Half syn cake

This is amazingly acceptable cake a la Slimming World! 

Half a syn for the whole mixture - you can either bake a cake or split the mixture into muffin cases - I got 10.  I did add a teeny smidge of jam in the middles, but there were only 1.5 syns in all the jam I used. More suggestions at the end of the recipe.

As there is no fat or flour in the mix they won't keep well, so best to freeze them.

Ingredients

4 eggs, separated

4 tablespoons sweetener

1 teaspoon baking powder

1 teaspoon vanilla essence

Method:

Whisk egg whites until stand in soft peaks, like meringue.

Add sweetener, baking powder and vanilla essence to egg yolks.  Whisk until well blended.  Add 1/3 egg whites and whisk again.

Fold remaining egg whites into egg yolk mixture with a metal spoon.

Line a baking tray with greasproof paper, sprayed with fry light.

Place mixture onto prepared tray.  Bake in oven (Gas 4) for 20 minutes.

Once cool, add filling (see below) and roll up like a swissroll, or cut into 3 strips and layer with filling.


Suggested fillings:

Fat free fromage frais, sweetened to taste with strawberries, grapes or berries. - no extra syns.
Muller light greek style yoghurt and fruit - 0.5 syns per greek style yoghurt used.
Plain quark mixed with sweetener and white chocolate options sachet and fruit - 2 syns extra.
Syns are for the whole cake - so if not adding syns in filling, whole cake is only half a syn!  

Rich beef casserole

Tonight's tea - with plenty left to freeze into at least 5 portions.  Another 5 nights where tea is quick and easy :)

It's basically braising steak (800g), onions, garlic, carrots plus stock (I love the Knorr stock pots, and used two). I chucked in some extra veg - tomatoes, mushrooms and broad beans - plus a couple of teaspoons of mixed herbs. My slimming world consultant is forever talking about 'rainbow plates' and I think it is now ingrained into my brain!

For a change, I had couscous instead of potatoes, and added broccoli which is probably my favourite veg at the moment.

Completely syn free, and delicious!   And I have 5 or so syns left today - and a Cadbury's fudge bar has got my name on it :)

Beef pasta bake

I absolutely love this - always make a big batch so I can freeze off a few portions.  You can add what veg you like - I added mushrooms, chopped onions, red pepper, garlic, and a few broad beans for extra colour. I forgot to add some mixed herbs, but didn't spoil the taste :)

  

The recipe:-

 300g extra lean minced beef

1/2 clove garlic

Onions, peppers,mushrooms (as much as you like!)

400g tinned tomatoes

2 tbsp tomato purée

450g pasta (any shape)

Mixed herbs (to your own taste)


Method

Brown off the mince. Add onions, peppers, mushrooms, tomato purée and tinned tomatoes. Cook on hob for 2-3 mins then put aside.

Cook pasta until al dente and drain then mix together with meat mixture.

Place in oven proof dish and cook for 20-30 mins on has mark 4/180 deg C (although I leave it in for an hour, so the peppers and onions are really softened)

Also you could add your HEA cheese on top for a nice topping

Result!

1.5lbs off today - that's a good loss for me, as I usually lose 0.5 - 1 lb a week.  2lbs away from my target, although I may increase that slightly so I get a 2 stone award (and fit comfortably into the next size)

This is week 25 and I've lost 1stone 10.5lbs, so it averages about 1 lb a week. Feeling very proud of myself (and my family and friends are too).

Lemon curd dip recipe

I've had quite a few requests for the recipe - so here it is.

It's delicious with any fresh fruit, meringues, or as a sponge cake filling. Re-posting the photo of some of mine in filo pastry cases :-

Beat 2 eggs

Add the juice and zest of a lemon and beat well

Add 3 tbsp sweetener. 

Place bowl over a pan of simmering water and stir till it thickens - about 5-8 mins. (Be warned once it starts to thicken it's instant so if you can take immediately from the heat and keep stirring or you will end up with scrambled eggs!! )

Remove from heat, then whisk in 2 tbsp quark.

Syn Free on all 3 plans :-)

NOTE - Don't freeze - when it defrosts it tastes quite bitty as if it has curdled :(

Butternut squash and sweet potato soup

This is from a SW facebook group (both recipe and photo) - looking forwards to making it tomorrow :)

Recipe:-

BUTTERNUT SQUASH AND SWEET POTATO SOUP

1 butternut squash - chopped

4 sweet potatoes - peeled and chopped

2 onions - chopped

3 veg oxos

1 knorr veg stock pot

1.5 litre boiled water

Salt and pepper

METHOD

Throw the chopped vegetable in a large saucepan, crumble the oxo cubes over the vegetables, season with salt and pepper, add knorr stock, pour over the hot water. Cover and bring to the boil, simmer till vegetables are soft! Blitz and serve with a sprinkling of parsley. 

This amount makes 3 - 4 good sized bowlfuls. Can be frozen and is syn free on EE.

I have a soup maker - best gadget I own! I'll be making it in there - much less work :)

Half syn cake

Yes, I have a sweet tooth!

This is a small slice of a half syn cake which I baked in a loaf tin, which I cut into 8 slices.  There's no fat or flour in the cake, it's mainly eggs, baking powder, sweetener and almond essence and is surprisingly cake like. Topped with lemon curd (no surprise there) and a few chocolate sprinkles. It barely registers on the syn scale!

Next time I might double the quantities and cook in two sandwich tins, and put the curd between the two cakes. Another idea is to sweeten quark (which takes on any flavour added to it) with a sachet of options (chocolate) and some sweetener - have heard that tastes really good too for the filling.

Very tasty, very satisfying when only cake will hit the spot :)

3 syn dessert

This was delicious: melted an Alpen light lemon drizzle bar (3syns), added my favourite home made lemon curd dip (syn free) and topped with summer berries and some Choc Shot drizzled over. Very decadent - eat your heart out, Jamie Oliver!

Dinner and dieting

People who don't follow Slimming World often have completely the wrong idea about it all. I've met people who've said they couldn't exist on lettuce, would miss rice, potatoes and pasta, and couldn't stand not being able to have sweet things any more. They think we don't eat properly!

I've never eaten so well for years and my plate is usually piled up. When I hit a bit of plateau a while back, I realised I wasn't eating enough, and upped the superfree veg (often half my plate is full of them).

Tonight's dinner is fairly typical -

Chicken breast roasted (minus skin) in the oven, new potatoes, broccoli, carrots, beans and a syn's worth of gravy.  I'm full to bursting!  Later on I will have some lemon curd dip and a meringue - home made and completely syn free.  I still have around 6 syns to use, so if I've room I'll have a Cadbury fudge bar, or save them til tomorrow and might have a creme egg (9 syns!!)

So yes, dieting is such a trial (....not!)

1lb off

- and very happy with that!

Only 3lbs to target, but may increase that by 2lbs so I get a 2 stone award. Not been my current weight in many years!
As always, I have eaten really well this past week, and not been deprived of sweet stuff. I still reckon Slimming World is magic :)

Salmon tea

Got some lovely salmon fillets today (bargain reduced price) - enjoyed some lemon and coriander cous cous plus beans and broccoli with some for today's tea. So tasty!  Any sort of sauce would have buried the lovely delicate tastes.

It was one of those rare times I managed to get near the 'reduced' section in the supermarket - I also got 2 x 400g packs of reduced price lean diced beef, and in total saved £4.70 - or so I thought.  At the checkout I got a further £2 off, as the 2 packs of beef qualified for an offer as well. Amazing value - could not resist buying them inspite of me saying I'd use up my stash before buying any more!

Weigh in tomorrow - eek!

Old favourite for tea

- my delicious beef and pasta bake, this time with lots of my favourite superfree veg, green beans and carrots.  Slimming World recommend a third of the plate superfree, but I decided on more as I love my veggies.

Last night I was sorting out the freezer. It's a big chest freezer, which right now is virtually full. When I cook, I tend to make a large batch and freeze several portions, as I don't want to be cooking every single day, much as I have grown to enjoy cooking.

I very carelessly put a container to one side as I was busy reorganising, and forgot to put it back in the freezer. I discovered this faux pas this morning when I went back into the spare room (where my freezer lives, due to having such a tiny kitchen) and found said container which had 2 portions of casserole in it. Defrosted of course, and it had been hanging around for too many hours to risk eating it.  Not happy!

Tomorrow I'm cooking a corned beef quiche, and my half syn cake which will have the syn free lemon curd dip as a filling. I'll also be going through my recipe books as I found a lot of meat in the freezer (I tend to buy when there's a good offer on), and planning out what to cook next. I have a lot of veggies in (I use Aldi and my local excellent farm shop) so I'm good to go.  My goal this month is to spend as little as possible on food, and start using up my stash in the freezer instead of hoarding it.

Weigh in on Tuesday - not sure how that will go. I've eaten probably a few too many syns this past few days, my weakness being chocolate!  We'll see what happens! I really want to get to target by the end of the month if possible - 6lbs in 4 weeks - but that's probably unrealistic as my weight loss has slowed down a lot at this point. I'll really be happy if I'm at target at the end of April, which is probably more realistic.