Tag: healthy

Meal Plan 3 Laura of London

Breakfast, a couple of dinners and a new meal plan – you lucky sods!

Laura NanaLeave a comment

Morning all,

I’ve recently started a new job hence the radio silence for a week or two but I’ve got some beauties for you this morning and more to come soon, including (hopefully) a wonderful guest blog from my lovely friend Nicola French!

Cashew cream on toast
Cashew cream on toast

Breakfast this morning is gluten free toast with cashew cream, which you’ll know having read my ‘Game Changer‘ post, this is my new and most favourite sweet treat!

Its been a pretty busy week as I’ve also started going back to the gym. I’m like a kid in a sweet shop with all the class options and had my first PT consult with one of the trainers, I’m really looking forward to getting fitter and leaner over the coming months, make sure you follow my Laura_of_London Instagram to track my progress!

Vietnamese Prawn Rolls Laura of London
Vietnamese Prawn Rolls

We’ve had a couple of nice new recipes this week as well as some good classics – my Vietnamese prawn rolls went down a storm last night with the family, they always taste so clean, healthy and fresh and adding a bit of spice to the dipping sauce makes all the difference!

I also tried to make a couple of new salads, first was a Goats Cheese and Grain salad with a honey lemon dressing and then we had a Steak and roasted veg salad with a lovely peppery mustard dressing.

I’ve made another meal plan for you to try, I really would urge you to try these for a week or to – most of the recipes are available on my site, they’re all clean eating and I’m always available to help chat through any questions you have. I’d love to have any feedback from people who have tried them as I want to make sure they work!

Have a super fantabulous weekend everyone, if you’re in London, it looks to be a nice hot BBQ-tastic one!

Meal Plan 3 Laura of London
Meal Plan 3

Meal Plan 3

Steak Salad Laura of London

Steak Salad

Laura Nana1 Comment

Ingredients

Steak Salad Laura of London
Steak Salad
  • 200-400g Thin cut rump steak
  • 1-2tsp coconut oil
  • Mixture of roasting vegetables – red onion, peppers, sweet potato, tomatoes, courgette etc…
  • Artichokes in olive oil, chopped (optional)
  • Fresh cherry tomatoes
  • 1 bag of Watercress and/or rocket salad
  • 1tsp Wholegrain mustard
  • 1tsp honey, agave or maple syrup
  • 1tbsp extra virgin olive oil
  • 2 Spring onions finely chopped

Method

Season the steaks well with salt and pepper. Add 1 tsp of coconut to a frying pan and heat to a very high heat. Use a stopwatch to cook the steaks. You want 30 seconds on one side and 30 seconds on the other then straight onto a plate and cover with foil to rest and cool down.

When the steak are cool you can slice them super thin and use some of the juices that have escaped in your salad dressing.

Heat the oven to 200 degrees and prep your roasting veg – be rough with it but aim for bite-size pieces. Roast for 35 minutes with a little coconut oil then leave to cool down.

Mix up the dressing – steak juices, oil, honey, wholegrain and a little squish of lemon juice if you have any.

Lay out the watercress, artichokes and spring onion with some fresh chopped cherry tomatoes then lay out the steak on top with the roasted veg and pour over some of the dressing and demolish! Enjoy!

A game changer…

Laura Nana5 Comments

Trust me, I’m not using that title lightly! I’ve just made something quite amazing from a ridiculously small number of ingredients leaving me in a state of shock!

So this week I’ve been researching the benefits of soaking nuts and grains etc to remove toxins and make proteins and other good nutrients more easily absorbable by the body. 

During the research I came across quite a few posts about ‘cream’ substitutes – especially when looking at vegan sites. 

I tried to make Cashew Cream today and I’ve pretty much polished it off standing in the kitchen cooking dinner!

  
 
It’s super smooth as a result of soaking the cashews and the maple syrup is a great partner in crime. I’m going to have this as ‘Strawberries and cream’, it could easily be a ‘buttercream’ on top of GF cupcakes and might even work with my morning granola/compote concoction. 

If you make anything from my blog, please make this.

Ingredients 

  • 1 cup plain cashews
  • 1/4 cup water 
  • 2 tbsp maple syrup
  • Small pinch of sea salt

Soak the nuts covered in boiled water for 15 minutes. 

Drain and add to a blender with all other ingredients and blitz for 3-4 minutes. 

Add more water and blitz again if you want a thinner ‘cream’.

Done. Taste it. Smile at your genius. Eat. 

Frittata-ta-ta-ta-ta

Laura NanaLeave a comment

I haven’t had a frittata for well over a year, I’m not a big egg eater you see but my family are and I’m on a mission to keep our meals cheap at the moment. 

 

Spanish Frittata Laura of london
Spanish Frittata

This is a Spanish frittata with a summery salad topping, I’ve  given some optional extras depending on how much veg you have in and whether you want to make it vegescarian, meaty or fishy! You’ll need a really good non-stick pan for this dish. 

Ingredients 

  • 4 eggs
  • 1tsp coconut oil
  • 1 leek or onion or 3-4 spring onions
  • 1 pepper, red, green or orange is fine
  • 100g chestnut mushrooms 
  • Handful of peas
  • 1 tsp thyme leaves
  • 2 medium size white potatoes 
  • 1/2 avocado, scoop lumps with a teaspoon
  • 2 ripe tomatoes, roughly chopped
  • Salad leaves – I used lambs lettuce

Optional extras

  • 100g diced chorizo
  • 50g grated cheese
  • 200g shrimp/small prawns
  • 1 tsp chilli flakes

  

Method

  1. Finely dice the onion/leek and pepper. Strip the thyme leaves from their stalks. Thinly slice the mushrooms and the potatoes.
  2. Put the potatoes in a pan of boiling water for 7 minutes and drain. Leave to cool a little.
  3. Heat the coconut oil in the pan and add the onion/leeks and cook well for 5 minutes. Then add chorizo or prawns (if using) and cook for a further 2 minutes. Add the red peppers, thyme, paprika and mushrooms and allow to cook down. Add the potatoes and season well.
  4. Turn the oven on to the grill or the oven/grill function at about 180.
  5. In a bowl, crack two of the eggs. With the other two eggs, separate the whites and the yolks. Add the yolks to the bowl containing the other two cracked eggs and whisk. Then whisk up the separated egg whites well until white and frothy. Pour the egg whites into the egg mix and whisk all together. This will make it lighter and it’ll puff up a bit under the grill. 
  6. Pour the egg mix into the saucepan containing all your lovely veg and leave for a minute to set around the edges. Add the handful of peas. 
  7. Add the grated cheese and place under the grill for 5-7 minutes until brown and crispy on top. 
  8. Remove from the oven and loosen around the edges with a palette knife.
  9. Shuffle it onto a plate and top with your salad and a spritz of lemon juice.

  

I served mine with a little chilli sauce mixed into some mayonnaise as a little treat.

  


Prosciutto Rolls & Salad

Laura NanaLeave a comment

I came up with this lunch idea at the weekend, I love prosciutto and combining it with good quality mozzarella and peppery rocket makes this a really delicious option for lunch. Please try and go for the best possible quality mozzarella you can realistically afford, I promise it makes a difference. I’ve added a cheeky little video for you, hope you like it!

  
Serves: 1

  • 2 slices of prosciutto
  • 2 tsp mascarpone
  • Couple of torn-off pieces of mozzarella
  • 3-4 sundried tomatoes
  • Rocket
  • Handful of spinach
  • Cherry tomatoes, cut into quarters
  • Squeeze of lemon juice

Lay out the prosciutto and spread the mascarpone over them and season well, you could add a little bit of oregano at this point too. Lay on the rocket and sundried tomatoes and add the mozzarella. Squeeze over a spritz of lemon juice and roll these up into little parcels of joy, you can secure them with a little cocktail stick if you need to.

Put the spinach and tomatoes in a Tupperware container and pop the parcels on top.

Try and wait until lunchtime.