New Breakfast Alert!

How did I miss this? A truly wonderful and different breakfast to all the others I have come across. What is more it involves chocolate and strawberries. There is something very refreshing about it and it contrasts completely with what we have been having. The ingredients are as follows. 100ml of Alpro Almond Dark Chocolate milk, as many strawberries as you want and 40grams of Shreddies cereal.

'Shrocolate Berry' Breakfast

In the spirit of true accuracy and honesty, I weigh the Shreddies out very carefully, almost forensically. I watch the numbers on the kitchen scales click over to 40g and then I very naughtily add one more Shreddie. How bad is that? And sometimes the reading on the kitchen scales still says 40g. Oh the joy of one extra Shreddie for free! Don’t try to tell me that I don’t know how to live!

I put the Shreddies into the bowl and cover them with strawberries. Then I have 100ml of the Alpro Almond Dark Chocolate milk measured out ready. I leave it on the side and await Naomi’s morning appearance at breakfast. I can reveal that since retirement Naomi is occasionally a little tardy in turning up in the mornings. Once she arrives to the table, wide awake and ready to take on the day, she pours the chocolate milk over her breakfast and eagerly consumes it with much gusto and pleasure.

The mix of flavours is lovely. You must try it. Since this discovery we have eschewed our old breakfast ideas. Not for us the overnight oats or omelettes, we have shunned yoghurts or porridge now. Nope, we have our Shreddie breakfast daily at the moment. It’s the best. I have tried to come up with a suitable name for it and the best I have come up with so far is ‘Shrocolate Berry’. Can you do any better for a name? Once I have a proper name I’ll put it in the recipe section of the website.

The Shreddies account for your Healthy extra B and the Alpro Almond Dark Chocolate milk is half of your Healthy extra A. The strawberries are the speed food. This ‘Shrocolate Berry’ breakfast has two more virtues. Firstly, it only takes a moment to prepare and secondly you can have it for lunch instead of breakfast.

Sweet Dreams Book

We have also been testing out recipes from the new Slimming World ‘Sweet Dreams’ recipe book. This is a serious contender for their best book so far. Obviously not as good as my book, ‘The World of Slimming’, but still pretty good. The best recipe so far has been the Chocolate Yoghurt Mousse. As there were three of us for dinner, I made the recipe up and served it out for three. This meant it was 4 syns each. Big mistake! It is so rich that it is hard to finish. Hard but not impossible. I made it again yesterday and served it out for six and the portions were much better. And this time it was only 2 syns each serving, much better.

Chocolate Yoghurt Mousse

The irony of all this is that thanks to Slimming World I am developing a taste for chocolate which I have not had before. That’s just not right. The other recipe we have made from the new book was the Breakfast Bran Muffins. These are quite stunning but are costly at 4.5 syns each. It is so hard not to have more than one. I had to freeze them and take them out each day otherwise they would have gone in one day.

Cooking Tip for Breakfast Bran Muffins – We used silicon muffin cases as the mix does not stick to these. The paper cases stick really badly and are not useable for these muffins.

Breakfast Bran Muffins

Slimming World Celebrity Superstar Alert

I met one of the Slimming World superstar heroes this Sunday. This guy, I’ll call him Mason, won Mr Sleek UK in 2016. He has lost over 10 stones and looks like a normal regular guy. He has since become a consultant and team leader within the ranks of Slimming World. I actually stood next to him and he even spoke to me directly and shook my hand. I was so excited! I resisted asking for his autograph and didn’t fawn and croon overly.

What am I saying? The joy to me was that Mason was a regular guy with no airs and graces. He shared his journey and all the struggles he still has with his weight even though he is now at target. This was incredibly helpful and inspiring to me. I figure that if another ordinary man can reach his goals, I can too. Do you know that Slimming World groups are full of ordinary people achieving the extraordinary in terms of weight loss?

“Hello, my name is Ken and I'm a food addict.”

There I said it out loud. I am a food addict. Not that this is news to me or anyone who knows me. I live for food. The taste of it, the texture of it, the smell of it and the look of it. If you want to make me happy give me some food.

Having said that I will not eat just any old thing. Oh no. I want the best quality ingredients cooked in the way I like and presented well. I totally understand Sally in the movie 'When Harry Met Sally ' when she says, “Here's what I want” for her cafe order. I think this closely precedes that other more famous scene in the film.

The Famous Scene

Anyway… back with food addiction. Don’t get distracted, I am writing my blog here.

I have become assured recently of the seriousness of my problem with food. It is all just so difficult. But I did have a few moments of revelation this week about my relationship with food. I realised that food is critical at both the high times and the low times in my life. When I have a bad day, I turn to food. It is my comfort. I know that food will in some strange way bring me solace from whatever rubbish is happening in my life. When I have a good day, I turn to food. It is my way of celebrating and enjoying the good times. I can’t win. Whatever I do I must have more food.

But I have a worse problem than this. Ken takes a deep breath… When I cook good food for friends and family I am seeking affirmation. I want to serve the very best food possible so that people will appreciate me and think that I am a worthy person. That was an incredibly difficult sentence to type out – I feel it so keenly. If I provide bad meals then I think that I am failing as a person. In fact, I think that I am a bad person if I don’t serve out good wholesome food.

This recent self-discovery has been milling around in my brain as I have walked the hind leg off a donkey this week. Food is intrinsically linked in my mind to my feelings of self-worth. Now how am I going to deal with that? No idea but I am working on it.