Brit Chick Runs

- Coffee.

Coffee in French press form:

Coffee moonlighting as beer:

Note: that really is coffee. Vincent the Vita is a wonderful machine!

Extra foam:

- Chocolate.

Real, good quality (vegan) dark chocolate.

An addict can never have too much

- Vegetables:

Melon and hummus? Why not?

I’ll tell you why – cos black pepper and sea salt hummus doesn’t exactly go with melon, that’s why.

Brussels sprouts and pear/melon/cereal/banana blends as a pairing however?

Kinda works But the hummus, it really is best left where it belongs – on toast.

With a side of cooked cucumber, natch :p

Jizzy new plate right??

Question: What was the last present you received?

Oh, & happy new year!!

Hello chaps.

I’ve written the next bit in italics cos it’s all horseh-horseh related, so I figure if you do care, read ORRN! If you don’t – skip the italics

So lol HA! I flew my kite today. That would be true if my kite had 4 legs, a lorra fluff and called itself Chika….she’s hardly been ridden the past month or so, due to the generous offerings received from the snow gods, so she was feeling…’somewhat frisky’ – to put it mildly! She was still super obedient to my voice, and she spent the first 15mins on the lunge being an annnnngel. Then, the inevitable happened, and she saw a distant lion. Her tail went up, her neck thickened up like a tbsp of flour to water (eh? what? Isn’t that the most awful simile ever?) and she started doing that snort-thing horses do when they see something spooky/scary. You know the one!? It didn’t help that it was extremely foggy and chilly, and she just wanted an excuse :p

So anyway, when she’s in that mood, when I say canter, she goes ‘yes mother’ – and leaps, bucks and kicks into and during canter! I actually had to drop my whip, use both hands and put my full body weight into leaning on the lunge rein so she wouldn’t completely take off :p Hilarious! I was just thankful I was in gloves….though it was nice; she released her inner-warmblood which I just KNOW is dying to get out; knees up round her chest, elevation like she was on pogo sticks…so good to see. After 10mins of that, I let her off the lunge and just did join up/gallop round the school for a bit. it was fun

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Not like the others, I say!? Yez, it’s true. Jenny, of Peanut Butter and Jenny fame, did a post on not being like all the other ‘big’ bloggers (or small bloggers, or healthy living bloggers in general) a while back. It made me thiiiink (never a good thing), and I came up with a few of my own…

1) I have a schmanzy camera like the proper bloggers do. The difference is? I ain’t a clue how to use it right :p (actually one of my New Year’s resolutions IS to learn how to use it to my advantage!). In fact, my ‘arty’ pics are often pretty crap:

Take One:

Take Two:

Take Three:

Take Four:

See? They also regularly come out dark, for no reason:

I’m guessing that’s maybe an …. ISO (?) ….. issue. See, I really am quite dim.

The other fancy-camera biggie – I don’t drag it evvvvverywhere I go – partly I can nay be bother (it’s awkward!) but mainly cos it’s so darn precious! I don’t want to break it – something I am hiiiighly likely to do.

2) I like canned pumpkin – but real pumpkin? I can take it or leave it:

Unfortunately (for that pumpkin), it got left.

3) I love to bake – but I’m no good at baking pretty things! Take my cookies today – they’re not uniform in size, they’re pretty ugly; and even my attempt at Angela-style photography didn’t reaaaaaally work….

The above was to prove my amazing stacking skills, in case they all fell over (they did) before I took them into the big wide world of outside for the Real Photoshoot!

The relegated cookies – deemed too poor to be stacked in the tower:

At least the baking part looked delicious (that’s date syrup used instead of maple syrup)

With added figs and carob chips instead of apricots

Chia egg!

In action….

(by the way – the cookies were deLICIOUS! I had one with lunch – very much smile-worthy)

4) However much I’d like to, I never have and never will present my food nicely. Or in small portions. Some bloggers do both, and I read their posts and think ‘oh yes, tomorrow I’ll eat a tiny portion of xyz and make it look preddy’ – then tomorrow comes, and I never do:

Above, was eaten with milky banana steel cut oats, below: *Da BOMB*

Bah, what can I say – I like volume! Especially when it involves seedy toast, and lots of mushy veggies

Pear on toast? Why not.

5) I love oatmeal, and I now love cereal and [soya] milk. But the thing that makes me different from the blog world? i really can leave the toppings :O. Yep, I kinda LIKE my oats without all the fuss and stuff on top! In fact, I find they get in the way – my brain gets overloaded with all the flavour combinations – which one will be the best, which little bit shall I save til last… – and I find that if I add peanut butter, it inevitably melts into the oats and I end up losing the strong PB flavour kick. It’s sad and woeful! And in regards to cereal? it’s either banana, or no banana:

Don’t even try and be fancy and add pineapple or grapes or – worst of the worst – APPLE to my cereal. It will. not. happen. I will. not. like it.

6) I don’t do yoga.

Well, that’s a lie – I DO do yoga, but my yoga ability is limited to the realms of two MTV power/Ashtanga yoga DVDs, that i have done thousands of times, mastered, but have not looked at in about 6months Really I feel there’s a closet yogini in me trying to get out – but until I live within screaming distance of a yoga studio, she’s gonna have to keep schtum!

7) I don’t have a husband. Hurrumph.

i have a horse instead :p (and two boys named Carter and Kovac!)

9) I’m British. Take THAT, American bloggers!!

10) I have a tendency to start posts off strong and whilst the evening is young, do something else, then come back to them late at night when I’m super tired, want to watch The American Office, read my textbook (Ok, My Sister’s Keeper – I’m bored with the textbook now) and just hit publish. Which is why my reasons stop at 10! I wrote number 9 hours ago – but this last one is all my fuzzled out brain can handle.

ALAS.

Question: How are you different from everyone else?

Hello lovelies! Did you all have a fabby Christmas/regular old Satdee? Ours was pretty quiet here (we weren’t even going to do one, til Chrsitmas Eve, when my mum and I finally felt well enough) – we normally have my mum’s parents and my aunt over, but since my mum and i have been suffering from some weird flu-like thing, we decided inviting over two frail 88year olds – whilst we’re sniffing, snorting and coughing everywhere! – was probably not wise. Sooo it was just my mum, stepdad, sister and I. Ah – Hannah!

Hannah came back Christmas Eve, after spending the last 3months in Australia, New Zealand, Africa, Uganda and a gazillion other places First thing she did when she got back? Drove into town to do some last minute shopping each to their own!

Anyway – Christmas day!

I got up about 7.45 after a pretty crap night of sleep, and took myself for a 7 mile run. Weirdly (despite being flat out and unable to move on Thursday) I now feel fine in my body; I just have the world’s worst cough/throat thing, and as I type I can’t quite breathe through my nose…lovely right? But the run was blissful – quiet, cold, slow, peaceful. My legs felt so strong and fresh, and I wished I could have gone further.

Breakfast was a quick pear/banana EGM without the green, then my mum and i took the dawg for a walk. Theeeeen it was PRESENT TIME! No pictures sadly – so instead you can have a pic of some amazebugs Vega-chocolate-protein-powder-infused-pancakes, with a carob-cherry sauce I had the other day:

Drooling yet?

As well as some sick-person oatmeal I made for my mamma, the day before I caught whatever she had:

I was a good doctor It’s just a shame that the next day, we were both laid up on the sofa, drugged up with paracetamol, moaning about our aching limbs and pounding heads Taking hay and water out to the horse – in the sleet – was NOT fun that day.

ANYWAY! Where was I?

I got lots of lovely things from my very generous family The best bit was seeing Hannah open up twice the amount of stuff as everyone else; her birthday was Dec 16th, so she got all her b’day presents too Twas fun!

Lunch was a quick spur of the moment carrot and potato soup:

It was really, really good! My mum added some peanut butter to it, which gave an ace flavour I only had a ladleful though; breakfast for me (as I’d been running) was later than everyone else’s, so I wasn’t hungry. I did have some cereal and yogurt later though (x2! Plus raw Brussels sprouts and random nuts…).

The afternoon was spent prep-prep-prepping! My mum and I act as The Women of the House at Christmas, whilst Hannah and my stepdad are The Men of the House, who metaphorically retire to the dining room to smoke cigars and drink whiskey. Or eat mince pies and read books and play with new toys :p

Anyway – I took charge of Brussels sprouts & carrots (which were boiled), parsnips (roasted in stock, wholegrain mustard, fruit sweetener, thyme) and a modified dish from Veganomicon – butternut squash, roasted with pear, walnuts, maple syrup, mirin and raisins. My mum did the guinea fowl (freshly shot about 3 days ago :s…), roast potatoes and sauce. The spread:

Twas delish! I oblebloosly didn’t have the guinea fowl; instead I made myself sooooome:

Holiday Tofu!

• 1 serving tofu
• juice of a clementine/small orange
• approx. a tbsp/to taste apple balsamic vinegar
• 1 tsp sweetener (maple syrup/agave etc etc)
• a couple of tbsps fresh cranberries
• cinnamon, to taste (i like a lot)
• salt, to taste

I started by microwaving the cranberries til they burst and turned mushy (2-3minutes, on about 600). Theeeen I combined everything up, mushed the cranberries a little into the mix, scored the tofu, and marinated it overnight.

A few hours before dinner, I fried it over a low heat (it took about 25mins+ to get where I wanted it).

Pink tofu? At this stage, i KNEW i’d love it :p

Then I set it in a dish, poured the leftover marinade liquid into the pan, and cooked it over a medium heat til it was reduced to a syrupy consistency. Theeeeeeen I poured it over the tofu, heated it up in the microwave just before serving, and voila!

Christmas-y tofu

Before I had that though, we had a small started of fruit (dragonfruit, clementine, kiwi, pomegranate seeds – leftover from LAST Christmas! – dried figs, and frozen grapes, added after the picture):

Then it was time to begin….

Why do they all look so unimpressed by me!!? Pity smiles I tell you, PITY SMILES!

Best parsnips EVER. Fact. Soft and gooey and sweet and full of flavour

My plate:

You bet I went back from a boatload more parsnips :p and I may have finished off my mum’s sprouts and parsnips too :p Bless her, she still has a tiny weeny appetite thanks to The Illness!

No-one felt like christmas pudding for dessert, so we left it at that (bar a few squares of Lindt for yours truly!!) The perfect amount of food in the end! I think the cats appreciated the leftover bird bones though Animals need a special dinner too!

I’ve now got the rest of the week to look forward to now – which is going to involve some major uni work, Fo Sho’. No slackin’ my end!

Did you all have a simply fahbulous Dec 25th? What did you have for dinner?

MERRY CHRISTMAS!!!

xoxo

…lots of FIGHT. Not the naughty, duff-you-in-the-face kind, but the ‘damn you Swine Flu, I will fight you off’ kind!! Remember in my last post, I showed you all a simply wunderbar picture of my fittie mamma going off to a party? Well, some *lovely* person who went to the same party had Swine Flu – and has promptly given it to my mum. Thanks for that. As I type this, she’s laid up in bed, with a temperature, a bowl, lots of sniffing and lots of drugs (the good kind, not the nasty kind). Poor lady! The implications of her illness?

• I miss her! I love having my mum home, but it sucks that she’s upset and sick, and I can’t do squat about it (bar feed her a Green Monster, as I did today – i figure spinach, milk, chia seeds, and maca powder can only do good!). I feel helpless though! I can’t make her better
• She can’t pick my sister up from the airport on Christmas Eve (Hannah’s been away on her gap year, and returns 5am on Friday. Apparently. If Heathrow can pull its act together. Seriously, 5 inches of snow and it shuts down??? Bah.)
• We will have to postpone Christmas – Christmas without my mum bouncing about would be the crappest thing ever – she’s the life and soul, y’all!
• She sure doesn’t deserve to be ill. No-one does I know – but especially not my mum; she’s the most wonderful woman in the world and IT’s. NOT. FAIR.

Talking of illness – I was ill on Saturday! I woke up feeling like junk, achey body, shivery, a football in my throat etc etc – and thought I had flu. But, food fights flu! So I opened up a packet of chocolate Amazing Grass (I got a sample online):

Chugged it down with soya milk/water, and voila! Come Sunday, I felt 10 x better! I still have a cough and a slight wheeze atm, but it sure ain’t bad, and I’ve still had 3 fabby runs (7miles, 6miles, 6miles) since Sunday, so all is well.

Anywayz! Onwardz and upwardz yeahh???

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BAKE – The blorld (blog + world) has gone cookie mad :s seriously! Every post I read, someone has eaten their weight in cookies, is on a sugar high, in a sugar coma, has gone to a cookie party, given birth to a cookie baby…is this some weird American trend?! I’m proud to say I’ve rejected the frenzied trend, and made just one batch of cookies – pumpkin oatmeal:

They might look like ordinary cookies, but BY GOSH, these boys (from the Vegan with a Vengeance cookbook) were OUT OF THIS WORLD. No lie!! I actually made them as a Christmas present for my mum’s work, but we snagged one before they left, and hoooooly cow. I plan on making another batch for whenever we next have Christmas

Whilst we’re on the subject of things that have been baked/Christmas, I have a quick review for all my lovely Brit readers! The kind folk at Sainsbury’s contacted me with an offer of a selection of their Free From range of Christmas items:

Dairy free, wheat free, gluten free

Sadly, the items were not vegan – BUT, when I told my mum and stepdad about this offer, they jumped at the chance to review! The other night, they broke into the iced Christmas cake slices -

(I seriously need to work out how to change the ISO on my camera….a New Year’s resolution for sure. My only excuse for the dark photo, apart from my inability to use my camera to my advantage, is the crap night lighting)

- and were very impressed Words like ‘moist…full of flavour…delicious…soft icing…lots of marzipan…juicy…’ floated about. Even my step dad liked them, which in itself is a HUGE deal – he won’t eat things that are ‘too vegan’ and prefers to live off frozen peas and mac and cheese. But I sure do think I saw a wee smile creep across his lil face when he ate a slice :p HIGHLY recommended.

More reviews to come!

——

Right – next up, BLEND!

Item One:

That would be a pumpkin pie blended cereal mess thing. I forget exactly what went in it now, but I know it involved cereal, soya milk, pumpkin, cinnamon, maple syrup (maybe?), vanilla, and banana. I also know it was one of the most incredible things I have eeeeever eaten. i know I say that a lot, but I mean it this time!

Next up – Item Two:

Ah yes. I was making my usual blended mess – cereal etc etc. Whilst I was digging about for frozen bananas in the freezers, I came across a packet of cranberries, frozen from last year. DING DING DING! I added in a laaaarge handful, accompanied by a tsp of agave (they were fresh, not dried, hence sourness – though I happily eat them fresh anyway ).

Wowzer! Beeeeeautiful colour, incred taste!! Not sour at all, just…cranberry-y. It was lovely! If I’ve taught you nothing else in this post, take this on board – add. cranberries.

OH! And those grapes, they’re frozen! And holy cow, frozen grapes are da BOMB!

I froze them aggggges ago, forgot about them, remembered (thanks, Jamie Oliver Christmas tv show), and now I’ve bought a whole new pack of grapes which are sitting in the freezer, ready to munch at my leisure. Bliss.

They made an appearance on my chocolate coffee Epic Green Monster this morning too (along with 75p-per-pack cherries!)

Boo yah.

Talking of…er…food – yesterday, I did the epic Christmas food shop. I figured I needed super good fuel for it, which led to my eating THE best bowl of oats EVER. A bowl to end all bowls. It was….well, I almost cried at how good it was.

The Bowl of Oats to Trump All Bowls of Oats:

• 50g oats
• 2 tsp carob powder
• 1 tsp maple syrup
• 1/2 c. soya milk
• 1/2 c. water
• roasted and mashed onion squash
• extra milk on top

Oh. My. It was soooo chocoaltey, so creamy, so comforting, so DELICIOUS! I can’t wait to make it again

Another thing I want to make again – aubergine sauce! T’other day, I roasted up some aubergine, then blended it with salt, mixed spice, water and nooch, and created this:

Looks gross, but it was incred stirred into kamut spaghetti:

Hurrrrraaaahhhh!!! I rejoiced, it was lovely! Silky smooth, with a spicy cheesy flavour. YUMMEH.

Other meals worthy of the YUMMEH tag? Sweet potato, roasted with maple, cinnamon, salt, apple and walnuts:

Totally where it’s at. As was this broccoli/millet/wild/brown rice combo:

Yum!

Now, I have a slight complaint. I would give the following a big old thumbs up too, but – I just can’t. For part of lunch today, I had a wholemeal English muffin, topped with a squeezy pack of Justin’s chocolate almond butter:

My complaint? To get the thickness I wanted, the squeezy pack was only enough for ONE half of a hardly-large English muffin! Booooo.

  

Not cool. At least the taste was right up my street (it tasted like a nuttier, thicker version of Nutella, which is odd considering Nutella is made from hazelnuts. But whatevrz.).

Aaaaaaaaaaanywayz, I have some missions to do now:

1) wrap presents

2) watch the end of Lucky Number Slevin (Josh Hartnett, if you’re reading – marry me?)

3) Make pancakes

4) read my newspaper

See yaz!

Question: Have you gone on the cookie-craze this holiday?

Any tips for getting over flu real quick?

(Oh – and MERRY CHRISTMAS if I don’t have time to blog before the big day! Eat, drink and be mERRY!)