), so I cut ribbons out of them using a vegetable peeler, and added them to my bowl along with romaine lettuce, ham, tomatoes, some cheese, a tsp of olive oil and a tablespoon of balsamic vinegar.

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I didn’t drink the orange juice, the soup, or eat the grapefruit or the plums (or pears!), and by the time I got to dinner, I was in a pretty bad mood so I decided that you could interpret green beans as chips and went to the chip shop. Luckily, they only had a child’s portion of chips left (but it was still large enough to share and have some leftovers, eh?) so we had it with our Spanish omelette. Actually, really nice! Of course I didn’t take any photos – you think I’m going to totally incriminate myself on the internet? Look at that salad up there, that’s my online dieting legacy (seriously, though, it was really nice!).

Because of the ravenous anti-dieting monster I became yesterday, I didn’t do a calorie count, but if I did the numbers would have read XXX, as in TOXIC! I’m a lot less stressed today, and although I ate a breakfast biscuit instead of toast (REBEL, REBEL!), I’m going to try stick to the plan again – or rather, my mixed up, 2013 version of the plan, which involves moving everything around and messing all up.

Welcome to the future, it’s just total anarchy!

The 1953 Vintage Diet: Day Three

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Yesterday was the third day of the vintage diet, and I was actually on the day that’s written on the sheet! I had to skip Wednesday because the lamb I bought had to be eaten, so here’s what was on the plan:

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As usual, I took this as more of a guideline, and had my usual toast and Flora in the morning (146 calories), saving the haddock for lunch. Cooking anything for breakfast is a bit of a nightmare, in my opinion, but I can just about manage toast. It did mean that lunch was pretty darn tasty, though – a bed of spinach, topped with a poached egg and some poached haddock, plus the fruit salad (only 300 calories)!

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Dinner was an eccentric proposal to say the least – endive and watercress salad with lamb cutlets? I couldn’t face the prospect of not having anything with that, so I cheated and added some wild rice. This is a pretty big cheat in all honesty, because the idea seems to be no carbs in the evening, but I definitely didn’t have enough lamb to make up for the lack of carbs…

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This meal (including the rhubarb, which I bought in a tin) came to about 500 calories, so the day wasn’t too bad at all… Except… Well, let’s just say, I broke down slightly at about half ten, when I was still working on my deadline and feeling pretty sorry for myself, so I ate a packet of Poppets. There may have been some white mice involved too. Either way, I pretty much nixed my calories for the day. But, the only way to be successful at something if you don’t get it right first time is to try again, right? The absolute worst thing you can do on a diet is to give up after a little hiccup. So… ONWARD!

The 1953 Vintage Diet: Day Two

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My second day on the 1953 diet continued in a very similar vein to the first – namely, swapping things around! Here’s what I was scheduled to eat today, and when:

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I don’t know about you, but making cauliflower and braised onions at lunch isn’t my idea of a relaxing break… I ended up dispensing with the orange for breakfast, and the sliced lamb for lunch (no idea where to get deli lamb from, in all honesty…). I then moved the cauliflower to dinner, and the cheese and biscuits to lunch. Are you keeping up? It’s getting a little bit complicated round these parts!

I very clumsily worked out the original calories of this plan as 287 for breakfast, 343 for lunch, and 421 for dinner – but that was before I worked out how to make the braised cauliflower and onions, so the end result for me ended up being higher even after I ditched the lamb and orange. (The end total was around 1050 calories.)

So, for breakfast, I had a scrambled egg on toast with tea, which was 247 calories. Lunch was three cream crackers, a slice of mature cheese, and a pear (delicious lunch, actually, I enjoyed that – shame it wasn’t all that filling), with a snack of vegetable cup-a-soup around mid afternoon. I was honestly so ravenous by then that I couldn’t give two figs whether it technically counted as ‘broth’ or not – the instructions specifically tell you not to eat thick soups, and this one had CROUTONS in it. Croutons. So that took me to a calorie count of around 318.

Dinner was about 463 calories, technically – although I did steal one of my husband’s potato croquettes which was 87 calories. Wow. (A potato waffle is only 100 or so!) I didn’t steam the fish, I fried it with some olive oil spray. Together with the peas and the braised cauliflower and onions, it was actually pretty tasty!

The braised cauliflower was awesome. I had only a vague idea about how you would go about making this dish, so I Googled it and adapted this recipe. I ended up sauteeing one small onion in a teaspoon of olive oil and 10g of butter until golden, then adding 400g of frozen cauliflower and 10g more butter, and frying until coloured in patches. Then, I added half a beef stock cube and water up to the halfway point of the veggies, and I simmered until the liquid was practically gone and the cauliflower was soft – and tasty! This serves two, by the way, but you can easily reheat it for another dinner. It ends up being around 185 calories a portion, because of the butter, which is terrible really (the cauliflower is only 50 calories for 200g!), but I imagine this is how it would have been made around the time the diet plan was created. Butter definitely plays a role in most of the diet plans I’ve seen from the ’50s. Hardship, right?

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I am aware that this looks utterly replusive, but I assure you, it tasted delicious.

All in all, with my teas and coffees, today was just under 1300 calories. Usually I’d make sure to be doing plenty of exercise along with this, but unfortunately, my work schedule is nuts this week – and to be honest, I’d rather blog. Ha. With calorie counts like these, I’d imagine that there would be a weight loss of around 1lb in a week. I haven’t dared weigh myself since Christmas, to be honest – which isn’t helpful for measuring results, but I think the alternative would actually be soul destroying at this point. Maybe I should try to fit in some of these great little retro exercises I found in The Book of The Home II (1956). Do you think I could do them and type at the same time if I cheated a little on the arm movements…?

A useful exercise for general reducing...

The 1953 diet previously posted at the Tuppence Ha’penny blog.

The 1953 Vintage Diet: Day One

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Today was the first day on the 1953 diet, and I’ve already made quite a few changes to the suggested menu – mostly swapping things around. I had to wait for my food shopping to arrive at one, so instead of a fairly substantial breakfast of 1/2 grapefruit, a boiled egg, a slice of toast with butter and a cup of tea, I just had the tea and toast (with Flora). The original breakfast would have been approximately 271 calories. I then had my tomato juice for a snack, and had some off-plan blueberries (my goodness!) to tide me over until the shopping got here.

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For lunch, I had the soup (using a tub of chicken broth powder, very economical), plus 45g of wafer thin ham, two leaves of romaine lettuce, the boiled egg from breakfast, and a fruit salad. The original lunch would have been 362 calories, and mine was near enough there. The fact that it actually turned out to be a three course lunch was pretty darn good, too!

Dinner as set down in the menu should have ended up being around 316 calories, but I swapped my baked apple out for the fruit salad, and also swapped out the tomato juice. With 120g of roasted (not poached) chicken breast, 100g each of carrots and green beans, plus a Bramley apple baked with 30g of maple syrup, that brings my dinner to 486 calories. I mashed the carrots so I didn’t miss the carbs as much… It kind of worked…

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As I’m a massive caffeine addict, I also allow myself tea and coffee (with sweetners and a total of 2 tsp demerara sugar) so my total calorie intake for the day was 1146. I also ended up drinking my Alibi Pretox drink instead of the milk, as I drink a fair bit of milk in my tea already…

I may or may not have eaten some white chocolate buttons ‘to finish them off’. I’ll leave that up to you to detect…

All in all, it’s not going too badly so far – this lunch was actually pretty good, but there are some challenges ahead for the midday period for the rest of the week. In order to stave off hunger, I’m also taking psyllium husks, to keep me feeling fuller for longer, I definitely recommend them to anyone who is on a low calorie diet to prevent those empty tummy pangs.

The 1953 diet previously posted at the Tuppence Ha’penny blog.