Good Monday to everyone! Have you all had a good start to the week so far?
My day is going fabby at the moment, I’m pleased to say 😀 Lots of good things – I set my alarm 25mins earlier this morning so I had a bit more time to fit everything in; though when I woke up, I looked and felt like someone who had died 3 or 4 months ago. I WAS SO TIRED! Seriously, 6.5hrs sleep is just not enough. Alas, I cracked on with the day regardless, beginning with some A.M. snackz before my run – Innocent smoothie (NO BANANAS recipe) and an O Bar:
They’re pretty good – they count as a fruit portion, and have a super ingredients list: sultanas, oats, oat bran, apricots, non hydrogenated vegetable margarine, dried peaches, freeze dried strawberries, strawberry flavour. Nothing too scary! There was also a good 31g of carb in each bar, hence why I thought they’d be good pre-run fuel. However, the last time I had an O bar was before I’d discovered Nakd/Trek bars – so when I bit into it, I have to say – I was a little disappointed. Very tasty in its own right, but inferior to my beloved Natural Balance Foods bars!
Ok, my run – BAD GARMIN! She took twenty minutes to find signal today 😦 so I wasted 10mins hanging around my yard, before setting off. About 11mins in/1.3miles ish, I had her company. Grrrr…so I’m not certain how far I covered, but I think it was approx. 10k in about 51minutes. Weirdly I felt soo lacking in energy this morning. My legs weren’t stiff and my lungs were fine, but I just felt like I was dragging! I actually stopped for a quick stretch after about 3miles, which helped a bit. Does anyone else get that?? What do you do to combat it?
Ah well, regardless of my sans-energy experience, I was still mega pleased to have done it. NOTHING beats the feeling after a run!
For breakfast, I did have great hopes for oatmeal, but once again, I came in and was too hot for hot food, so it was a Green Monster again :p 1 cup cereal, 1 frozen banana, 1 small pear (they need eating!!), spinach, 1/2cup soya yogurt, 1/2cup milk, 1tbsp cocoa. Topped with a peanut butter wafer, granola, dates and Fru-Grains:
Hehe, it’s meant to be a face!! I thought I should at least TRY and make it look a bit more interesting 😛
After breakfast, I cracked straight on with some work. I decided today was the day I finished my [last ever] lab report! It’s due in two weeks, but it’s been hanging over my head for ages, so I decided to just get it DONE.
Halfway through the morning though, the postman came and brightened up my day considerably! The wonderful people at 9-Bar sent me some samples of their (newly improved packaging) bars!!
YAY!! Here’s my review:
These bars are fabulous – they’re basically a big blend of seeds, topped with carob chocolate, with no artificial anythings – natural goodness!! They included all 20 amino acids, as well as being packed full of Omega-6…so much good fat in these babies! They have a good carb and protein content too (about 18g protein per 100g). Check out the great ingredient list: mixed seeds (sunflower, pumpkin, sesame, poppy), carob topping (sugar, vegetable fat, soya, carob, emulsifier: sunflower lecithin), honey, raw cane sugar, vegetable oil, dehulled hemp seed. And that’s it! Well, in the flavour I had anyway 😛 You can also get pumpkin seed, organic, nutty and flax flavours. DELICIOUS! I had one with my lunch:
Super tasting – kinda chewy, but very firm and full of flavour. I think it’s love…I can tell they’re going to feature lots in my marathon training 😛
Ok, and the rest of lunch – soup! I had the other half of my block of sheep’s cheese to use as well as a pear…SO, I cut up said pear, squash, leek and garlic:
And simmered it til the squash was soft in veggie stock, along with some cinnamon and nutmeg:
Then I stirred in the sheep’s cheese:
And blended it, along with a big spoon of apple sauce (which fyi, totally made the soup!). I sprinkled it with some walnuts and pumpkin seeds, and voila!
World’s Tastiest Soup! It made a heck of a lot, but it was so tasty I didn’t care 😛
For dessert, I had a lemon organic natural biscuit thing (I’ve banged on about them loads before).
Gosh was I busy in the arvo! I did more work, did the horses, baked some muffins (you’ll see tomorrow, they look fab :P) AND made another variety of Fakd balls!! These ones involved figs, dates and cocoa, amongst other things…. I shan’t post the recipe yet though, cos I want to tweak it slightly and make it better, but here they are:
They are verrrry yummy! I had one along with a hot chocolate and a vanilla soya yogurt for my afternoon snack 🙂
For dindins, I made crispy chicken (chicken breast, coated in seasoned oatbran – cinnamon [of course], s&p, garlic) with carrot, sweet potato and parsnip fries [coated in cinnamon, garlic, and agave, with date syrup on the sweet potato], and roasted broccoli:
Excuse the mangled chicken…I get SO paranoid that I won’t cook chicken enough, I always end up cutting it up into little pieces so I can check it’s white all the way through 😛
Most. Delicious. Plate. Ever.
Yes, I know I say that at pretty much every meal – but that doesn’t stop it being true 😛
I love crispy chicken – it’s hard to believe that it wasn’t deep fried, or fried in a pint of oil (I only used the spray!) – who says healthy food has to be bad!?
For dessert, I shall be enjoying some full fat Greek yogurt with a square of chocolate, hot chocolate, and quite possible episode 7am in ‘24’! My sister made me start watching it..has anyone else seen it? I’m only on season 1; confusing, but it’s nice to watch every now and then 🙂
Have a good evening!
*EDIT: I have an exciting announcement to make on Tuesday!!
Yum, your soup looks so nice! Glad to know I’m not the only one that does that with chicken too! 🙂
I love, love, love 9 bars. Do you reckon if I email them they’ll send me some to review for the blog?!
They might! They are giving away free samples on their page anyway 🙂
Ooh I’ve never been on their website before (which is odd, since I tend to spend a disproportionate amount of time on cereal bar websites). I’ll take a look – thanks 🙂
lol @ the face in your oatmeal. I make faces with my food too 🙂
Thanks for the bar review! They sound tasty!
I love 9 bars… the original is my favourite! alsooo… can I come to your house for dinner?! hahaa!
I’ve always wanted to try the new varieties of 9-Bar…I absolutely adored them way back when I was vegetarian…curses that they have to use honey in them!
I am a big fan of O Bars too, but you’re right that they don’t compare to Nakd bars.
Can’t wait for your announcment 😀
❤
~Jess~
Everything in this post looks AMAZING. I’ll have a serving of everything, please 🙂 Would love to find those 9-bars to try. And I love your green monster face 😛
Besides the carob ( i detest carob), those bars look great!
As far as bad runs…I have them all the time! It seems like I have bad weeks, then good weeks. My funning is so finicky…I hate it!
If I saw your facebook right, I think I know what your announcement is!! 😀
I’m the SAME way with chicken, so paranoid. I’m really bad at telling if it’s done without cutting into it but I know there is a way.
Your soup sounds delicious and the presentation is gorgeous!!!!
All those bars!! so lucky are you!
Love ya girl!
Hey Freya
So I saw a reference to marathon training in there… are you in??
I hope we can get places – apparently its quite hard!
Looking forward to your announcement……………….
Julia
Briitish Bride
My Garmin took like 10 min to find satellites yesterday too, sooo irritating!
Both of the bars that you tried today sound good, but the 9-Bar is definitely something that I will have to try ASAP, thanks for the review!
I love your food 😀
I discovered greek youghurt today at my local store, thinking about buying it but then : ED-alarm , full-fat.
Hm hm hm, need a couple of days to think about that, Hedda, analyze a bit.
Agh. Perhaps I should try again tomorrow then, because it really looked delicious!
Girl – go for it! Imagine how you’l feel after – you’ll have challenged yourself, you’ll have pumped your body full of brilliant protein and GOOD fat, you’ll have enjoyed a wonderful taste, and you’ll be one step closer to overcoming the bitch that is ana.
Maybe buy it, and just have half the pot? A spoon? Small steps are still steps.
I believe in you hon 🙂
And if you don’t challenge yourself, nothing will change and you’ll be angry you didn’t try.
Greek yogurt is worth it!!
Thank you for the support, Freya.
You are right : there is protein and good fat. Yes, there are calories- but Hedda, that is what you need.
I will buy it, and then eat as much as I dare to the first evening.
I have challenged myself a lot lately, you should have seen my evening-snack today. Hoff, bye ED, I have to have some real amount of cheese on my toast. And most importantly, I did it with my own hands, no one else made that toast for me.
Know that getting in touch with you has helped me a lot.
And girl- lucky you for that package in the post 😀
[…] *EXCITING ANNOUNCEMENT ALERT* So last night, I was browsing the 9-Bar website, seeing as I’d done a review of them yesterday, when I found a link to something INCREDIBLE! ……..*drum […]
All of your food looks fantastic, especially the bar though.
Can’t wait to hear the announcement, sounds pretty exciting hehe…