In praise of porridge

I love porridge. I’d have it for breakfast every day if it weren’t for the perplexed stares I draw when cooking up oats in summer! So, when the warm weather hits I switch to fruits and yoghurt, but as soon as the air takes a cold turn, I reach for my oats!

I’m quite a purist about my porridge, and quite particular about how it is prepared. No microwave oats for me, and don’t even think about mentioning the awful, tasteless Ready Brek in my presence (sort of like baby food, but worse).

I favour organic oats and at the moment I’m using Flanahan’s, although sometimes I like the big, chunky oats Sainsbury’s does. However, my ideal texture is somewhere between the two so I might try combining them at some point – stay tuned for that experiment.

Step one for me is soaking the oats: 30g is about enough for me and I put them in a cup of water over night. In the morning, I pour the whole lot into a pan with a pinch of salt and let it cook on a very low heat until it reaches my desired consistency. I like my porridge thick, so it takes at least 15 minutes. 

Every five minutes or so I give it a good stir with a wooden spatula ("materials are everything") and when it is ready I tip it into my bowl. 

By now, you will have noticed the total absence of milk from this procedure: blame my Scottish ancestry. Occasionally, when I am out, I have to settle for porridge made with milk, but I never make it at home. I think it was Clarissa Dickson-Wright who described porridge made with milk as “puppy sick”. She isn’t wrong, you know. By all means pour a bit of milk or cream onto your porridge once it is in the bowl, but don’t insult your oats by poaching them in it.

Despite my aversion to milk, I do like to top my porridge with something: soft fruits, dried fruits, banana, peanut butter, grated apple, cinnamon, or some combination thereof. For breakfast this morning, I sprinkled some figs with brown sugar (I know some people are horrified by sugar, but one teaspoon won't hurt, even when you are trying to lose weight) and baked them until it the sugar bubbled:

And then put them on top of my porridge:

Delicious, filling and healthy :)

Cooking!

As part of my healthy living regime, I’ve been cooking up a storm. Essentially, I’ve been trying to prepare as much of the food I eat as possible, which has meant getting up early to make breakfasts and lunches instead of grabbing cereal at work or buying lunch from a café; making my own stocks and soups, etc.

Another reason is that I am quite a foodie and most low-fat foods in the supermarket just don’t inspire me. Also, I am signed up to an organic veg box service which means that once a fortnight I get a crop of food to use up. And since the contents are a surprise, I get to push my boundaries and think creatively. 

I am doing Weight Watchers, so my criteria for each main meal is that it must be fewer than ten points – other than that, anything goes. 

Here is what I cooked last night: stuffed courgettes with a side salad tossed in parmesan and balsamic vinegar. 

The salad was my own invention, but I got the courgette recipe from AllRecipesUk using smaller quantities of everything (100g mince, 50g brown rice)and substituting lean beef mince for the lamb. And yes, that is cheese on top - I grated 25g of parmesan, topped all my courgettes and still had a generous amount for my salad. Even with the more modest quantity of filling I made I was able to stuff two large courgettes and freeze about 1/3 – enough to stuff a small aubergine I think.

The Great Body Overhaul: Day 1

I am hijacking this blog for the next 52 days to deal with a pressing issue: my weight.

Since returning to northwest London in August and rediscovering my party spirit, I have gained almost 30lb. I am not happy about it! My clothes don’t fit.

So, until May 31st, this blog is going to chart my efforts to shift some of the excess before actually going to a Weight Watchers meeting and subjecting myself to the weigh-in.

• Long-term goal: Shift 5st
• Medium-term goal: Shift 30lb
• Short-term goal: Be slightly lighter in 14 days' time

Progress so far
Well, technically, Day 1 was Monday, but it was rather stressful – my first day in the new job and then an argument with my housemate. I ended up getting takeaway and drinking a martini. Whoops!

Tuesday, I arranged to meet some friends for a drink – but a meeting at work overran by ninety minutes, so drinks became dim sum and some cake Emilie had brought for me.

Wednesday, once again, I ended up going for dinner with a friend, followed by total surrender in the form of coffee and cake. And I announced over a lime and stem ginger brownie that I am giving up on going out for the next fortnight to try and concentrate on healthy eating. I’ll give it about that I’m skint, or something.

Today has been pretty good. I didn't manage to get out for a run this morning as I got home later than planned last night and was somewhat tired, but I used my extra minutes wisely by cleaning the kitchen. Tonight I'll try and do the same for my room!

Foodwise, I have been quite well-behaved:

• Breakfast = Chocolate Weetabix and skimmed milk (5 WW points)
• Lunch = homemade sushi and salad (7 WW points)

One huge difficulty I have is drinking enough water. A fitness professional advised me to aim for 3l a day and most days I have trouble even managing 1.5l. It's not even that I don't like water, I just don't often feel thirsty and find remembering to drink really difficult. I have had some success this week making sure I drink half a litre before leaving for work, but remembering to drink after that is still a battle.

This evening's big challenge will be going out for a drink with my housemate. She has brought a bit of drama into the flat recently and wants to talk about it. My plan: stick to two light drinks and go home after about an hour.

Explanation of absence

O, I am such a terrible blogger!

Where have I been?

Well, at the beginning of March I gave up my job, which you would think would give me loads of time for blogging, but it didn’t. I was out partying with friends and enjoying life! 

I went to the theatre; I met up with people I haven’t seen in ages; I discovered iPlayer and 4oD and caught up with all the TV shows my friends have been on about; I knitted; I went to the cinema; I sat in pubs and parks in the afternoon and watched the world go by; I read large, long books.

And then, I got a fantastic new job. Well-paid, intellectually stimulating and a ten-minute walk from my flat. I couldn’t ask for much more, really. Oh, except for nice colleagues. And they are: lovely. 

Curiously, any ability I’d had to sit through a TV show evaporated the day I started the job, and so did all the time I’d had for reading and knitting: I now walk to work so there is no ‘built-in’ culture time in my schedule!! On the plus side, I don’t have to leave home until 8:30 in the morning, so I can probably reinstate my ‘sacred hour’ for reading or writing, although so far I’ve been using it to listen to Radio 4. 

So, that’s just a quick update about where this blogger has been…