What to Eat in Split, Croatia

Morning! 

I recently shared my photos with you from my trip to Split, I have more photos to share from islands and other places in Croatia but had to share my food photos and recommendations too!

Fitness Friday: Food Maths

Good morning!

I've had a really bad 2 weeks of exercising, I've had a bit of a virus that wiped me out for a week or so. I thought I was OK but went to Body Combat and had to leave when the stars came rolling in and I thought I was going to hit the floor!

After a few days without the gym I felt better but work has taken over a session or two so I haven't really got my A game back yet.

Throughout this time I've had to try and reel in my eating habits. I do eat healthily and can't remember the last time I had crisps, biscuits or chocolate but I am constantly hungry so keeping my food and snacks all within a decent calorie range and without overdoing the sugar is important.

There's one thing that always helps me keep my raging food monster from taking over, and that's Food Maths. Bear with me, I'm not about to get some crazy equations out and boggle your brain in a Friday.... This is pretty simple. 

I'm giving you some foods and their equivalent exercises you would need to burn them off. Get ready to be horrified!

To start off, here are images from Pinterest so you understand what I mean:

Image from Pinterest but property of Skinny Mom

I don't know about you but 87 minutes of crunches, 272 burpees or endless running sound horrendous and boring and totally uninspiring!

There are definitely more fun ways of burning these foods off but MY GOD isn't it a wake up call?!

Let's have a browse of the next one.....




I love fried chicken but 65 minutes on a bike? I struggle with a 45 minute spin class!

159 minutes of climbing stairs?! My heart rate would sky rocket doing that, and don't even get me started on the 170 minutes of Pilates.

Wow, doesn't it all make it really hit home what you're eating??

I do find things like this really help but a lot of these snacks aren't what I eat so I've looked up a few of my favourite snacks and treats to see what I'd need to do for those:

1) Starbucks Blueberry Muffin - admittedly I am more likely to eat my mums homemade muffins as I'm a cheap individual and wouldn't fork out the cash (forever a student....) but blueberry muffins rate highly on my treat scale and I would pay for these when I had the cash....These come in at 380 calories which according to My Fitness Pal would take me 40 minutes of running (at 5mph) to burn off or 32 minutes of swimming.

2) Whitworth's Fruit, Nut and Seed mix - this stuff is the best mix I've found. It's an even distribution of fruit and nut as opposed to a game of 'spot the almond amongst the raisins' and all of it tastes great. In my opinion it's healthier than eating chocolate and sweets but it's easy to get out of control. A serving is 25g but I never measure.....going with a 50g helping this would give me 240 calories to burn. This equates to 23 minutes on the elliptical trainer as punishment...just for a few bits of dried fruit and nut!

3) 9 Bars - I can't get enough of these beauties, so many gorgeous flavours and some even have a bit of chocolate on them.....drool! The 50g bars can take you into the 280 calorie region meaning a 33 minute Zumba class is coming my way!

4) Nutella - its a shameful secret that I have a tub of Nutella by my bed (literally with my name on thanks to Selfridges!) that I tend to have a teaspoon out of when I'm feeling low, it does work to cure my chocolate cravings usually so I don't feel guilty about it but the other day I sat and ate quarter of the tub with a spoon straight out of the jar....whoops! That's 520 calories for a few spoons of happiness - I felt seriously better afterwards (long day and feeling run down, you know the drill) but the 65 minute hike with a weighted back pack necessary to burn them off definitely wouldn't!

So even with my seemingly healthier alternatives to a pizza and a family bag of crisps I'd still have to do some serious exercise to burn off my treats.

Have you thought about your snacks as an exercise to complete afterwards? Have you really thought about how much your weekend takeaway chinese food or pizza might be ruining your hard work during the week?

It's a scary thought, but it's all about balance. Being aware of your calorie intake from treats goes a long way to helping you towards your goals!

L xxx

Fitness Friday: Top 10 Tips for Clean Eating

Hi all!

It's been a little while since I've written a Fitness Friday post, but I felt compelled to write one this week after continuously seeing posts on Facebook, tweets on Twitter and comments on Instagram about how hard it is to eat clean and find time to make things, to find recipes etc etc etc. 

EVERYTHING IS HARD.

Let's just get that thing right out there. Life generally is hard and you go through it having to work for things you want and quite often, there are setbacks.

If you want a holiday, you save hard and give things up for it knowing that the end result will be worth it, why don't people treat eating in the same way?

You can always come up with excuses; I ran out of time, the ingredients are expensive, it's too much to cook all the time, I don't like eating x/y/z......

All it takes is a bit of preparation and effort on your part and you can have meals quite easily. Here's my top 10 tips to help you out.

1) Write a meal plan - plan 7 evening meals, plan 7 lunches, and plan a variety of breakfasts and snacks. If you plan it all out and know what meals you have available to choose from then you have no room to deviate, and can actually look forward to meals knowing what you are having. To eat clean you will have to cook, accept it now!

2) Bulk buy everything in - clear out the old (or use it up if you wish) and then bulk buy in everything that you will need for a few weeks of meals. Obviously you can't buy fresh foods in for that long and if you don't have much cupboard or freezer space then this may be a challenge but the less you have to go to the shops the less you will be tempted. Also it means that you can....

3) Have a cooking day - doing this is essential for me! I make sure all ingredients are available and batch cook meals, snacks etc all on one day, i.e. a Sunday. If you cook a chilli, bolognese and a curry in one go with enough for a few portions of each it will take you a large part of the day, but will save you hours during the week. I also roast some veg, cook a whole chicken, a packet of quinoa and bake some muffins using this recipe here so that I have lunches and snacks for the week. It's tiring sure, but saves so much time and effort in the week it's worth it.

4) Swap things slowly - Or as fast as you like! Some people prefer to go cold turkey and others are all about a gradual change, but the easiest thing you can do is to swap your foods, that way you can still have them. For example, swap your white rice for cauliflower rice, swap spaghetti for strands or courgettes (courgetti?!) or even simpler, just swap chocolate and crisps for fruits, nuts and yogurt. There are always alternatives and fresh produce is always a better choice than anything that comes in a packet. There are so many small changes you can being to make that I can't even begin to list them!

5) Plan the freezer and cupboards - there are a lot of alternatives to save you running out of fresh ingredients. Frozen fruit and vegetables can be lifesavers and you can stock up on meat and fish if you have the room when it's on offer. Tins are also great, chickpeas go in almost any meal to bulk it out cheaply as well as loads of different types of beans, plus fruit and veg. Tuna is also something that can be bought quite cheaply and be added last minute to a salad.

6) Variety is everything - batch cooking is great but don't fall into the trap of eating the same thing, variety will keep you enthusiastic and motivated and finding new recipes to try is fun, especially when you find a recipe for brownies or muffins that contain clean ingredients!

7) Always take snacks in your bag - NEVER leave home without a snack. My bag is constantly full of food; fruit, nuts, pretty much anything like that that can help when hunger strikes and will stop you from buying crisps or sweets when in a weak moment. I get laughed at for always having food, but I've saved so much money and stopped myself from eating unnecessarily bad foods so many times it has been worth it.

8) Increase the number of meals you eat - Eating more often but smaller amounts is a much better option than bigger meals less often. Eating more regularly will stabilise your blood sugar levels and keep your metabolism going which are all positive things! Never skip a meal, eating because you are hungry is vital, don't cut down on what you're eating just swap it for something else. It's also quite exciting to eat 4-6 meals a day don't you think?!

9) Keep your motivation going - Create Pinterest boards, follow 'fitspiration' accounts on twitter and buy fitness and health magazines. Seeing everyone else working out and looking healthy and happy will want you to do the same; it's also invaluable for new recipes, workouts and exercise ideas to boost your enthusiasm and dedication.

10) Don't sabotage your hard work - I believe in rewarding yourself for your hard work, and over time have changed this from a bar of chocolate to magazines, books, shoes, anything that isn't going to add calories to my day. Of course I have treats, I go out with friends for food and cocktails and I have bad days that mean I end up on the kitchen floor with a jar of nutella and a spoon. I try to work off my daily problems and frustrations to help with this but avoiding adding additional salt, sugar, alcohol and bad fat to your day can only help. A cheat meal once a week is ideal, look forward to it and work hard knowing you can reward yourself at the end of it, but as they say, one cheat meal won't make you fat, but one salad won't make you skinny!

What do you think of my tips for eating clean? Have you been trying and failing to eat healthier?

What would you add to the list?

I'm always looking for inspiration so send blogs or pinterest boards my way if you have favourites!

L xxx

Life Lately

Morning All

I'm having one of those mornings where I've got up early as I had a few things to sort before work after a rather lazy weekend. I'm so excited for the next week and can't wait for Friday to hurry up and come. On Saturday I'm travelling back to Somerset as I'm off on a family holiday to Cyprus to watch my brother get married. Then two days after I land I'm off to Glastonbury. L and I have only mentioned it a few times but we're mega excited as it's our first festival! Yesterday I said buy to L till the 25th! It always seems weird when I know I won't see her for a few weeks. I've got an amazing two and a half weeks coming up and I just want it here now!

My Glastonbury clashlist so far! Everyone keeps telling my I won't see half of them but there are some I will be at no matter what!

I thought I'd share some bit's I've been up to lately. It's easy for me to do these at the moment as I am still doing my 100 happy days. I've stuck at it for 72 days now. Some days it is a real struggle to find something happy but it does make you appreciate the small things.

Last Sunday I was up early and headed off to London to meet up with some old friends and do The Color Run. Branded the happiest 5k in the world. The London one is one of the original but it has started a reaction of other color runs for different charities in cities all over the UK. I was concerned as I've not been running really at all lately but saw it as a run chance to catch up with the guys from back home that I don't see often. We agreed we'd take it easy and stop if we needed to. At every km powder paint if thrown at you. We actually managed to do it without stopping and finished in 29 minutes! One of my friends I was running with managed to win a free pair of trainers on the day and kindly donated them to me! How Lush of her. The running was painful on my knee but we ended up having such a laugh doing it. We are looking for more run 5k runs now!

Jumping photos look run till you get smacked in the hand with a phone! Ouch! ha

My parents came down last week for a catch up as I've not seen them for over a month now. I do miss my family but with exams and lots of stuff going on it's not been possible to go home. We decided this time we'd try somewhere a little out of town. Since starting seeing the guy I've been spending more time at the other end of town and have been pleasantly surprised with the restaurants. I love going to small privately owned places as opposed to chains so took my parents to a turkish I've been loving. For our welsh readers it's Istanbul restaurant on City Road. The food is amazing and my dad was eyeing up lots of other places he wants to try there.

I was actually such a pig I ate one and half of these as my dad has been dieting a lot his appetite isn't very big. 

For ages I've wanted my own herb garden. I love to cook and love the idea of being able to walk into my garden and pick fresh herbs. I bought a mint plant from asda a few weeks ago that has been growing well. I love having mint and lemon infused water! Infused waters are meant to be good for you. I can't say I notice a difference but they taste good. My housemate also gave me a kit she had to plant but they are from seed so we'll soon see if I actually have green fingers!

If you follow my instagram this is usually a happy day! A phone call from Gabon. The guy I'm seeing if currently working away and has been for almost 4 weeks. So whenever I get a call it's usually my happy day for that day! 

Cocktails or evenings out always seem to appear in my happy days. I love catching up with friends and when it's over a cocktail or two it's always better! I'm a big mojito fan! L and I always went out for my brother's fiancée's hen do on Friday. We ended up having a buffet in a local tapas bar. Note to self never eat that late on a night out. It just made the food not settle well. The Hen had a great night though so that's all that matters!

This week is going to be a busy one for me. I need to pack for Cyprus and Glastonbury and figure out what to take. I really want new clothes and sunglasses and I'm really trying to tell myself  I don't need these beautiful Topshop sunglasses and trousers!

L is also in love with them now! What beautiful shades!

Happy Monday all!

Love M

xxx