Daily menus - vegetarians

[TiaLi]

Band went really well. I've healed really quickly and adapted to living with my band well. I never feel hungry at the moment so hoping that lasts
I've got my first fill next week so feeling a bit nervous.
Thank you for putting up ur posts they are really fab x

That's great to hear, glad everything went smoothly!

Haven't had a look through your lovely food pics for a while, so just catching up.

Seven stone is an amazing amount to lose in five months and as the results of your bloods have shown, you must be going about it the right way

Thanks Mazza

 

[TiaLi]

Quinoa, sweetcorn & chilli pancake with salsa and basil creme fraiche

So I think I'll change the format of my posts, so I can post a bit more often. I've been quite busy lately, so I hardly ever remember to photograph all three meals during the day. From now on I'll post pics of my meals etc as and when I remember to do them instead of waiting for days when I manage to capture everything. All my meals are pretty much the same size anyway, and I always stick to just three meals per day - so you can still get a good idea of what my food intake is at various times.

The only thing I actually photographed today was my breakfast. I wanted to experiment a bit and try something other than the usual scrambled eggs or smashed avocado on crispbread (as you can tell I've been in an avocado-craze phase lately).

The title pretty much sums up what's in it - a bit of pancake batter mixed with red and white quinoa, sweetcorn and chopped green chilli. The tomato salsa is just 1 chopped up cherry tomato. All topped with some fat-free creme fraiche mixed with chopped, fresh basil. For basil, I always go fresh rather than dried, because the flavour is so vastly different. Yes, it's more expensive and there's often wastage - but my food bill is so drastically reduced these days that I now just always go for the best ingredients. Just because your meals are small that doesn't mean they can't be bursting with flavour!

I have the cutest mini-frying pan, which basically is the size of a fried egg - perfect for making little fritters like these. Bought it after surgery to help with portion-control.

 

[Mazza]

I've got one of those pans too @TiaLi

That looks lovely! I'm with you on the avocado craze too x

 

[TiaLi]

I have that little pan too, it's the perfect size
Your meals look really tasty
When you say pancake batter, do you mean a packet batter mix? Or an egg mix that you have made? X

Those pans really are great, aren't they? For the batter, I prefer my own over the store bought (find that too sweet), but just use whatever you like best. I never really measure or stuff like that, I sort of just wing it when I'm cooking. Admittedly that means things sometimes go very wrong though!

 

[TiaLi]

Chilli, ginger & lime-marinated Quorn fillet with apple and cashew salad

So this was today's lunch. Very quick and easy to throw together - you can buy Quorn fillets already marinated with this particular Thai mix. Alternatively, buy plain fillets and just throw together a marinade with your own favourite spices. The side salad was a bit of a strange mix (typical case of "what do I have in the fridge/cupboards") but the flavours worked really well together! Spinach, two chopped up apple slices, a bit of light cheddar and a couple of cashew nuts.

The Quorn fillet is only 93 calories, with 11 g of protein. The cheese another 60 cals and 5g protein. Didn't weigh the rest of the ingredients (cashews, apple, spinach) though, but a rough guess is the whole thing ends up at a little over 200 cals.

 

[TiaLi]

Grilled halloumi with pineapple/mango salsa

Today's lunch! Wanted to try something similar to the kiwi/halloumi salad I had the other week - there was something about that salty/sweet/spicy combination I really liked. Super easy and quick to do: just chop up some pineapple, mango and red chilli and serve together with fried/grilled halloumi. You can buy snack packs with mango and pineapple to avoid too much wastage. Alternatively, keep a bag of frozen tropical fruit in the freezer and take a couple of chunks from there. They're great for home-made protein shakes as well! For the halloumi, I use Tesco's lighter variant with 30% less fat (1/4 of a pack, which is what I normally use in a portion, equals 152 cals and 14g of protein).

I probably overdid the chilli a bit though - can barely feel my tongue...

 

[TiaLi]

Breakfast egg muffins with spinach, shallots and feta

Today's breakfast. These turned out really well, think I'll have to try it again some time. Just beat an egg together with a splash of milk (I was actually out of milk and used sour cream, which worked fine too - but I'll use milk next time) and add your choice of filling. Pour the mix into muffin tins/cases and cook in the oven at 190c for approximately 25 mins. One egg was enough for two small muffin moulds for me.

Since you don't use flour in the mix these are virtually carb free, so it's a good low calorie, high protein breakfast choice.

For the filling, I used spinach, shallots and low-fat feta cheese, seasoned with some black pepper and oregano (the feta is already salty so was no need for salt) - but there are so many different combinations you can try. Just throw in whatever you fancy, like peppers, mushrooms, herbs, sundried tomatoes, mozarella, onion, chives, parmesan etc.

 

[OkieGirl]

Seriously, your meals look and sound gorgeous!

 

[TiaLi]

Seriously, your meals look and sound gorgeous!

Thanks @OkieGirl ! I'm working hard at trying to reprogram my brain in terms of eating habits, in order to avoid regain once the honeymoon period is over. Simply doing smaller portions of my previous "regular" foods wouldn't be enough for me in the long-term I think (I have too much of an addictive behaviour when it comes to certain foods and tastes), so I'm being quite strict with what type of ingredients etc I can have. Because of that I have had to really think about new food combinations - and obviously ones that work from a nutrient perspective. I'm eating so little these days that it can be tricky to reach a decent daily intake of protein, fibre etc.

I did notice the other day that my brain has really started craving colour on my plate, so hopefully that's a step in the right direction. A meal now looks wrong to me if it doesn't have both red and green in it. Hence all the cherry tomatoes!

 

[TiaLi]

Crudités with butterbean dip

Today's lunch! I wanted an alternative to hummus, and ideally with a higher protein content and lower fat content (the oil and tahini in hummus can make it quite calorific). As usual this was a bit of an experiment and I didn't really measure anything so I don't have an exact recipe - but if you want to try it just start mixing and taste as you go along to get the right flavour balance for you. It was really nice! Made far too much dip though, but I guess it'll be fine in the fridge for a day.

The dip contained: tinned butter beans, fat-free Greek yoghurt, 1 clove garlic (I love garlic though), a bit of low-fat feta cheese (not very much) and fresh chives. All seasoned with ground cumin and paprika. Just throw everything together in a bowl and use a hand blender to make a smooth paste. I used carrots, cherry tomatoes and some leftover grilled halloumi sticks as crudités, but obviously any veggies will do.

 

[Mazza]

We we're at a wedding yesterday and as the bride is veggie, there where some lovely veggie canapes, which made me think of you @TiaLi.

My favourite was bite sized grilled halloumi with pesto and a half, grilled cherry tomato on top

 

[OkieGirl]

(I have too much of an addictive behaviour when it comes to certain foods and tastes)

This. I could tell you right now what my go to comfort foods are and I know that it's purely the texture/taste that gives me my fix. I am hoping that once I have surgery that my brain will have a bit of a reset period where I can start working on rewiring it, but I also know that it's going to be something that I'll always have to be on guard for in the future.

 

[TiaLi]

We we're at a wedding yesterday and as the bride is veggie, there where some lovely veggie canapes, which made me think of you @TiaLi.

My favourite was bite sized grilled halloumi with pesto and a half, grilled cherry tomato on top

Oh that sounds lovely, I have to try that!

This. I could tell you right now what my go to comfort foods are and I know that it's purely the texture/taste that gives me my fix. I am hoping that once I have surgery that my brain will have a bit of a reset period where I can start working on rewiring it, but I also know that it's going to be something that I'll always have to be on guard for in the future.

Yeah I think that is really important for long term success - at least for me. I know how I work. My relationship with food was definitely affected by having the bypass, the surgery had an impact on much more than just the quantities I could eat. I just don't think about food as much at all, and the addictive loops seem to have been severed for a while, so it has been easy to resist temptations. I am very well aware that that is a temporary state though, and that cravings will start sneaking in the further out you go. So I'm a strong believer in that you need to make sure to make the most of that window you have in terms of changing habits, because it won't last forever.

 

[TiaLi]

When I was put on the waiting list my surgeon gave me a predicted weight loss (60% of excess weight). I remember it made me quite upset that he predicted I'd never get to a normal weight even with surgery, but I always appreciated him being so brutally honest. After initially feeling very disheartened by this, I instead started channelling that disappointment into a strong drive to prove their statistics wrong. Someone has to be on the right side of the Bell curve, and I'm determined to be one of those people. When Professor Patel came by to see me during my second stint in hospital I told him I'd prove him wrong and that we now have a bet going on. He smiled, shook my hand and replied that that was a bet he'd be very happy to lose.

I am now 6.5 months post op and happy to say I have just surpassed that predicted weight loss. Now, let's get cracking on the remaining 39%

 

[elizaxx]

Your food looks delicious. I was a year out in June, and have been maintaining since feb,

so today's menu looked like this

Breakfast: Eat Natural Protein packed bar, and Milky coffee

Lunch: Grilled halloumi with salad of lettuce, beetroot and olives, with Balsamic glaze

Snack: Nakd bar

Dinner: Butterbean, Kidney bean, and pepper chili, with cheddar, half fat creme fraiche, and Guacamole

Freddo, and milky decaf coffee