9 Belfast Bites

[jmcbn]

Hotel California.  You can check out anytime you like but you can never leave. Sounds like all of the rooms are filling up.

 

I would like to order some of your guests but I don't think they'd make the trip in one piece. We're in the process of ordering Siberian Peashrubs from Tennessee and that's an ordeal to keep them alive.

 

How's everything tasting now?  Lively and fizzy?

Well, there's still some room at the Inn, but things are going well... HULK & HOGAN are going from strength to strength, and each of the large jars have a few new inhabitants - larger in circumference obviously, and a little thinner, but they're growing nicely and producing good Booch. I'm currently doing a mix of rooibos & green tea and it's a nice light, fresh flavour with a good amount of fizz - the last batch I bottled was fizzing/frothing over as I bottled it and that was before adding in any ginger, so I think that was a good sign. Messy, but a good sign nonetheless.

I was just looking at some new teas last night to try out as I will be bottling a batch at the weekend... 

[jmcbn]

Sounds like an excellent plan

Just when the kids thought their mum was weird enough - she just gets weirder 

LOL Welcome to my world   

Sure drop me a pm anytime you fancy and we can arrange a handover 

[jmcbn]

My boys were at their Dad's last night instead of tonight as he has plans for this evening. This means that this evening I can actually take off my chauffeur hat & relax - Wednesday is the only night of the week that both boys don't have something on after school - their Dad sure knows what he's doing   

 

Just poured myself a glass of Booch to cleanse my pallet after dinner (braised kale & boiled baby potatoes sauteed in garlic infused oil with peppered mackerel & two fried eggs -yum!) and when I popped the lid it fizzed over like it was a Beer - I am SO proud of myself - my best batch yet!! 

[MeadowLily]

That sounds so nice.  Wish we could all have some of your  Hotel California.   

[jmcbn]

I'm coming down with something.

 

Or at least my body thinks it's coming down with something - my head says no - I don't go down without a fight   

I come from the school of tough love. I was brought up that way, and I raise my kids that way. Feeling a little ill was never an excuse to stay off school and it's not an excuse to stay off work. And more often than not when you waken UP feeling a little off, if you get up, get dressed, and show up you soon start to feel a bit better.

Looking back the last time I was off work for anything other than annual leave was when my youngest son was born - he was 10 in February. I ate pretty well even back then but I started really shaking up my diet when he was only a few months old and diagnosed with multiple food allergies - allergies that were severe enough that he reacted to pre-digested food in my breast milk. We spent A LOT of time with dietitians & nutritionists and my interest in food and how it effects our bodies was piqued. I started making everything from scratch. I still ate grains back then but obviously none of his foods contained his allergens, and over time I gradually eliminated more and more foods until I eventually ended up in the world of Paleo.

Each year (and often more than once) I hear my friends complain of having the flu, being floored by some bug, or suffering from a chest infection or whatever. Sure I get 'colds'. I get a stuffy head, a blocked nose, an achy throat. Last year I even had some kind of a mild sinus infection which killed my appetite for a few days. But I've NEVER been floored by a bug, or had anything like a 'flu', or had a chest infection confine me to bed that I can recall.

Yes I can feel congested, and a little sub-par, but I can still work. I still train. I still parent. And I'm convinced that eating this way makes it all possible - I'm convinced that eating this way reduces my susceptibility to illness and/or infection in the first place.

 

And when I DO feel a little sub par I get up, I get dressed, and I show up, and in doing so I always feel a little better.

It's all about the positive mental attitude - and eating this way helps with that too 

[jmcbn]

The Sugar Conspiracy.

A long, but interesting read.

[kirkor]

The Sugar Conspiracy.

A long, but interesting read.

F@$#ing hell, reading that made me grumpy. Ancel Keys remains HIGH on my list of "who would you kill if you could time travel?" people.

[jmcbn]

The Whole9 focus for the month of April is Stress.

I'll admit that I sometimes get stressed about getting everything done that I need to get done - shopping, cook ups, ironing, gardening, dusting, vacuuming, changing bed linen, cleaning bathrooms... and all that on top of actual parenting, training, a full time job, study, and runnning a taxi service to and from all the extra curricular activities - as well as trying to maintain some semblance of a social life.

As a single mum I don't have the luxury of sharing the ever expanding list of chores with anyone. Yes, I have two sons who help out in their own way, but let's be honest here - they're 10 & 14. There's only so much they can/will do.

So for the month of April I've been trying to priortise the chores, and setting a 'clock off time' for evenings & weekends so that I have scheduled 'me time' - what isn't done by 'clock off time' gets carried forward to the next day. The dust will still be there tomorrow anyway...

As I mentioned before I've been feeling a little sub-par for the past few days, and this has, in the past, sometimes resulted in a loss of appetite. So to pre-empt that (& because I felt that a change was needed anyways) I've mixed things up a little this week with my food prep. This week my focus has shifted to sea food, and having got my hands on some well priced tiger prawns I've made a HUGE thai green prawn curry, and have slow cooked a batch of mixed potatoes, asparagus, carrots & zucchini to have as a side with seared salmon (which I'll cook to order). I've also roasted a batch of mixed peppers, tomatoes, & eggplants in garlic infused oil & mediterranean herbs/spices for a side with my usual peppered mackerel, braised some kale in ghee, made a fresh batch of mayo, and thrown together a kind of a ground beef, kale & zucchini curry. This is probably the first week in the last year I haven't cooked a whole chicken. 

It's been a glorious day here and my youngest son has had half the neighbourhood round playing in the sunshine in the back garden. There is something very uplifting about the sounds of children playing - the random conversation, their vivid imaginations, the laughs & the giggles.... And to open the windows throughout the house and let the fresh air blow through... Cathartic on so many levels.

Hogan (et al) was also ready for bottling today, and once I'd finished my chores and tidied up from the batch cook I poured myself a glass and sat on my back step listening to the sounds of the birds nesting in the apple trees in my back garden as I enjoyed the warmth of the sun on my skin, and the refreshing taste of the Booch on my taste buds - the perfect way to de-stress - and all feels well with the world again.

[jmcbn]

Aaaaaand, I've just realized that I didn't actually buy any foods to reintro this week - my bad!!

Well, since food prep is done it'll just have to wait until next week - so that's one less thing to stress about.... 

[MeadowLily]

Oooo, and what was that food going to be.   Don't tell me, let me guess.  Beets.    

Family is here visiting. We're making a prime rib with all of the trimmings. Au jus, greens, garlic/potatoes, salads.  Bear's cooking drives them wild (er).

[jmcbn]

Beets? Sure I did beets back with the fructans a lot of weeks ago..... We're on polyols now & the remaining choices were sweet potato & celery. I'd kind of settled on sweet potato as I don't eat celery that often anyway, but it'll be next week now, either way.

Aaaaaaaand today we're back to winter in God's country it would seem - cold, wet, grey & windy.

So so glad I took some time out yesterday to enjoy the sunshine!

[jmcbn]

SUB PAR UPDATE

Started the day with some prawn curry on a bed of spinach, followed that with some beef curry on a bed of kale, then rounded up with the last of the chicken in a Big Ass Salad with some freshly ground black pepper and a sprinkle of blueberries.

I actually wasn't feeling too bad when I got up, but the sneezing started around 11am, and I'm currently sneezing twice every 30mins. Head clear, sinuses clear, and nose alternating between congested & runny   

Both curries contain a generous helping of gelatinous bone broth, and I'm currently sipping on a mug of the same right now. Between my food & the various herbal teas & booch I drink throughout the day I'm getting generous amounts of chilli, cayenne, cinnamon, turmeric, and ginger - all with natural healing properties.

I've got this   

In other news the local council recently set up new rules regarding the disposal of food waste in the area. All food waste must now be put into compostable bags and disposed of along with garden waste in our green/brown bins. Anyone putting food waste into the general waste bin will be fined, in the same way that anyone putting general waste in the paper/plastic recycling bin will be fined also. They supplied one roll of compostable bags. They also supplied an ugly plastic food caddy for the kitchen counter top which I replaced with a retro bin with a carbon filter in the lid to prevent any escaping odour.

As someone who cooks everything from scratch I have A LOT of food waste - peeling, bones, stalks, skins, egg shells - you get the picture. Between myself and my boys I fill a compostable bag pretty much every day. I'd been lead to believe that the council would be providing the compostable liners on a regular basis so I emailed them on Friday requesting a fresh supply. Their response? Yes, they'll be providing the liners on a regular basis - if by regular you mean twice a year!!

Now I'm all for recycling & composting, but I'm NOT all for being penalised for eating whole foods, thereby generating more food waste, rather than opting for pre-packaged foods in plastic, microwaveable, non recycleable containers.... My regular bin only needs emptied once a month now, and my green bin is pretty much the same - I'm using the council half as much as most of my peers. Yes, the cost of the bags to me is minimal, but it's the principle of the thing - we all pay the same to the council in rates and this is all supposed to be about reducing the impact on the environment, and reducing the costs for the council who were having to dump mixed waste in landfill sites....!!!  

/rantover

[jmcbn]

Today's breakfast was eggs scrambled with a generous serving of spinach in ghee, smoked salmon, some cherry tomatoes & mayo.

With the whole FODMAP reintro thing I've been paying a lot more attention to how foods make me feel and something I've been considering a lot lately (but been afraid to admit) is that eggs aren't necessarily my friend.

Yesterday I had the prawn curry on a bed of spinach as a little bit of an experiment because even though I often have curry (or a serving of whatever else I've cooked up) for breakfast, more often than not I have eggs. The result with no eggs = no bloat

 

Today with eggs = bloat

 

No beuno. No pain, but still, no beuno.

 

One other thing I've suspected for quite a while (given that my most regular breakfast lately has been eggs scrambled with spinach, cherry tomatoes, pickled dill cucumbers & mayo) is that cherry tomatoes impact my blood sugar levels in the way that fruit would if I eat it in the morning - and given the level of my yawns at around 10:15am & the fact that my sleep was good quality & uninterrupted last night I think my suspicions are right.

So, since I won't be reintro-ing any further FODMAPs this week due to my poor planning I'm going to try eliminating eggs & keeping my tomatoes for meals 2 or 3 to see how that goes.

 

Don't get me wrong. I don't feel bad. I think I've just become a little complacent around non FODMPAP foods, and I know I can feel better.

In other news - my sniffles appear to have disappeared 

[Zoe]

In other news the local council recently set up new rules regarding the disposal of food waste in the area. All food waste must now be put into compostable bags and disposed of along with garden waste in our green/brown bins. Anyone putting food waste into the general waste bin will be fined, in the same way that anyone putting general waste in the paper/plastic recycling bin will be fined also. They supplied one roll of compostable bags. They also supplied an ugly plastic food caddy for the kitchen counter top which I replaced with a retro bin with a carbon filter in the lid to prevent any escaping odour.

As someone who cooks everything from scratch I have A LOT of food waste - peeling, bones, stalks, skins, egg shells - you get the picture. Between myself and my boys I fill a compostable bag pretty much every day. I'd been lead to believe that the council would be providing the compostable liners on a regular basis so I emailed them on Friday requesting a fresh supply. Their response? Yes, they'll be providing the liners on a regular basis - if by regular you mean twice a year!!

Now I'm all for recycling & composting, but I'm NOT all for being penalised for eating whole foods, thereby generating more food waste, rather than opting for pre-packaged foods in plastic, microwaveable, non recycleable containers.... My regular bin only needs emptied once a month now, and my green bin is pretty much the same - I'm using the council half as much as most of my peers. Yes, the cost of the bags to me is minimal, but it's the principle of the thing - we all pay the same to the council in rates and this is all supposed to be about reducing the impact on the environment, and reducing the costs for the council who were having to dump mixed waste in landfill sites....!!!  

 

 

I have had the nasty plastic food caddy for years - they actually don't tend to smell that much and I fill mine pretty quickly too. 

Are you getting a tag for your brown bin ? I have one which I fasten to the bin when I need more bags - the bin men then shove them in the bin once they are emptied - seems pretty efficient - maybe your council hasn't got that far in the process yet.

LIVE IN HOPE !!

[jmcbn]

I have had the nasty plastic food caddy for years - they actually don't tend to smell that much and I fill mine pretty quickly too. 

Are you getting a tag for your brown bin ? I have one which I fasten to the bin when I need more bags - the bin men then shove them in the bin once they are emptied - seems pretty efficient - maybe your council hasn't got that far in the process yet.

LIVE IN HOPE !!

My garden waste bin is green rather than brown - I think that depends on which council you're in, and nope, no tag.......  

I got my food caddy a while ago too, but I've been using it out at the BBQ - which shows how long ago I must have got it because we didn't get much in the way of BBQ weather last summer!! They only just started the whole food waste thing about 2mths ago though.

That said a friend contacted the council recently about which bin to put dog poo into and they told her to put it into the regular grey bin but that they would be providing liners for the green bin at some point - so maybe we'll get there eventually....

Do you have one for glass? I've only seen them in central Belfast but I'd love me one of those!!

[jmcbn]

Today I had an appointment I had to attend with my eldest son which meant me leaving work around 2:45pm. The appt wasn't too far away and my plan was to drop my son at Chess Club & scoot back to work when we were done. Predictably the appt over ran by quite a bit and it was 4:25pm before we were out, and since I technically finish work @ 5pm & Chess Club finishes around the same time my son and I decided to just come on home.

I don't normally get home until at least 5:30pm so it was a complete joy to kick my shoes off & get the washing hung up to dry, the gym bags ready for tomorrow & dinner prepared - and still have plenty of time to spare before I have to pick up my youngest son from gymnastics. It made me long for the days when I worked a 4 day week......... <looks wistful>

Anyway.... dinner tonight was a salmon steak seared in garlic infused oil, and served with a huge helping of the baby potatoes, carrots, courgettes & asparagus I did in the slow cooker at the weekend, with a generous dollop of mayo of course - all washed down with a glass of my very own booch - absolutely delicious.

Egg-streme food trials commence tomorrow....   

[Zoe]

Do you have one for glass? I've only seen them in central Belfast but I'd love me one of those!!

 

Don't have a glass one - but I have a bottle bank less than 100 m away - so I have a "BOTTLE BANK BOY" whom I despatch when required 

[jmcbn]

This time yesterday I was denying oxygen to the rest of the world, and feeling somewhat constricted in my business attire having had eggs & tomatoes with breakfast.

This morning I went back to prawn curry on a huge bed of spinach (& some olives) for breakfast and all is well with the world again.

Hmmm.

 

 

[jmcbn]

Very productive day at the office, followed by a very productive gym session, but I'm feeling it now....   

I had my second physio session for my elbow today, having confirmed at the first one that as suspected there is more to the pain than an RSI.

Someone ran into the back of my car last June and as I braced on impact my left hand side took all of the force. I did have a mild RSI in my elbow at that stage but the pain in my elbow almost immediately worsened - and of course I ended up with the prolapsed disc which had me IN weekly physio sessions and OUT of training for about 8wks. I got a cortizone injection in my elbow a few weeks after the accident but it did nothing to relieve the pain and I've been training around it ever since. I'm not one for taking meds so eventually, when I saw the elbow really wasn't recovering I asked my Dr for a referral.

The physio I was referred to has said that the problem stems from trapped nerves in the left hand side of my neck and across my left shoulder and she has been doing some soft tissue massage to release the nerves, whilst I've been doing some exercises that she's given me to stretch/lengthen the tendons in the elbow & forearm. She hopes that our combined efforts will eventually relieve the pain.

I have to say I've felt immediate relief in my neck, shoulder, elbow & back (yep, it still gives me gip even after all this time) after both sessions, but the stiffness soon returns and there is then also a dull ache in the areas she's manipulated. I'm back in three weeks for another session and I'm thinking that once I'm signed off that I'm heading for a deep tissue sports massage - I feel like I need someone to go in with a bit of elbow to really release those nerves & I know just the man for the job   

I was thinking today too about the eggs, and how if they have been causing some degree of bloating (which, in my opinion, has been a gradual thing becoming more apparent in recent weeks) then they could also have been causing some degree of inflammation, so perhaps my recovery will be faster with them out of the picture.

As always, food for thought...

[jmcbn]

I can't remember the last time I ate any of this stuff, but an interesting move forwards nonetheless...

Dolmio and Uncle Ben's firm Mars advises limit on consumption of some products

[jmcbn]

A few weeks back I had a host of blood tests done. I'd had a chat with my GP about the menopause and how I have a lot of the signs. My sister and my mum both went through the menopause early and so we decided that the best way of determining where I am was by doing my bloods. She wanted to rule out any other underlying cause for the regular symptoms, just in case - I was happy she was covering all bases. Not surprisingly everything came back normal - even the oestrogen levels.  Of course that doesn't mean that I'm NOT menopausal because oestrogen levels can fluctuate drastically from day to day, so we'll repeat the full screen in six weeks.

There is absolutely no doubt that eating in a Whole30 way is the best thing any woman can do at this stage in their life. Research shows that eating three square meals a day made up of wholesome, natural ingredients does wonders for balancing hormones, and with menopause it's fundamentally hormones at play. Cholesterol, however, also comes into play in a BIG way here, with total cholesterol levels rising much more rapidly in post menopause, and more specifically the slow decline of the HDL levels (good), and the rapid increase of the LDL & VLDL levels (bad)  - so you definitely want to be avoiding trans fats & sugars to keep that in check.

Unfortunately eating wholesome, natural foods will not prevent the process, delay it, or make it go any quicker - we can be perimenopausal for anything from 6mths to 10yrs. But ultimately it happens - it's the circle of life.

And unfortunately eating wholesome, natural foods will most likely not prevent the very common symptom of central/abdominal weight gain. The spikes & troughs in oestrogen levels (as the body tries it's best to stimulate ovulation) directly impacts a woman's resting metabolic rate (that is the energy she requires simply to 'be'), meaning that energy requirements (& therefore the amount of food required to provide that energy) will differ vastly from day to day - so this is where listening to your body & feeding it what it asks really comes in to play.

It is believed (but not scientifically proven) that eating foods rich is phytoestrogens may help alleviate symptoms - so for Whole30 purposes this would be foods such as garlic, mung bean sprouts, alfafa sprouts, dried apricots, dates & prunes, pistachio nuts, sunflower seeds, chestnuts, fennel & yams.

And with depression, anxiety, and panic attacks being some of the most common syptoms of menopause due to the lower levels of oestrogen effecting the bodies processing of serotonin it is important to eat foods rich in serotonin, selenium, & omega 3 - things like oily fish, seafoods, lamb, beef, turkey, liver, mushrooms, potatoes, bananas, brazil nuts...

I'm pretty sure I'm doing everything I can to ensure I stay healthy throughout the menopause and beyond. I eat primarily Whole30 foods, I listen to my body as best I can, I avoid sugar & trans fats, I limit alcohol, I get out in the sunshine any chance I can, I practice good sleep hygiene & relaxation techniques, and do weight bearing exercise on average 5 days a week.

Pre-menopausal, peri-menopausal, menopausal or post-menopausal - we might as well say Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday or Thursday 'cos it's just another day for me in God's Country 

[MeadowLily]

Those are things that no amount of visualization or head tapping or tanning beds will make go away. 

 

 garlic, dried apricots, prunes, pistachio nuts, sunflower seeds,  fennel & yams.

 

I like those things ^^.   I'll add them  now for when I go Back to the Future.  It can begin in the mid 30's.   A friend of mine started at age 28 and was finished by age 38.  Genetics.  

 

Gentle changes for the permanent WIN.   For real.   It's all about the hormanal balance.  Eating breakfast is a walk in the park   Watching your relatives stand out in the snow, hang their heads out windows and all of the rest, not so much fun.

 

 

http://annlouise.com/2013/03/26/why-perimenopause-can-strike-as-early-as-your-mid-30s/

[jmcbn]

Yesterday was a glorious day in God's Country. The sun was shining brightly enough to need sunglasses - ok, so it had 'teeth' as the Greeks say but it was shining nonetheless, and the boys and I went for a long walk along the beach and onto the Coastal path  

The idea was to stop off for refreshments at a great little spot just across the road from the ocean, but my teenager got all worked up about seeing any of his friends in there & them mocking him for being out with his  mum - he kind of missed the point that in order for them to be there they'd have to be with their parents too as it's licenced premises...   

Anyway, we stopped at the Boat House and climbed on the rocks for a bit, and then retraced our steps, taking in the numerous kite surfers, and the young sailors out from the local yacht club racing in their dinghies along the way, as well as collecting some interesting shells for our garden...

When we got to the car my hands were so cold I could barely turn the key in the ignition, so it was lovely to come to the welcoming smell of my chicken in the slow cooker, and the warmth of the house.

 

After de-boning the chicken I sealed the beef heart & got the slow cooker going again - leaving a lot less food prep to do today thinking I'd maybe get out into the garden.

Unfortunately by the time I got back from the gym the sun that had been shining again when I left the house had disappeared, and so I spent the day as I normally would - catching up on chores indoors, and getting the boys uniforms/PE kits etc ready for the week - but it's been a lot more chilled because I had less to do.

The changing weather and the resulting changing plans really made me think about living for the day. When I'd picked the boys up from their Dad's yesterday the youngest had wanted to come back to the house to play in the garden. I knew that for the teen that likely would have meant an afternoon on the sofa surfing the net, or in his room reading. It was glorious - I wanted us ALL to make the most of it, breathe in the sea air, bask in the Vitamin D, de-stress.... I might have got stuck into sorting the garden had we just come home, but I more than likely would have done food prep thinking ahead to free myself up for today. In other words I'd have been looking to the future instead of living in the present - sometimes we really DO just need to sieze the day.





 

[jmcbn]

So - Food.

The plan was to reintroduce sweet potatoes last week, and then I forgot to buy some. So this week I bought one. Yep, one. My heart really wasn't in it. And I didn't actually cook it when I was doing the rest of my food prep. It will keep, so sweet potatoes are staying off the menu for now.

Then there's the egg issue. 

I've only been a few days without them, and already I'm noticing changes. My right knee has been achey & a little temperamental for a while now, and I was putting it down to age/general wear & tear from running/training... Well, the ache is subsiding (although the triple crack I get when I climb the stairs is still there!) so it looks like it might have been inflamed... I'm really keen to see what else might be inflammation too so I'm keeping the eggs out of the picture for a good while longer - two weeks at least   

I'll admit going egg free has been kind of hard. I'm fine at breakfast - I'll eat anything without a second thought - but eggs were always my go to option when I was in a hurry, or when I had leftover veg to use up. Chicken will work just as well going forward, but of course I hadn't cooked a chicken last week when I decided to pull the plug on the eggs so we're back in the game this week - along with a batch of chilli (not chocolate, just my own regular HOT chilli), a batch of beef heart stew, more mackerel, more salmon, more kale, more roasted veg, more salads, and more baby boiled spuds.

I'm thinking I need to consider egg free mayo though. With avocado out of the picture I tend to rely mainly on mayo for my fat, and I'm using one egg plus a yolk with every batch. It's a minimal amount when you consider the quantity of oil and the size of the batch, but egg is egg is egg.... Must google egg-free mayo and see what my options are.

 

[Zoe]

Chin up on the menopausal thing - I went through it early (42) and it messed up ALL my hormones - but agree living a W30 / paleo lifestyle helps 

Will be interested to see how your egg thing goes re inflammation / joints 

I give them up from time to time - but probably haven't really looked at what got better / worse - could do will a full set of working / pain free joints !!!

How long have you been off them ? - might join you for a week or 2 - we can compare