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Good Days, Bad Days and Salad Days



Today I’ve had a really good day, the sun has been out, we’ve been for coffee and whiled away an hour in a coffee shop, did a little shopping and did some ad hoc working on our respective laptops before dinner, with a spot of Billy Connolly or Bill Bailey playing in the background. It has been a relaxed and very enjoyable day and another upside has been that I haven’t felt hungry. Other than my coffee (174 cals) I ate nothing until dinner. At which point I was very hungry and I over-faced myself with a plate full.

Yesterday I had a “bad” day that is I went over my calorie allowance by 224 cals. I don’t consider this to be all that bad, I had under-eaten by a similar amount the day before and the reason I went over my calories was the consumption of a whole bottle of delicious red wine. I refuse to apologise for this because it happens very rarely and sometimes it’s fun to get slightly tipsy with my hubby. 

I say I over-faced myself today but I have discovered a new and very helpful taste. I made myself a plate full of food today but I’m happy to say that at least half of that plate was salad, the rest was a 150g cordon bleu chicken and 8 potato croquettes. I ate all of the salad first (and loved every bite) and found that I couldn’t eat all of the croquettes or the whole chicken fillet. Essentially I overate on salad and couldn’t eat the rest, which was of significantly higher calorific value. 

I’m loving my new habit of eating a ton of salad with a meal because I always eat the salad first, if I have made too much for myself then it’s the higher calorie foods that get left.
My new love of salad and other vegetation has prompted my creative streak to turn itself to the creation of salad dressings. Okay, I live in Cyprus so I should start with the traditional olive oil dressing but at 120calories/tablespoon it’s a little bit on high side while I’m trying to LOSE weight.

Dressing 1 – 50 calories (a bit high for a fast day salad)
1tsp       Olive Oil /extra virgin if preferred
1tsp       Balsamic Vinegar
1tsp       Warm water
Fresh ground salt and pepper to taste
1pinch Oregano
  
Dressing 2 4-5 calories – obviously not including the salad (much better for a fast day)
Prep; Rinse salad under warm water for thirty seconds (just long enough to lightly warm the salad leaves) and drain.
Grind salt, pepper and a mixture of preferred herbs/spices (pretty much any of the flavours you like with salad) and mix into the salad.
Coat salad with 4-5 sprays from a salad dressing style Frylite.
Voila! A dressed salad.

One of the best ways to change the flavour of your salad is to vary the ingredients. There is much more to salad than iceberg lettuce, mix things up with some rocket, romaine (nice peppery flavour), lollo rosso, rocket and my personal favourite, spinach (baby spinach leaves are a little sweeter and softer).
If you fancy a different flavour use lemon juice instead of balsamic vinegar (or even white/red wine vinegar). Grate a little bit of carrot or even radish into your salad leaves. Even adding the sprouting tips of broccoli is tasty.

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